Why isn't Varget made in the USA?
- Thread starter lee1000
- Start date
Going back to the OP's question, Hodgdon has never made the powders sold under its name. B.E. (Bruce) Hodgdon started the Hodgdon Powder Co. up by buying surplus DuPont and Winchester-Western made stocks at the end of WW2 when ammunition manufacture was drastically scaled back leaving vast stockpiles of propellants in the manufacturing-supply chain. He'd learned that the same situation applied at the end of WW1 and thousands of tons of powder had ended up being destroyed. The original H4895 was .30-06 M2 ball ammo powder, H4831 was from heavy machine-gun or light cannon ammo production, the forerunner of BL-C(2) was called Ball Lot-C and came from demilling millions of W-W manufactured .303 Brit rounds that were being supplied to us Brits.
When the surplus supplies ran out in the 50s, early 60s, Hodgdon looked for suppliers to make similar grades and most stick powders were originally made our side of the Atlantic by ICI Nobel at Ardeer, Scotland. Ball powders were supplied by the Olin Corporation who made Winchester ammo and propellants and some Hodgdon / Winchester grades are close if not identical. W760 and H414 are the same thing in different bottles, while W748 and H. BL-C(2) are close but not the same. Three generations of the Hodgdon family have become adept at making contacts within the large manufacturing outfits and adapting propellants designed for other purposes to handloaders' needs and adapted to use in a huge range of commercial cartridges. In doing so, they've also become wholsalers and suppliers to many ammunition manufacturers acting as the link between the original factory and industrial users, so it's not just us they supply.
ICI Ardeer closed down in the '90s and Hodgdon moved its extruded powder supply to the privatised former government ADI (Australian Defence Industries) propellant plant at Mulwala, New South Wales. ADI has since been bought by the multinational defence supplies group Thales.
So .... why isn't VarGet made in the US? First of all you guys didn't develop it. You might as well ask why Rolls Royce cars or Barbour jackets aren't made there, or for that matter Vihtavuori powders.
But, there are deeper reasons too to do with the nature of explosives manufacturing and defence industry ownership. The place that makes Pyrodex aside, the US has only one propellants factory left - the former Olin Corp ball powder maker, now called St. Marks Powder Co. near the the town of St. Marks FLA. Like every other significant powder manufacturer it's one cog in a multinational's operation. in this case General Dynamics Ordnance division.
St. Marks makes all Hodgdon's 'spherical' grade powders including some pistol grades like Titegroup that you might not think of as 'ball'. St. Marks has a good steady base operation in that it has supplied the majority of propellants to Uncle Sam for his smallarms ammo for over half a century. When the US adopted the 7.62mm M80 in the 1950s, it took a decision to only use ball powders, and that applies today right through the 5.56mm era, even though the former DuPont corporation developed the propellants for the original .223 Rem / 5.56mm and the AR-15 was built around the pressures they produced.
All Hodgdon extruded powders come from Thales / ADI in Australia and the partnership has worked out VERY well for all parties. The Hogdon range has doubled - at least! - since I started handloading, and the pair have been very innovative in improving powder characteristics and behaviours, such as the Xtreme temperature tolerance. BUT ... remember that handloaders are small beer to propellants manufacturers whose main business is supplying powders in bulk to the ammunition manufacturers, especially for military orders. Moreover, 'canister powders' mean a lot of extra work and expense to the manufacturer, packager / distributor as (unlike the bulk commercial orders) the burning characteristics must be kept the same or close from lot to lot if necessary by blending the outputs of different factory production lots. 1lb / 8lb packaging and the high costs of distributing small quantities of hazardous materials add enormously to workloads and costs.
Finally though, there is the SAFETY aspect. Nobody makes extruded (stick) powders in the US and haven't done so for many years, likewise the UK and many other western countries. IMR powders are mostly made in Canada, Alliant rifle powders in either Sweden (Bofors) or Switzerland (Nitro-Chemie). Many old plants went back to WW1 were out of date, but worse built close to villages and towns that expanded throughout the 20th century until their suburbs ran up to the explosive factories' boundaries. As safety rules were tightened, it was deemed totally inappropriate to have people living so close to dangerous manufacturing activities - the houses didn't go, the manufacturers did!
