It's the best stuff since sliced bread…. Or so I hear.
I wonder how much of the "crud ring" etc. claims about 777 is due to powder charge? Almost everyone in my family shoots 777 except me, and no one has ever experienced a "crud ring." And 777 is the cleanest burning powder any of us have ever used. One patch after a shot and the barrel is clean as a whistle. But then no one is shooting more than 90 grns of 777.
You may be onto something. At one point, I use to shoot 80 gr of FFF 777 with a 410 gr Conical out of a older model CVA Optima. Never once remember dealing with crud ring formation in that rifle and load combo. I have had it rear it's head when shooting higher volume load 777 loads with lighter weight bullets though. Surely someone out there has done some experimentation comparing crud ring formation to powder load size.
Bill Knight aka "Mad Monk"(sadly now deceased) who knew more about black powder and its substitutes than the average bear studied the "crud ring phenomena. His conclusion was that 777 burned extremely hot and very heavy charges with it exasperated the problem. His recommended cure was to back off on your charge.
Raise that to 110 charge or so it will appear. And then you can see the wasted powder get burned outside the barrel. It's what all the cool kids do
Last year it was just $28 a bottle, can't recall what size.
I remember those days.
It was $85 at Cabelas a week or two ago. I bought 3 bottles last year, one was $48, the others were $56.
