SmallCaliberCentral

Is there a problem with loading below the reccomended powder load by - .5 gns?

There could be. Most reloading manuals and the companies that test their powder charges, reccommend not going below their min charge. The main reason is you can get a condition they call "Dentonation". In other words the powder burns at a much faster rate and acutaly can produce high pressures, resulting in a blow up.
As for how far below, I do not know, but I would just not go below their recommended charge. There are reduced loads available, for light loads and I would suggest locating them and using those, if you want a reduced or light load. Bill K

Never done any in the .204,but did do some in my 22-250 shooting 50gr vmax BLC2, min charge was 31.5gr made some up at 20gr,25gr30gr, all fired fine i was just testing the flash off the mod, then went back to normal charge 34.6gr

On a detonation the powder doesnt ignite & burn creating propelling gases. It actually detonates or explodes all at once as the flash from the primer shoots acorss the length of the powder charge since there isn't enough powder to fill the case properly. You now have the effects of pulling the pin on a grenade. Reduced loads are different in that the appropriate powder for such a condition is used.

http://www.imrpowder.com/trailboss.html

http://www.imrpowder.com/data/rifle/tra ... ct2005.php

www.imrpowder.com/PDF/Trail-Boss-data.pdf

http://hodgdon.com/PDF/Trail-Boss-data.pdf

bottom link includes reduced loads and how to. trailboss is a powder designed for reduced loads.