Then ... ball powder manufacture is inherently safe until its final stages when the little balls are precipitated out of a solution in a still. Until that point, the ingredients are made up in non-inflammable, non-explosive water based slurries and piped from one process to another. Extruded powders on the other hand start out by nitrating wood or cotton fibres producing 'guncotton' a fierce, unstable, and violent explosive. The remainder of the processes involve altering the explosive's chemical structure and burning characteristics by adding and extracting solvents or other inflammable / explosive agents which are themselves dangerous. The result is that this type of powder is more expensive and dangerous to make, and modern health and safety rules virtually rule out its manufacture in many countries. A contact in the US powder business once told me that your EPA requirements on making such powders haven't banned it, just made it so expensive and restrictive that you'd never sell a pound of US made extruded powder.
There is a final, and VERY important factor. Powders were mostly made in government plants outside of the US, and even here they were made by two or three large combines (primarily Olin and DuPont) who were very close to the military procurement people. Since the 1980s, all western governments have got out of the arms manufacturing business and where private suppliers were previously used moved to much more distant arm-length arrangements with completely open tendering etc. The view is that 'the free market will supply the best deal'. The trouble is that demand changes dramatically in this field from year to year depending on whether you're fighting a war of not, and private companies won't keep large amounts of spare capacity standing by for purely 'strategic reasons'. This is a major reason for the periodic serious shortages of some components over the last 20 years, especially primers. Right now, government demand is on the way down as the UK, USA, and NATO pull out of Afghanistan and Iraq so supplies should be plentiful, but they're not for two reasons.
First, ammunition manufacturing capacity has been reduced too much by private companies (or not increased enough to take the place of closed government factories), hence the recent Bulletin story about Remington Arms' huge expansion of its Lonoke AR facility. Second, and more important, the panic buying and hoarding that's going on after the Sandy Hook school shootings. This is the second such event in recent years, the first being fears that the newly elected President Barak Obama would introduce gun ownership and handloading controls after his initial inauguration four/five years ago. No suppliers irrespective of where they're situated, whether in downtown Burbank or Outer Mongolia could cope with the panicked demand that good old American Joe Shooting Public has created here out of his/her own fears. Here's what the Forum Boss wrote after speaking to major suppliers Brunos recently:
http://forum.accurateshooter.com/index.php?topic=3812995.0
When the surplus supplies ran out in the 50s, early 60s, Hodgdon looked for suppliers to make similar grades and most stick powders were originally made our side of the Atlantic by ICI Nobel at Ardeer, Scotland. Ball powders were supplied by the Olin Corporation who made Winchester ammo and propellants and some Hodgdon / Winchester grades are close if not identical. W760 and H414 are the same thing in different bottles, while W748 and H. BL-C(2) are close but not the same. Three generations of the Hodgdon family have become adept at making contacts within the large manufacturing outfits and adapting propellants designed for other purposes to handloaders' needs and adapted to use in a huge range of commercial cartridges. In doing so, they've also become wholsalers and suppliers to many ammunition manufacturers acting as the link between the original factory and industrial users, so it's not just us they supply.
ICI Ardeer closed down in the '90s and Hodgdon moved its extruded powder supply to the privatised former government ADI (Australian Defence Industries) propellant plant at Mulwala, New South Wales. ADI has since been bought by the multinational defence supplies group Thales.
So .... why isn't VarGet made in the US? First of all you guys didn't develop it. You might as well ask why Rolls Royce cars or Barbour jackets aren't made there, or for that matter Vihtavuori powders.
But, there are deeper reasons too to do with the nature of explosives manufacturing and defence industry ownership. The place that makes Pyrodex aside, the US has only one propellants factory left - the former Olin Corp ball powder maker, now called St. Marks Powder Co. near the the town of St. Marks FLA. Like every other significant powder manufacturer it's one cog in a multinational's operation. in this case General Dynamics Ordnance division.
St. Marks makes all Hodgdon's 'spherical' grade powders including some pistol grades like Titegroup that you might not think of as 'ball'. St. Marks has a good steady base operation in that it has supplied the majority of propellants to Uncle Sam for his smallarms ammo for over half a century. When the US adopted the 7.62mm M80 in the 1950s, it took a decision to only use ball powders, and that applies today right through the 5.56mm era, even though the former DuPont corporation developed the propellants for the original .223 Rem / 5.56mm and the AR-15 was built around the pressures they produced.
All Hodgdon extruded powders come from Thales / ADI in Australia and the partnership has worked out VERY well for all parties. The Hogdon range has doubled - at least! - since I started handloading, and the pair have been very innovative in improving powder characteristics and behaviours, such as the Xtreme temperature tolerance. BUT ... remember that handloaders are small beer to propellants manufacturers whose main business is supplying powders in bulk to the ammunition manufacturers, especially for military orders. Moreover, 'canister powders' mean a lot of extra work and expense to the manufacturer, packager / distributor as (unlike the bulk commercial orders) the burning characteristics must be kept the same or close from lot to lot if necessary by blending the outputs of different factory production lots. 1lb / 8lb packaging and the high costs of distributing small quantities of hazardous materials add enormously to workloads and costs.
