DG45, You raise a good question and one that has me wondering too.
So let's try to analyze and figure it out.
Perhaps Newton's law..."For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction".
Or Occam's razor which generally means...."When you have two competing theories that make exactly the same predictions, the simpler one is the better."
Your question has to be related to those two somehow. Let's try to analyze it.
The .44 chamber has a larger space than a .36 chamber. So if you put the same exact say 22 grain charge in both of them and then seat the ball and then fire them, the pressure generated in the two chambers would seem to be different because one has a larger space capacity than the other. But in really analyzing that, actually there isn't a difference in space because the 22 grain charge of powder will take up exactly the same amount of space whether in a .36 chamber or a .44 chamber. Once either a .36 or a .44 ball is seated upon the 22 grain charge, the charge takes up exactly the same amount of space behind the ball. It's just that the .44 chamber would have more air space on top of the seated ball, but that doesn't count because that is over the ball and not behind the ball in the pressure area. So that idea is out. Hmmm.
Okay, let's explore some other angles to figure this out.
If using the exact same powder grain charge, the only difference is the different sizes of the balls and perhaps the .44 and .36 cylinders are a different weight from each other. Not sure if that would matter though, but it might. The question about that is....is the .36 cylinder heavier because it has less metal removed from its chamber diameters than the .44 cylinder does, or is the .44 cylinder heavier because it has a slightly larger circumference to accommodate the larger .44 balls, or does the more metal in the smaller chambers of the .36 cancel out the weight difference of the .44 cylinder being slightly larger in circumference????
Whatever the answer of which cylinder is heavier, I'm not sure what significance the different weights of the cylinders (if they are different weights) might play in the equation, but again....it might, I just don't know.
So if there is a difference in weight between the cylinders we would need to find out. And what the significance of any difference in weight between the two cylinders might signify needs to be found out. So those are as yet unknown variables in the equation. Moving on to other theories.....
Then there's this idea....
The powder charge again being an equal 22 grains in both calibers.....the .44 ball being heavier than the .36 ball will travel at a lower velocity than the .36 ball because the .44 ball is larger and heavier and would take more powder to travel at the same velocity as the smaller lighter .36. Perhaps the .36 traveling at a higher velocity due to its lighter weight, causes less pressure in the chamber because the ball moves out faster not building up more pressure behind it as the heavier larger .44 ball would. Nope, that idea doesn't work because if that were true you could fire heavier loads safely in the .36 than you could the .44.
Hmmm again.
Really got me rubbing my chin now. I see what you mean about this. Since both 22 grain powder charges take up the same amount of space in a chamber (22 grains in a .36 or 22 grains in a .44), in cylinders that are perhaps close to the same weight, one would think it would be more stressful to load 22 grains behind a .44 ball than behind a faster moving .36 ball because the heavier ball will develop a higher pressure behind it before it moves because of its weight. But we have all been told for years that a .36 should take a lower powder charge than a .44, so there has to be a reasonable explanation.
Okay, I think the correct explanation just occurred to me and took me back to Occam's razor. We both were over complicating it when the explanation is actually the simplest one.
The brass frame .36's and brass frame .44's are equal in this respect, you can't overload either of them and cause any danger using standard black powder. All you might do is over time cause the brass frame to stretch out or dent up your recoil shield ring if you use a heavy charge in either of the two brass frame revolvers. So in that respect both the .36 and .44 are equal which cancels out any possibility of Newton's equal and opposite reaction in this case.
But the .36 chambers being smaller cannot physically hold as large a charge as the larger .44 chambers can. So naturally you reach a point where the charge for a .36 has to be smaller than the charge for a .44. I'm thinking if a .36 cylinder were LONGER than a .44 cylinder, so that the smaller but longer .36 chambers COULD hold as large a powder charge as shorter but larger diameter chambers of the .44, then you COULD load the same powder charge in both cylinders. But since the .36 isn't longer and does have less room for powder than a .44.....then you HAVE to use less powder in it. Even for full power loads in EITHER revolver, the .36 will still be limited to less powder than the .44.
So (just like Occam's razor said), the simplest explanation would be that since both brass frames will stretch or ding the recoil shield ring if they are either one loaded too hot, since the .36 holds less powder than the .44....that you have to load less in the .36 than in the .44 to preclude stretching or dinging the frame, simply because the .36 cannot hold as much powder as the .44. Actually they are different in C.U.P.'s of pressure but equal in relationship of pressure to ball weight because one takes a smaller powder charge to push a smaller ball while the other takes a larger powder charge to push a larger ball. Sure the charge weights are different, but so are the weight of the balls they are pushing. So they are equal in that relationship.
Which boils down to me to mean you have to load the .36 with less powder than a .44 because the .36 chamber will hold less powder than a .44.
Sure you could load the .36 hotter, but then again you could load the .44 hotter too and in both cases you would over time damage the brass frame on both revolvers. So even if you loaded both revolvers to maximum capacity, the .36 would still physically take less powder than the .44. So if you load them down to safe loads where they won't damage the brass frame, the .36 will naturally take a smaller grain load than the .44.
For our purposes, let's say the .44 would take a max powder charge of 35 grains. And let's say the .36 would take a maximum charge of 25 grains because of its smaller chambers. Now let's say you wanted to load both revolvers with smaller charges to preclude damaging the brass frames.
If you lowered the .44 from 35 grains to 20 grains (a reduction of 15 grains) and you lowered the .36 from 25 grains to 15 grains (a reduction of 10 grains) they would be equal in their relationship of loading down. Sure the .36 holds less than the .44.....because its chambers cannot hold as much as a .44 chamber. So I believe it all boils down to the fact that a .36 chamber will not hold as much powder as a .44 chamber when both are loaded to maximum capacity, and if you load them both down to avoid damaging the brass frame on either of them, naturally you have to decrease the load in both of them which of course means the .36 will be loaded with less powder grains than the .44 will be.
That makes sense to me, does it to you? Or did I miss something and go way off the beam here?
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