Boatload O' Bullseye

[ReloaderFred]

That goes against what I have read. There have been several powders from Alliant that are in the Bullseye family. Previous to BE86 there was BE84 which eventually was released commercially as Power Pistol. From what I have read BE86 is not as fast as Bullseye but faster than Power Pistol but it's not a replacement for Bullseye.

That's correct. I talked to the Alliant rep at the SHOT show about BE-86, and he stated it's part of what they call the "Bullseye family", but that it's midway between Bullseye and Power Pistol in burn rate. They brought it out to fill the gap, so to speak, in their line up.

Hope this helps.

Fred

 

[rsrocket1]

I've tried 800X in light load .308 rifle cartridges. It works as well as any other pistol/shotgun powder for 10-12g plinking

I've tried it by itself and with Dacron pillow stuffing filler. It didn't seem to make much difference in the shot performance other than seeing a bunch of "confetti" flying around with the pillow stuffing shots. 800X is excellent in 9mm but you do need to trickle the charges if you want consistent loads. If you keep the loads to within 0.1g, you can easily get single digit spreads in velocity. If you are just making noise and poking random holes in paper, a powder measure will work but you'll have a pretty large variation in charges.

I went through an 8 pound jug of Bullseye early on in my reloading career. Bullseye is an excellent performing powder with the exception of lots of burning "stuff" coming out of the pistol even with normal loads which can be annoying if you shoot with short sleeves on. If you have a stainless steel revolver, it will look like a blued revolver within 50 shots due to the soot, but it cleans off easily enough with a little soaking and elbow grease. The small flakes meter well but will eat up some plastic powder measures (RCBS, Hornady) so empty your hopper after each session.

 

[reddog81]

There is no right or wrong answer. Either Bullseye or HP-38 will work equally well in those applications.

If you have the most amount of Bullseye just use that and you won't have to change powders when changing calibers. Heck the powder charges are so similar on those rounds (depending on bullet selection) you could almost choose the correct amount of either Bullseye or HP-38 and never even need to touch the powder dispenser. I believe 3.8 grains HP-38 would work in all your applications.

 

[Hokie_PhD]

That's correct. I talked to the Alliant rep at the SHOT show about BE-86, and he stated it's part of what they call the "Bullseye family", but that it's midway between Bullseye and Power Pistol in burn rate. They brought it out to fill the gap, so to speak, in their line up.

Hope this helps.

Fred

I don't know about others, but it helps me understand things better. And was much better than my comment and it's somewhat misunderstood understanding of what they're doing.

In any case, it seems like OP has some excellent choices.

 

[Dudedog]

Between HP38 and Bullseye I give a nod to HP38 in 9mm.
For ,45 I would call it a tie but HP38 is cleaner.
Don't load or shoot much ,38 special but I have used both in ,38 with good results in the past.
Never used in 800X so no help there. It does have a rep for not metering well, but i don't know for sure having never used it. Something about cornflakes as I recall......

I don't believe BE86 was intended as a replacement for Bullseye. Closer to Unique/Powerpistol IMO.

 

[Stumper]

All 3 powders work well in all three cartridges. As a practical matter, 800x does not meter well in small charges so it will be easier to utilize it in the 45 where the charge weights are a bit higher. I have also used 800x in .38 special with excellent results but some folk find it frustrating if charges don't drop dead on. Much depends upon [powder measure and technique but it is also worthy of note that a couple of tenths of a grain variation between charges doesn't necessarily open groups.