Dry powder or pellets, what brand and reason for your choice? I have only used the pellets because of the ease of using them. Are there better alternatives? Accuracy, distance, velocity? Which one produces less fowling? Thanks for the input.

i use real black.
traditional-type sidelock guns aren't
very pellet friendly. when hunting and
using tubular speedloaders, i can get
a charge and a ball down about as fast
as the average guy with pellets. of course,
if you didn't do it right with the first
one, there's most likely no real need for
speed is there?
i've never chrono'ed one of my muzzleloaders
and likely never will. making a hole in the
right place is all i care about.
cleaning a m.l. isn't really that much more
trouble than a thorough cleaning on a smokeless
gun black powder or not. it does need to be
done asap instead of setting it aside, but a
responsible gun owner wouldn't neglect the
iron anyway.
good luck

Maybe it was me or my guns but I could not get the pellets to group good. No problem using loose powder though.

I only use pellets 777. i thought they all fowled about the same.

I use pellets in my in line gun. It's not as messy loading or cleaning and I get more shots before it gets hard to ram home a round and I have to clean the gun.

I use 777. I tried the pellets but never could get a decent group. Found 110 gr of loose 777 put 3 shots into a .75 group off of the bench @ 100 yards.

Its much easier to work up loads using loose powder. I use Blackhorn 209 and their loading tubles. I also weigh my loads to be sure they are consistent. BH 209 can be cleaned up with Hoppes or any conventional cleaning products. No need to use hot water etc. I can fire 15 to 20 rounds with no issues with reloading. No crud ring etc. Pellets arn't very consistent weight wise to start with and they if you don't handle them carefully they can lose more weight.

I would love the convenience of pellets, but my sidelocks just don't like them.

It always feels good to tote a powder horn around. Loose powder gets my vote.

Sidelocks don't like the pellets due to how they are manufactured. The hollow core allows the flash to ignite from the inside and expand out, along with giving an air pocket for the flash. More surface area allows better combustion. Plus, there is a ring of easier to catch powder on the back end that help ensure faster ignition. This is all coming directly from Bill Hodgdon's son.

Loose powder burns more completely (I use to use that in the early days and loved it) but now I am very happy with the White Hots. I shoot three 50 gr pellets out of my Prohunter (28" barrel) and get velocities of 2200 fps with a 250 gr Barnes tipped expander. With that load I get 1 to 1 1/2 in groups at 100 yds. The reason is convenience and the accuracy is more than acceptable. That said, the loose powder will probably be more consistent across a range of muzzleloaders.