My first failure to fire....

[Remington1911]

I bet I have been reloading for roughly 20 years and I have never ever had a failure to fire....till last weekend.

Round in question was like #8 out of 10 in 243 from a savage 99. To tell the truth I don't remember if I noticed a primer pop, or just quiet....but no bang.

I shoot the rest, including 10 more using another recipe with no issues, and told myself I need to pull that guy down.

To tell the truth I forgot about it when I got back to the house, took care of the guns, and filed away my notes and just went upstairs.

Last night I cleaned out the range bag and opened the box and went oh yea I had that FTF....dug out the puller and knocked the bullet free. Powder, bullet and nothing really strange, must have been a bad primer....had to have been.....unless you guys have another idea.

Don't think I am going to reuse the powder, just feel funny about it, not sure why but I do. Bullet and case will be reused, and marked as not fire formed to the chamber.

So how often does it happen to you, I have had to reload thousands of rounds in my time, and this is the first.

 

[243winxb]

May be time for a new main spring?

1 bad CCI 400 primer in 50+ years for me. Did fire on the 3 or 4th try. 223 in savage axis. Shoulder was set back .006" to .013" from repeated firing pin strikes, after more testing. Excessive cartridge headspace. Started with .002" shoulder bunp.

If powder started burning & stopped, it will be clumped together & different color. Powder issue. (H450)

SLOW Firing pin velocity is the cause of most misfires. Old oil in action. Clean bolt.

After normal cleanings, store gun muzzle down. Let any excess fluids drain out the muzzle.

 

[Rule3]

If the primer popped you would have had a stuck bullet, If the not, did you try a "restrike" of the cartridge, Usually a primer not seated correctly.

 

[243winxb]

If the primer popped you would have had a stuck bullet

Had 22-250 with H450 not move the bullet when mag primer fired. So, not always.

 

[MakBaba]

My failures to fire have always been a high primer/light strike. I’ve never had a round not fire if the primer ignited.
If the primer ignited, then yeah, I would definitely dump the powder. Could be a bad primer? Maybe moisture or oil contaminated the powder?

 

[Rule3]

Had 22-250 with H450 not move the bullet when mag primer fired. So, not always.

Almost always, sometimes, could be

 

[Blue68f100]

I've had a primer or 2 that was missing the anvil. Only once have I had a primer with no compound in 40+ yrs.

Did you punch the primer out to look at it?

 

[edwardware]

I've had FtFs occur for failure to seat primers all the way, and a few from a very old box of primers with some sort of moisture damage.

I'll bet you didn't seat it quite all the way.

If the primer popped you would have had a stuck bullet,

Not necessarily. Once you're up into rifle case volumes, it's common that a primer-only shot will fail to push the bullet free of the case neck.

In pistol cases, the primer will usually push the bullet free of the case.

 

[Remington1911]

I have not popped out the primer yet, but will.

I had a good hard hit, almost looks too hard as it does look a little odd almost like the center has been pushed in.

After pulling it out and seeing how well it was hit, I did not try a second time.

The pic did not really focus in on the rest of them in the background, but all the others looked very normal.

These are loaded on the lighter end of 243.

 

[twarr1]

Is that an illusion or is the primer face concave? Very odd

 

[usaral63]

Pull the charge and try it again...........might just work on a 2nd strike.

 

[Fishin4guns]

Wonder if the primer anvil is missing. Had a sleeve of Federal large pistol primers last year that the anvils were missing on 6 primers.

 

[edwardware]

. . . it does look a little odd almost like the center has been pushed in.

That's what a primer looks like without the propellant pressure to conform it back out to the the bolt face. You aren't used to seeing it, because you don't have much experience with FtFs.

 

[Remington1911]

That's what a primer looks like without the propellant pressure to conform it back out to the the bolt face. You aren't used to seeing it, because you don't have much experience with FtFs.

There was powder in it, one poster said it would be a bit off, but this looked like it came out of the bottle yesterday.

Yes it is concave, that is what is just off.

I never thought of it missing the anvil, I guess that could happen, I have had spent primers come out in two parts before, but never a fresh one.

I can tell you that when I pulled the bullet there was nothing but powder in there....so it did not come loose during the loading process. I guess the primer could have not gotten any compound from the get go....another possibility.

A few months ago I had some contaminated rounds that just went pooft, but I knew the cause behind that. These got made up and stuck in the box, so no really strange storage like on the 38 rounds that had ballastol soak into them and contaminate the powder.

Another question, lets say there was no anvil in there, but there was primer compound, chances of it going off during the de prime process. With this bit thinking of the bucket for this case.

 

[Varminterror]

So how often does it happen to you, I have had to reload thousands of rounds in my time, and this is the first.