Finally though, there is the SAFETY aspect. Nobody makes extruded (stick) powders in the US and haven't done so for many years, likewise the UK and many other western countries. IMR powders are mostly made in Canada, Alliant rifle powders in either Sweden (Bofors) or Switzerland (Nitro-Chemie). Many old plants went back to WW1 were out of date, but worse built close to villages and towns that expanded throughout the 20th century until their suburbs ran up to the explosive factories' boundaries. As safety rules were tightened, it was deemed totally inappropriate to have people living so close to dangerous manufacturing activities - the houses didn't go, the manufacturers did!
Then ... ball powder manufacture is inherently safe until its final stages when the little balls are precipitated out of a solution in a still. Until that point, the ingredients are made up in non-inflammable, non-explosive water based slurries and piped from one process to another. Extruded powders on the other hand start out by nitrating wood or cotton fibres producing 'guncotton' a fierce, unstable, and violent explosive. The remainder of the processes involve altering the explosive's chemical structure and burning characteristics by adding and extracting solvents or other inflammable / explosive agents which are themselves dangerous. The result is that this type of powder is more expensive and dangerous to make, and modern health and safety rules virtually rule out its manufacture in many countries. A contact in the US powder business once told me that your EPA requirements on making such powders haven't banned it, just made it so expensive and restrictive that you'd never sell a pound of US made extruded powder.
There is a final, and VERY important factor. Powders were mostly made in government plants outside of the US, and even here they were made by two or three large combines (primarily Olin and DuPont) who were very close to the military procurement people. Since the 1980s, all western governments have got out of the arms manufacturing business and where private suppliers were previously used moved to much more distant arm-length arrangements with completely open tendering etc. The view is that 'the free market will supply the best deal'. The trouble is that demand changes dramatically in this field from year to year depending on whether you're fighting a war of not, and private companies won't keep large amounts of spare capacity standing by for purely 'strategic reasons'. This is a major reason for the periodic serious shortages of some components over the last 20 years, especially primers. Right now, government demand is on the way down as the UK, USA, and NATO pull out of Afghanistan and Iraq so supplies should be plentiful, but they're not for two reasons.
First, ammunition manufacturing capacity has been reduced too much by private companies (or not increased enough to take the place of closed government factories), hence the recent Bulletin story about Remington Arms' huge expansion of its Lonoke AR facility. Second, and more important, the panic buying and hoarding that's going on after the Sandy Hook school shootings. This is the second such event in recent years, the first being fears that the newly elected President Barak Obama would introduce gun ownership and handloading controls after his initial inauguration four/five years ago. No suppliers irrespective of where they're situated, whether in downtown Burbank or Outer Mongolia could cope with the panicked demand that good old American Joe Shooting Public has created here out of his/her own fears. Here's what the Forum Boss wrote after speaking to major suppliers Brunos recently:
http://forum.accurateshooter.com/index.php?topic=3812995.0
I have seen RL 15 be more temp sensitive. Also heard from a few shooters who shoot where it is hot and say it is not a good powder if it will be in the heat getting warm while you shoot your strings in FTR.
Look into VV-N140. ABout same as Varget and about same temp sensitivity.
PVI has been having it available on and off for past 2 months
Look into VV-N140. ABout same as Varget and about same temp sensitivity.
PVI has been having it available on and off for past 2 months
Viht N140 works very well with 175s in 308 Win, likewise N150 which I actually prefer. Both powders are temperature tolerant, in fact Bob Pitcairn the Canadian International Palma and F/TR shooter uses N150 in 223 Rem with 90s and says it's not temperature affected at all in this application.
I've used Re15 with great results in 223 / 80+90 but even in our much cooler UK climate, a warm summer's day (~80F), used to have me worrying about drastic pressure increases. The new Alliant AR-COMP is Re15 that's been treated to make it temperature tolerant, the process also making it slightly slower burning. I don't know if you can get any in the US at the moment, of course. (It's not imported into the UK so that's not an issue over here, irrespective.)
I've used Re15 with great results in 223 / 80+90 but even in our much cooler UK climate, a warm summer's day (~80F), used to have me worrying about drastic pressure increases. The new Alliant AR-COMP is Re15 that's been treated to make it temperature tolerant, the process also making it slightly slower burning. I don't know if you can get any in the US at the moment, of course. (It's not imported into the UK so that's not an issue over here, irrespective.)
