While wandering the halls of the WAC show in Monroe briefly, I ran across an older gentleman, slightly the worse for wear, with a musty OD chest bag and a sign saying "Custom Blackhawk .30 Carbine rechambered to .310 Cougar, dies, loaded rounds and cases, $200 OBO.

Being attracted to the weird and unusual in the firearms world (as some of my friends will tell you - the Weird and Cheap!) I had to have a look. Out of the depths of a VERY dusty and musty bag he withdrew a positively scabrous looking Blackhawk...covered with dust dinosaurs and spotted with SOMETHING...sticky. And a set of Dies much the same and the ammo box with a scattered assortment of rounds. "I was cleaning out my safe and I found these in the back at the bottom....I don't shoot anymore but someone should have it who will appreciate it." I assured him that I could be such a home for it - my penchant for weird and strange poking its nose over the bat-wings and calling "watchagothere?" I happen to have a spare NM .30 carbine cylinder somewhere, I thought, should this be a pig in a poke. At the worst its a Blackhawk frame.
I was informed that I could " Pour oh, 5-6-7 grains of Unique in and put a 110 grain bullet, just like the carbine and you are good to go". "Oh and you screw the dies down TIGHT on the shell holder, grease one up and shove it in...that is all there is to it."

We sealed the deal, gave the state its due process and went on our merry ways.

Dragged it out of the show and to the truck...and curiosity took over...safety tie SNIPPED...Cylinder OUT, wipe it all down and see what I really had. Found a spare boot lace in the glove box and made a hasty bore cleaner, pulled it through the bore and chambers and wiped it down thoroughly with an oily rag kept in a zip-lock bag for JUST such purposes. A few rust spots that had been there a WHILE...but basic action was OK, the bore was clean and shiny and the chambers were as well. I oiled it up, and will reserve a good tear-down for a slow afternoon at the shop where there is a solvent tank and an ultrasonic cleaner as well.

The ammo was of random head-stamps...none of them new. Names like Super-Vel, Nivens (who?), S&W, Aguila and the rest of the usual suspects. I tore down the loaded shells...the powder was clumpy, so I WEIGHED it...and dumped it out. Weights ranged rather randomly from 4.5 to 9.2(!) grains of something that might have been Unique a LONG time ago. I poked around on Loaddata.com, my CotW and a few internet searches yielding exactly ZERO data. I looked at a few reloading manuals and loaded the remaining ones back up with 5 grains of Unique..a very mild load I think.

More load development to come.

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Reheating pizza – sheesh. Totally destroys the delicate flavor.

A Smith and Wesson beats 5 aces...

Woodswalker AKA AaronE