I’ve seen some reports pointing towards as high as 3% failure to be expected for primers, but I think most of us shooters never experience anything remotely close to that. The last time I remember a Failure to Fire of centerfire primers would be many years ago in my 3 gun rifle or my cowboy action ammo, and I was shooting a whole bunch of ammo loaded on progressives, 10-15, even 20k rounds per year at the time. Not to jinx myself, but I’ve never had a failure to fire in my hunting, long range plinking/practice, or competition loads, and I’m pumping out typically somewhere around 6-10k per year for these uses.

I had a good hard hit, almost looks too hard as it does look a little odd almost like the center has been pushed in.

That concave appearance is caused when the internal pressure doesn’t reform the cup back flat, but is very common in failures to fire caused by improperly seated primers (soft seated). If the primer isn’t seated firmly, then the firing pin does the final seating of the primer, and we get a concave primer witness like that, sometimes even if the round fires.

Did you attempt to fire the round a second time? Did it fail to fire twice?

 

[BJung]

Maybe a contaminated primer. I once tried WD40 to lube my cases and it killed the primer. In my case, it wasn't that the primer failed to ignite. The round shot maybe a minute or so later. I'm glad I didn't eject the round too soon.

 

[Remington1911]

Maybe a contaminated primer. I once tried WD40 to lube my cases and it killed the primer. In my case, it wasn't that the primer failed to ignite. The round shot maybe a minute or so later. I'm glad I didn't eject the round too soon.

That would be flat scary.....a minute wow.

This one I let sit for about 30 sec.....trying to think just what the hell I forgot.

Going to try to pop out the primer this weekend. I am just planning on going real slow, if the compound is in there I don't want a chance in setting it off.

 

[GBExpat]

For those who do not know (most folks, probably ) ...

If you are using a bolt gun, look at the back of the bolt for milled notches like these:



They are there to give you a safe option to recock the bolt, without unlocking the action, for a restrike on a misfire. Use a cartridge case rim in one of the grooves to recock the bolt.

 

[Remington1911]

I don't think I said what gun, did not really think it mattered, but for what it is worth Savage 99.

 

[mdi]

About one in a million primers I load are truly "bad". If I have 2 failures out of the same lot of primers, I would jump on the "Why Wagon" until I found a definitive answer. Otherwise just it was an anomality where the tolerances stacked in the wrong direction...

I cannot remember a primer failure since I started reloading (1970) that was properly seated. I did find a loose anvil in sleeve of Winchester LP primers, and I have been unsuccessful "killing" primers. Nuttin' special about me,just never hurry, and keep focused on the task at hand...

 

[Otto]

I don't think I said what gun, did not really think it mattered, but for what it is worth Savage 99.

The primer indentation looks gnarly. I'd replace the FP and spring if this is a reoccurring problem. If you don't know how, here's a video

.

 

[MarshallDodge]

I have it happen about once every couple years but I reload 3 or 4K rounds per year.

Reasons-

1. No powder in case. Rare but it has happened
2. Bad primer
3. Moisture in case. I wet tumbled some rifle brass and let them dry overnight. In the dry Utah climate that is pretty easy to do but one time they did not dry all the way.

 

[EricBu]

I have not popped out the primer yet, but will.

I had a good hard hit, almost looks too hard as it does look a little odd almost like the center has been pushed in.

After pulling it out and seeing how well it was hit, I did not try a second time.

The pic did not really focus in on the rest of them in the background, but all the others looked very normal.

These are loaded on the lighter end of 243.

View attachment 1090013

That actually looks like it was a proud primer, firing pin drove it in and "seated" it, and indented it, but lost to much energy seating it to crush anvil. Could also be something goofy, like debri in the pocket. I've seen that exact same look on a new brass case that had no flash hole in the primer pocket. One of the reasons now why new brass goes through a decap station on my presses.

 

[kalielkslayer]

I’ve had 2 FTF that I can remember in my life. I’m not counting duck loads that got wet in my jacket/waders and the powder was contaminated before I shot them, pretty common when they first started manufacturing steel shot shells.

1st was a true squib that I failed to put powder in.

The 2nd was a 12 gauge skeet load exactly 7 days ago. The indentation in the primer was larger than usual. No primer ignition. I believe I didn’t seat the primer deep enough. I had just switched from Winchester primers to Cheddite primers and I don’t know what primer was in that load since I discarded it. The Cheddites were purchased in 2022. The Winchester in the mid 2010s stores on a dry, cool basement. The primer switch was after I had just loaded the last 600 Wins out of a case with no other issues.

The Cheddites are .0005 wider and you have to seat them a little harder, at least for the first loading with them.

I’m chalking mine up to operator error because I don’t think i seated the primer fully.

 

[LaneP]

Some events defy an immediate explanation. Many years ago I was shooting a Marlin 1895 .45-70 with 300gr JSP and 4198. Everything was going bang, then I pulled the trigger and there was no discernable report that I remember, but a bunch of unburned kernels of powder squirted out the bore (I could see and heard them scattering the ground). There was no bullet in the bore. To this day I have no clue what happened, save for a possible partial burn. But they were standard pressure loads from the manual, not light or under power charges.