I think the bigger question is "Why isn't it on the shelf?" or "Where is all that's being made?" or "Why is it stuck on the dock?" or "Who is responsible for it not getting it to us (the shooters)?".........I just can't believe it's because everyone has bought it up and the manufacture can't keep up........Bull Hockey...
bigedp51
brxbrad said:
Its not Bull Hockey, its called supply and demand, its because so many people are buying large quantities and hording it. At my favorite gun shop I watch customers come in and send in different family members into the store buying reloading supplies to work around the two product limit on bullets and powder.
In the Canadian Gun Nutz forums a few are saying unkind things about Americans buying up all the reloading supplies. When a friend who works in this gun store calls me and tells me we have bullets and powder if I don't break the speed limit getting there it will be gone.
I don't know if you were in the military overseas during the Viet Nam war but on payday our favorite girls were in short supply also.
Laurie, amazing post. Thanks for all that info and typing.
Isn't ATK partnering with a German(?) company to make powders in the US? A high energy powder of some sort.
Viht just announced shutting down a Scandinavian powder plant. They have other facilities around Europe
Re 15 is temp sensitive as are most Alliant Re powders. AR-comp is the solution and my last reading showed it to be FASTER then Re15.
Hopefully, the supply chain will catch up with demand.
Jerry
Isn't ATK partnering with a German(?) company to make powders in the US? A high energy powder of some sort.
Viht just announced shutting down a Scandinavian powder plant. They have other facilities around Europe
Re 15 is temp sensitive as are most Alliant Re powders. AR-comp is the solution and my last reading showed it to be FASTER then Re15.
Hopefully, the supply chain will catch up with demand.
Jerry
ATK rifle powders all come from Sweden - bar one - and are double-base extruded types manufactured by Bofors. This is a long-standing arrangement going back to when they were still called 'Hercules' and Re12, 15, 19 and 22 were introduced sometime in the late 80s after a long gap when the company only supplied the fast-burning Reloder 7 + the famous range of pistol powders from Hercules Bullseye through to 2400.
The one exception is Re17 which is bought in from Nitro-Chemie AG, a Swiss firm. We've been promised a new range using the same unique deterrent technology as Re17, but so far none has appeared. I can't imagine them being made in the US, partly from the Health & Safety regulations involved. (It's even more dangerous to make double-base extruded powders than traditional single-base types like those in the IMR and Hodgdon ranges as the 'double' bit refers to the combination of nitroglycerine, a highly unstable, dangerous explosive in its own right, with the base nitrocellulose.) Moreover, Nitro-Chemie has stolen a march on every other powder manufacturer with its unique deterrents (that are used to control burning rates) mixed throughout the basic material formula rather than being coated on the external surfaces only as used by everybody else. I just cannot see them giving that trade secret away in a hurry!
I think on Viht, you have it right but back to front. Vihtavuori (formerly a Finnish government outfit, privatised and operating as an independent for some years) was bought by the western European based Eurenco conglomerate because of its strong showing in the military powder supply market. That was back when you, us, Uncle Tom Cobley and all were invading Saddam Hussein's Iraq and firing lots and lots of 5.56, 7.62 and .50BMG ordnance out over the trackless wastes. Eurenco presumably did well out of its investment for a few years, but hey Uncle Sam isn't firing enough rounds off today or invading anyone, and Prez Obama shows a marked disinclination to invade anyone even if they fired a missile at the White House. (We're worse off in the UK - even if David Cameron decided to fight anyone, the British Army with its about to be reduced to 85,000 personnel, the smallest since the Napoleonic wars of 1800-1815 couldn't supply more than a division or two and they'd run out of armoured vehicles, ammo, gawdknowswhatelse in a matter of weeks if not days in a real shooting war against anybody serous like the Russiansd and Chinese!) So, Eurernco has got too many powder plants and has tried to sell Viht, but apparently no go. Since they have all Viht's production secrets, expect non-Finnish 'Viht' powders anytime soon. We already have a Swiss made clone of N140 called TR140 in the UK that gives identical performance but makes a different smell on firing. I'd bet that was a trial production run to see about making Viht products in other plants.
