Does Win-231 Look Like This?

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Rustynuts

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New to powder, but I thought 231 was supposed to be BALL! This batch looks mostly like flakes. There seems to be some balls mixed in, but what gives? Got some Accurate No 2 and it looks like mostly spherical. On top of this Midway threw in a Ramshot load guide instead in Winchester!

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Yep, looks like the W231 in my cannister. While it really doesn't look like little round balls, it meters very consistantly in my Hornady measure.
 
Winchester 231 is a ball powder that is run through a flattening process to enhance the burning characteristics. So in essence, it's a flattened ball powder.

Hope this helps.

Fred
 
"Ball" powder is the manufacturing process used to make the powder.
(As opposed to extruded "stick" powder, or cut "flake" powder.

It is not necessarally the final shape of the grains, and not all Ball powder is little round balls.

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rcmodel
 
No, Ball Powder is a registered trademark of Winchester-Olin and is not a generic term. So Win. 231 is "flattened Ball."

Which is why Hodgdon sells "Spherical" powder; even HP38 which comes off the same production line as 231, and had to change one of their early surplus sales product's name from Ball C2 to BL-C2.
 
Well, thanks for the promotional history of a defunct powder company, Jim. They may have a trademark, maybe that belongs to Hodgdon now, as well. Semantics.

A True Ball powder is not flattened. If you want to know what one looks like, open a canister of Ramshot True Blue. I know the term was trademarked when sphericals were developed, but any load manual will give you the correct definition, not trademark semantics.;)

Or, try shooting baskets with a flattened ball.
 
Damn!!! I load lots of 231 and I didn't even recognize that with the enlargement! Cool pic.
 
CZ57, rcmodel and I are right, you are wrong. Ball Powder refers to the manufacturing process, not the end shape of the granules. And if you think trademark history does not mean anything, then you might be at risk of getting acquainted with a corporate law office.

You will note that Ramshot does not call their ball process powders, most if not all imported from abroad, Ball Powder: "All Ramshot powders are double-based, spherical powders."
Neither does Accurate Arms: "Accurate No. 7 is a double base, Spherical propellant originally developed for .38 Super Auto ammunition."
Nor Hodgdon: "Hodgdon spherical powders are great all-round propellants"

I don't have the very newest paid manuals, just the free company literature, see above. My latest, Lyman 47, calls ALL ball process powders "spherical", even the Winchesters, which are entitled to the name Ball. Have they changed?

Hodgdon wangled the distributorship of Winchester branded powders but they do not own the name, the company, or the factory facility. Same with IMR.
 
JW, I have to agree with you: rcmodel was right. He explained the differences between the various powder types. He probably also knows that when the first ball powders were developed, they were ball, spherical, i.e. round like a ball.

And, you don't need a newer manual to see how the reloading manuals explain it, look at any manual that shows photo's of various powder types and see how they define them. I wonder why Winchester's people didn't call their people. Anyway, I don't plan to start manufacturing powder anytime soon, so I doubt that I have any worries of litigation.

I am not interested in being right by Winchester's terminology or trademark. I thought the whole point here is trying to help those that might not know the difference in how to distinguish one powder type from another.

I will admit that this is all amusing for the benefit of my edification since a flattened ball is an oxymoron. But then again, Winchester went belly up, didn't they? Wonder why they didn't trademark the term ball ammo while they were at it so everyone else but them would have to call it FMJ or FMC?;)
 
How far back do we have to go? In 1953 Phil Sharpe described the new step of rolling Ball Powder into flattened granules to control burn rate. He was a little behind the times, The WW II surplus powder sold in Hodgdon's early years as Ball C and Ball C, Lot 2 are described in old NRA literature as flattened ball powders. Winchester, as a division of Olin-Matheson, was a going concern in those days... but they would not sell powder at retail.

As to pictures and loading manual terminology, Speer No 9 shows a pile of powders as typical of Winchester and Hodgdon "flattened ball"; and another as "round ball." But in the text they make careful distinction of Winchester brand Ball Powder and Hodgdon spherical powder. I expect Speer knew that Winchester knew the difference between a physical description and a trademarked brand name.

As far as helping readers distinguish one powder type from another, that is tough to do by appearance. Rolled ball powder looks a lot like extruded powder chopped off into flat flakes. But it was not made the same way and does not shoot the same. I have a rack of little vials of different powders. Unfortunately I lost the key chart and a lot of those powders of different brand and type look an awful lot alike, so it is no longer a useful display. Sometimes you have to read the label.
 
Dang, I thought this was an easy one. :evil:

I agree with Jim and rcmodel. "ball" is the process. It can end up round or flat (squashed) before it gets packaged. It is a common question among new reloaders, of which I was once one, with the same queery. :)

That pic could be a dozen powders. Hard enough to tell in person.
 
I do hope that during this attempt to not piss each other off over a trivial brand or shape of a particular powder/manufacturer that someone has taken the time to informed the original poster and all other beginners that may be reading this string that one should NOT go by the look of a powder to determine the powder type and use...But to read the label on the packaging and use a loading manual of some repute when reloading...:evil:

All Rustynuts wanted to know is... Was it W-231?? And that had been determined in the first couple of posts.:D

Did enjoy the little bit of history though...:)
 
Well, I just want to add my own perspective on why I differentiate. Since JW mentioned the AA load guide and #7, I think he's looking at the 1 out of 10 that says #7 was formulated originally for .38 Super. The other 9 out of 10 said it was formulated for 9mm Nato, or 9mm Nato Carbine ( and yeah, I probably have all 10 around here somewhere). It is also worth mentioning that when AA describes #2, #5, #7 and #9, they use the term BALL powder with no mention of paying ascap fees to Winchester for stealing their trademarked lyrics. My SPEER #11 also uses the term Ball to describe, True Ball, Flattened Spherical or Flattened Ball if you prefer. I can only assume that you never played basketball if you do! :D

If you disagree, dismiss my entire postings on the thread, make wise-ass remarks, or print it out and throw the wadded up paper at my posts. It ain't gonna hurt my feelings. Regardless of Winchester's trademark, I use the term ball to describe round ball powders like True Blue, or as SPEER does for H380, H870 and AA2520. I use Flattened Spherical (go ahead and call it Flattened ball if it blows your dress up) for powders like 231, HS-6, Silhouette, 3N37 etc. Alliant powders are extruded flake, and in Europe they have a variation known as Cut Sheet Flakes, i.e. Alcan. Then there's Extruded Tubular like IMR's rifle powders as well as many other companies.

So, I don't disagree with most of what rcmodel stated except that I don't bow to Winchester for my terminology anymore than I believe that Microsft owns my PC, even if they think they do!;)
 
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would it be OK to ask what caliber this is for?

I'm a novice. Would it be okay in this thread to ask what calibers could be loaded with this powder? I've probably 6 pounds of it picked up at auction from a police sale. I'd like to load the .41 mag or smaller handloads. My speer reloading manual didn't seem to reference this powder.
 
Hey there, guiltybutsaved. Welcome to the forum. This is a great place to learn a lot about reloading. As to your query, have a look at this site:
http://www.reloadammo.com/

There are various load data shown there for using 231 for .41 magnum and smaller calibers...

Corner Pocket
'also guilty and also saved'
 
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