Titegroup . . . dirty?

P

Prof Young

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Is titegroup considered a "dirty" powder? I use a lot of it and it seems like my hands are always dirty when I'm done at the range.

Life is good.
Prof Young
 
I haven't noticed it being too dirty. Not enough to stand out from any others. Personally I think it's cleaner than my Red Dot or Unique.

(but I only shoot cowboy loads, so I don't really power it up too much)
 
Powders burning cleanly or dirty is not a yes or no thing. Powders have a burning speed and pressure curve. Each powder will burn more or less cleanly depending on whether you reach its optimal burning pressure with your choosen weight of bullet, and selected load hotness.
Powder X may burn dirty with Bullet Lite, 1/2 dirty with Bullet Heavy and mid-range loads, and really
Clean with Bullet Heavy at maximum load.
The reloader controls the variables of bullet weight and how hot. When the reloader choses light bullets and low hotness, they are creating conditions where "dirty burning" is much more likely.
Don't be quick to blame the powder, until you understand the effect of your other chosen variables.
 
Titegroup is filthy with lead bullets. It seems to burn extra hot, and I don't know if all the filth is lead, or burnt bullet lube.
 
When i was loading the lowest charge i got alot of soot, bumped up to middle of range and was good to go with little to no increased recoil. Have seen this echoed by many people regarding Titegroup. I also noticed my barrel would get much hotter than HP-38/W231 which i have been using lately.
 
Titegroup will leave cases sooty with loads towards the bottom end. Just be careful not much of a window from min loads and max loads.


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@tranders - I know, the funny thing is W231/HP-38 have just as tight a window as Titegroup, and i always see people recommending that as an alternate to Titegroup.

9mm 124GR

Hodgdon HP-38 3.9 - 4.4

Hodgdon Titegroup 3.6 - 4.1
 
HP-38 is a little slower burning compared to Titegroup and I agree both have a narrow window between max and min loads. Then again most faster pistol powders have narrow windows.
I haven’t had much luck with Titegroup using lead projectiles in 9mm. Went to plated projectiles and no problems.


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Titegroup is known to burn vey hot and it is not recommended for lead projeciles due to this. Some lead bullet manufacturers caution against its use with their bullets.
 
Lots of data for Titegroup and cast lead bullets in Lyman's Cast Bullet Handbook 4th Edition if you want to shoot lead with Titegroup . I find it works quite well.
Gary
 
Titegroup is filthy with lead bullets. It seems to burn extra hot, and I don't know if all the filth is lead, or burnt bullet lube.
Click to expand...

^^ This. ^^

Most likely, the great preponderance of the smoke is from the lube. Either way, TG's hot burning characteristic is probably the culprit.

I quickly learned to use TG only with plated (or jacketed) bullets. It's an excellent performing propellant. Used this way, from my experience, I find it quite clean burning actually.

It will leave behind a lot of partially burned flakes when it's turned down too far. No propellant likes to be underloaded.
 
I've shot quite a bit of it, but only in 45 Colt, usually with 250-255 grain bullets, usually home-cast lead, but also some jacketed. Cast bullets have lube; that's a fact that makes them smokier and grimier than jacketed bullets no matter which powder you use. I only shoot maximum loads, or nearly so with this powder; maximum for a standard Colt-type load, that is. Although I shoot these loads in the very strong Ruger Vaquero, (original Vaquero), and I know I could use more powder, I don't. There are much better powders for higher performance. But for how I use it, as a target-load, it is perhaps the most consistent, accurate and cleanest powder I've ever used in 45 Colt. I get 840 fps with 255 grain cast bullets. It's a powder of choice at that performance level for me. I use a lot of other powders to compare it against. For my next step up in performance, I go with Unique, another powder that gets a lot of flak for being dirty. But that's just not true at all, the way I use it. Personally, I like cast and lubed bullets even though they smoke and aren't as clean as jacketed. Big deal. Y'all might need to try a box or two of ammo loaded with genuine fffG Black Powder; it would furnish you with a whole new perspective on this dirty-powder issue.;)
However, as Marco mentioned previously, all powders have an ideal pressure at which they burn most efficiently. So if you are trying to put together a low-recoil target load, it requires a different propellant than a hunting or long-range silhouette load. But still, you need to have enough pressure for a clean burn.
 
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