56-50 Armi Sport Spencer Loads.

DISCLAIMER: I offer this for your information ONLY. Follow all the established rules for safely shooting any weapon. If you decide to follow these directions you are taking full responsibility for any accidents or injury that may result from improper use or action. Shooting live ammunition is dangerous. Make sure to inspect all brass for imperfections before you reload it and take care to measure powder charges with care and accuracy. Guns are deadly so take all precautions when shooting.

Over the last 6 months I've been working on a good Smokeless and Black Powder load for the Armi Sport Spencer. I'm using a 350Gr Flat point Bullet (RCBS-82309) that I bought from Montana Bullet Works. Its a great bullet that has a bit of a point. which aids in smooth feeding from the magazine, but is flat enough to be safe in the Spencer.  The Armi Sport Spencer can use smokeless, black powder and black powder substitutes, so we have a lot of options for reloading.

As an aside I'd like to shamelessly plug Montana Bullet Works – great folks and they make a very high quality bullet. If you need lead and don't want to deal with the mess give them a call.  Quality folks all around.

As I said I'm using a 350gr bullet. I've worked with a couple of powders and have found that for smokeless, Trail Boss and Unique work well for me. For black powder or black powder substitute GOEX (a bit difficult to get try Track of the Wolf) and 777 (Triple 7) work great as well. NOTE: Do NOT use smokeless powder in any original Spencer or Spencer reproduction that was designed to use black powder, such as the superb Romano Spencers.  Do not use duplex loads either.  Using smokeless in a weapon designed for Black Powder can result in catastrophic failure and severe injury or death. 

Of the two smokeless powders I prefer Trail boss, it shoots very gently and gives good accuracy. Unique has a bit of a kick but also has good accuracy. I'm not sure of the lube used by Montana Bullet Works, but it seems to perform well.

For the black powder and 777 black powder substitute I find both are equivalent in my Armi Sport Spencer. The lube used with black powder was SPG. I removed the smokeless lube (laboriously I might add) and lubed the bullets with SPG myself.

Powder	Charge	Lube
Trail Boss (smokeless)	9gr by weight	unknown
Unique (smokeless)	8gr by weight	unknown
Triple 7 (777) (BP Substitute)	30gr by volume	SPG
GOEX (Black Powder)	30gr by volume	SPG

This information comes from my experiments of reloading for the Armi Sport Spencer.  A another great source for Spencer load information, and for that matter Spencer information outside that purview of this blog please see The CasCity Spencer Forum, run by my good friend Two Flints.  Its a great place for info on a wide variety of guns, not just Spencers. 

I hope this information is of use for you in figuring a load that work best for you Armi Sport Spencer.