So all of Drew's posts from contemporary sources providing the ORIGINAL service loads for vintage guns are of no value? Wow.

There's a whole lot of understanding to be gained from BOTH original proof AND original service loads, Ted. For example, I expect a whole bunch of folks posting here now likely understand (maybe even YOU do, although I'm wondering based on the apparent thickness of your skull) that a reference to "psi" in 1900 isn't the same as a reference to "psi" currently. Has to do with crusher vs piezo-electronic measurements, which are not the same. If you don't understand that, you don't understand either proof or service pressure data from historical references.

Exactly how do you think we determine just how low the pressures should be on our current "low pressure loads"? Even relatively modern references to proof can be confusing. Confused me when I wrote an article on the subject for Shooting Sportsman. Turns out that 850 bar isn't really 850 bar as measured by transducers. Nope, it's a lead crusher measurement. (Or at least it was for the Brits.) Which means that what we thought we knew about appropriate pressures for 850 bar guns was wrong. Thanks to a response from the Birmingham Proof House, we got that one straightened out.

No one is suggesting using century-old powder in current loads. But it's certainly valuable--to some of us if not to you (and certainly not to you if you're only worried about your Silver Snipe)--to know the characteristics--shot charge, velocity, pressure--of the service loads that were used in those vintage French guns with a PJ proofmark. If we can find that data, what better guidance can there be for us to use in working up loads using modern components?

But hey, Ted . . . just go on shooting your triple proofed Darnes and your Silver Snipe. No worries, mate. And do your best to tell us that any references to "period" literature is of no value, since those are just old loads. And after all, we're using plastic hulls and plastic wads and modern powder, so who the hell cares anyhow?

Well, some of us do, even if you don't. So if you have nothing constructive to contribute, why don't you just . . . not contribute to the particular discussion in question? I'd say "butt out" but I'm working on being polite.

Last edited by L. Brown; 09/01/17 07:31 AM.