So IF viht DOES close .... that'll be one less major powder production facility in the West, and what did I say earlier about private companies not keeping strategic production capabilities in mothballs ready to be activated for increased demands, like when we have an itsy-bitsy war like Gulf One and Gulf Two? If I were the Russians or Chinese, I'd just let Cameron, and Obama and their military procurement departments carry on like this. If you're prepared to fight a big and LONG war against the West you can't help but win no matter how good the West's weapons, equipment and personnel are - six weeks, three months, six months at the outside and our guys run out of shells, missiles and smallarms ammo, and the production facilities behind them aren't geared for rapid build-ups as happened in World War 2, Korea, or even the Vietnam war. Note I said Cameron and Obama, but didn't mention Hollande (France) or Merkel (Germany). The way the rest of Europe has gone, maybe France aside, they wouldn't even consider fighting a war even if their own liberty was at risk. What can you say about an air force whose rules say they cannot fly over hostile territory at night. Yessir, that the modern Bundesrepublik's Luftwaffe - shame it didn't have those restrictions during 1939-45!
The one exception is Re17 which is bought in from Nitro-Chemie AG, a Swiss firm. We've been promised a new range using the same unique deterrent technology as Re17, but so far none has appeared. I can't imagine them being made in the US, partly from the Health & Safety regulations involved. (It's even more dangerous to make double-base extruded powders than traditional single-base types like those in the IMR and Hodgdon ranges as the 'double' bit refers to the combination of nitroglycerine, a highly unstable, dangerous explosive in its own right, with the base nitrocellulose.) Moreover, Nitro-Chemie has stolen a march on every other powder manufacturer with its unique deterrents (that are used to control burning rates) mixed throughout the basic material formula rather than being coated on the external surfaces only as used by everybody else. I just cannot see them giving that trade secret away in a hurry!
I think on Viht, you have it right but back to front. Vihtavuori (formerly a Finnish government outfit, privatised and operating as an independent for some years) was bought by the western European based Eurenco conglomerate because of its strong showing in the military powder supply market. That was back when you, us, Uncle Tom Cobley and all were invading Saddam Hussein's Iraq and firing lots and lots of 5.56, 7.62 and .50BMG ordnance out over the trackless wastes. Eurenco presumably did well out of its investment for a few years, but hey Uncle Sam isn't firing enough rounds off today or invading anyone, and Prez Obama shows a marked disinclination to invade anyone even if they fired a missile at the White House. (We're worse off in the UK - even if David Cameron decided to fight anyone, the British Army with its about to be reduced to 85,000 personnel, the smallest since the Napoleonic wars of 1800-1815 couldn't supply more than a division or two and they'd run out of armoured vehicles, ammo, gawdknowswhatelse in a matter of weeks if not days in a real shooting war against anybody serous like the Russiansd and Chinese!) So, Eurernco has got too many powder plants and has tried to sell Viht, but apparently no go. Since they have all Viht's production secrets, expect non-Finnish 'Viht' powders anytime soon. We already have a Swiss made clone of N140 called TR140 in the UK that gives identical performance but makes a different smell on firing. I'd bet that was a trial production run to see about making Viht products in other plants.
So IF viht DOES close .... that'll be one less major powder production facility in the West, and what did I say earlier about private companies not keeping strategic production capabilities in mothballs ready to be activated for increased demands, like when we have an itsy-bitsy war like Gulf One and Gulf Two? If I were the Russians or Chinese, I'd just let Cameron, and Obama and their military procurement departments carry on like this. If you're prepared to fight a big and LONG war against the West you can't help but win no matter how good the West's weapons, equipment and personnel are - six weeks, three months, six months at the outside and our guys run out of shells, missiles and smallarms ammo, and the production facilities behind them aren't geared for rapid build-ups as happened in World War 2, Korea, or even the Vietnam war. Note I said Cameron and Obama, but didn't mention Hollande (France) or Merkel (Germany). The way the rest of Europe has gone, maybe France aside, they wouldn't even consider fighting a war even if their own liberty was at risk. What can you say about an air force whose rules say they cannot fly over hostile territory at night. Yessir, that the modern Bundesrepublik's Luftwaffe - shame it didn't have those restrictions during 1939-45!
Upgrades & Donations
This Forum's expenses are primarily paid by member contributions. You can upgrade your Forum membership in seconds. Gold and Silver members get unlimited FREE classifieds for one year. Gold members can upload custom avatars.
Click Upgrade Membership Button ABOVE to get Gold or Silver Status.
You can also donate any amount, large or small, with the button below. Include your Forum Name in the PayPal Notes field.
To DONATE by CHECK, or make a recurring donation, CLICK HERE to learn how.
Click Upgrade Membership Button ABOVE to get Gold or Silver Status.
You can also donate any amount, large or small, with the button below. Include your Forum Name in the PayPal Notes field.
To DONATE by CHECK, or make a recurring donation, CLICK HERE to learn how.