The UK's Finest Independent Forum for Shooters and Gun Owners. Est 2010.

Thankfully I just scored 7lbs of Varget off someone getting out of shooting for a good price & four of the tubs are the same lot.
That's the 22-250 fed & some for the .243.
Now I need to find some H4831sc for the .270...

Ovenpaa wrote:I keep hearing rumours of an EU ban of some reloading powders, does anyone know any thing about this and will it impact us post Brexit?

I doubt if "Brexit" (if it actually happens...) will affect this. As I understand it, EU laws are to be incorporated into UK law and I cant see this (or any) government rushing to reverse something like this?

anyone care to comment on this? https://echa.europa.eu/regulations/reac ... ding-reach

Vhit and Reload Swiss powders are ok, it just seems to affect a variety of american powders, go figure!!
REACH is a regulation of the European Union, adopted to improve the protection of human health and the environment from the risks that can be posed by chemicals, while enhancing the competitiveness of the EU chemicals industry. surprise, surprise.

this is what's known so far.

(1) REACH comes into effect for this group of products on 01.06.2018. Anything delivered and accepted into the country before then is OK and can still be sold and used indefinitely. But on that day, the affected (non-REACH compliant) products lose their CE certification and it becomes an offence to import them into any EU country.

(2) BREXIT makes NO difference at all for the reasons that Edinburgh Rifles gives. Also, all of Europe for the affected marques is supplied via Edgar Brothers in Cheshire. Even if the UK government opted out of REACH unilaterally, Hodgdon would be unlikely to be interested in supplying the UK alone as only one part of this market - which is VERY small overall by US standards anyway.

(3) NOBODY is going to reformulate ANYTHING in the short term and certainly not just for us. The 'bad' ingredients cannot be simply replaced by 'good' ones and you carry on as before. Change anything and you go back to first principles designing a new product. Manufacturers will only reformulate propellants either when the US EPA says they must (and so far no signs of that happening anytime soon or even ever) or the big government and ammunition manufacturing buyers say that they must have 'green' powders for PC reasons. As that would likely cost extra money, the chances of that are modest to nil.

(4) ALL HODGDON BRAND RIFLE POWDERS with the single current exception of H. Lil Gun and the possible second one of CFE223 are REACH non-compliant and therefore lose CE from 1.6.18.

(5) ALL WINCHESTER BRAND POWDERS are REACH non-compliant and therefore lose CE from 1.6.18.

(6) ALL PRE 'ENDURON' IMR BRAND POWDERS are REACH non-compliant and therefore lose CE from 1.6.18.


So to list them, those that are banned for import as of the middle of next year are:

Thales / ADI Mulwala NSW Australia manufactured:

IMR Trail Boss + 8208 XBR

Hodgdon H4198, H322, H. Benchmark, H4895, H. VarGet, H4350, H4831/4831sc, H1000, H. Retumbo, H50BMG


Ball powders manufactured by general Dynamics St. Marks Florida:

Hodgdon H110, H335, H380, H. BL-C(2), H414, US869, Hybrid 100V, H. SuperFORMANCE; H. LeverEVOLUTION

Winchester 748, 760


IMR powders manufactured by General Dynamics Canada, Valleyfield, Quebec Province

IMR 4227, 4198, 3031, 4064, 4895, 4320, 4350, 4831, 7828/7828ssc


(7) Unaffected and remaining are:

Hodgdon L'il Gun and maybe with luck CFE223 (not yet CE certified under the new regulations)
Some Hodgdon shotgun / pistol grades - 700X, 800X, Clays, International, Universal
Hodgdon Pyrodex and other black powder substitutes

New IMR pistol / revolver powders - Red, Target, Green, Unequal, Blue

New IMR 'Enduron' Rifle powders - IMR-4166 (4895/VarGet alternative); IMR-4451 (4350 alternative); IMR-4955 (4831 alternative); IMR-7977 (7828/H1000/Retumbo alternative, also H50BMG / US869 for some applications)

IMR-4166/4451/7977 are here now - and are very good products indeed - 4955 has yet to arrive

Everything from:

Alliant ATK in the Reloder rifle powder series (they are made either by Bofors or Nitrochemie in Europe)
Can't comment on Alliant pistol grades such as Unique - so a question mark there, but they have been reformulated in recent years.

Bofors (Some Alliant and all Norma grades)

Explosia a.s., Czech Republic - Lovex brand extruded and ball powders (previously branded Accurate Arms in the UK)

Nitrochemie Wimmins a.g., Switzerland - Reload Swiss brand powders

PB Clermont, Belgium (part of Eurenco Group) - Ramshot ball powders.

SNPE (various, part of the Eurenco Group) - Vectan extruded (Tu) and ball (SP) powders

Vihtavuori (part of Nammo) - all Vihtavuori 300, 100, and 500 series extruded powders

This was posted in a group I’m in. Anyone know what’s ‘new’?

It's a VERY old tub.

Note it says "Quality propellants for over 45 years"

All the tubs I've seen, including those on the Hodgdon website, say "Quality propellants for over 60 years"