primed 5.56's

[Slasher]

primed 5.56's (updated with pictures)

I picked up some "new" primed Lake City brass recently and had a questions about it. I was told it was new but I see head stamps of 02 to 10. Could these be pulled or could they be new with that old of a head stamp?

Is any sizing required for these if they are new?

Would they need to be re-sized if they were pulls?

Thanks

 

[rodregier]

Check some samples in a cartridge headspace gage to see if they are dimensionally correct for loading w/o resizing.

Try hand-seating a projectile on the case mouth. If the mouths are dimensionally correct you will encounter resistence seating a projectile.

Mixed headstamp suggests they are resized/reprimed by someone other than the factory.

Factory LC will also have crimped primers. Look at example complete factory cartridges w/crimps (anything milspec), then look at your product for difference in the appearance of the primer pockets.

 

[GLOOB]

Mixed headstamp suggests they are resized/reprimed by someone other than the factory.

+1

With "once-fired" brass being so commonly and brazenly used to describe random range pickups and/or a reloader's brass that is so old it's starting to have case head separations... I suppose he could have meant "new" as in truly once-fired brass?

Would they need to be re-sized if they were pulls?

If the cases fit your chamber, then all you really need to worry about is neck tension.

 

[joustin]

Most LC primed brass I have seen is pull down. Is there any black sticky residue in the neck? If so it is most likely pull down hence the mixed years.

Sent from my DROID RAZR using Tapatalk 2

 

[MtnCreek]

I size all new brass. Usually there'll be several in a batch with slightly out or round / dinged mouths. With most dies you can remove the decap pin.

Are the primers crimped?

 

[FROGO207]

The last Midway flyer I got (June IIRC) with that brass it was described as "new production military brass with primer and no crimp". So who knows what it was that they bought. Might have been the brass that fell off the assembly line at a certain point and dumped in a 55 gallon drum. Then sold to Midway as a "deal" when it was full. That would indeed qualify it as a "special buy".

 

[Slasher]

Thanks for the replies everyone. I have posted some pictures if you don't mind taking a look and letting me know what you think. If I had to guess I would say they are crimped, looks like they still have the red sealant in the primer pocket.









Thanks for all of the help.

 

[funklord12]

I agree with you about those cases appearing to have the primer crimp and primer sealant. My opinion is they are virgin, pulled cases and you will probably need to neck size them.

 

[jim243]

Where did you get these from?

Jim

 

[4895]

They look good to me. I would run the sizing die into the case far enough to size the neck but not knock out the primer. I don't see any ejection dings or scratches and would agree they look to be unfired, new brass.

 

[Slasher]

Thanks for checking them out. I really appreciate it. As for where I got them, there is a guy in Middle TN that comes down my way and has all kinds of mil surplus stuff with really great deals. He was selling 1000 of these 5.56's for $100 and they are primed with CCI41's. I was having a hard enough time getting once fired LC brass and when I saw I could get new primed brass for basically $70 for the brass I jumped on it.

He is mostly on another forum but I can hook you up with his phone number if you are interested.

 

[NeuseRvrRat]

will he ship them?

 

[rodregier]

Concur they have the appearance of original production priming/crimp.

Probably an interesting story behind them, but we may never know...

Before you load up a bunch would be good to try "firing" a few of the "just-primed" cases to see that they are still alive. Mix of headstamps selected would be a better test.

(If they were subjected to horrifying temperatures or contaminants it might not be obvious by simply visual inspection.)

 

[longdayjake]

Fyi, I sell a lot of military surplus bullets and I am often given a lot of pulled brass by my suppliers as "samples." Those are most definitely pulled cases but they have never been fired and are brand new in that sense. I personally just load them up without using a neck sizing die. The only problem you will have with doing it that way is the neck will be a little bit tight right in the mouth area where they crimped it and you may have it shaving some of the bullet. You can mitigate this if you wish by chamfering but I have found that a little shaved bullet doesn't hurt accuracy enough for me to tell the difference. I loaded up about 500 this spring and shot rockchucks and ground squirrels very consistenly at 200 yards using 50 grain zmax bullets. All I did was throw powder and bullets in there and called it good. I tried my hardest to push the bullets into the casing and I just couldn't do it. Neck tension should be plenty.

 

[Slasher]

Thanks for all of the replies and advice.
This is probably a dumb question but how loud would it be to fire off a primed only, no powder or projectile, 556 case? I'm an hour and a half drive from my nearest rifle range and didn't know if this would be something I could do in the house, like in to a bucket of sand or something like that. Would the neighbors hear a primer going off if I was inside my house?

 

[MtnCreek]

Press the muzzle into an old towel. No one will know a thing.

 

[rodregier]

Primers (only) in my experience are same sound level as those noisy plastic-cup cap-guns. I saw a gunsmith use a piece of scrap close-weave carpet on a floor to cover the muzzle of a shotgun that was being tested with a primer-only hull in his shop.

As always, be really careful to distinguish between a primed case and a complete cartridge when doing such testing.

 

[moxie]

Might be new brass but they don't appear to have been primed at Lake City, not with that sealant. Appear to be good stuff nevertheless. I'd certainly size them and check case length.

 

[Hacker15E]

That purple primer sealant is *exactly* what LC brass has. Here's some once-fired 1990s LC that came directly from a military range for comparison.



I don't see any indication the OP's brass has been reloaded or loaded anywhere but the Lake City plant.

 

[moxie]

It's not the purple, it's the crud in there along with the sealant. I don't see that in your examples. And, in the last few years, don't know when it started, you can't see any sealant at all. They've either lost the purple or found a way to seal without visible evidence.

 

[Hacker15E]

I don't have much recent headstamp that I haven't all ready decapped, but this LC09 and LC11 sure look purple sealed to me (the 11 is pretty dirty, but all I could grab in a big tub of unsorted brass).

 

[ArchAngelCD]

You might want to neck size that brass IF you feel the neck doesn't have enough tension after loading up a few. If you seem good just load them up like suggested by "longdayjake".

You got a great price especially if they are primed with CCI #41 primers.

 

[moxie]

Another small detail.

CCI #41 primers are silver colored, the ones in the photo are gold/brass colored.

 

[longdayjake]

Guys, these are unfired lake city cases. Made by ATK. My guess is that they are CCI primers as well since CCI is owned by ATK. Here is a picture of a random sample of lake city cases that I got directly from a contracted puller. As you can see, some of them have purple sealant and others do not. They are indeed unfired lake city cases.

 

[atblis]

If it were me, I'd run them through a Redding full length S die with a 0.245" TiN bushing and no expander/decapper. Set it up to bump the shoulder slightly. No lube should be required.

CCI #41 primers are silver colored, the ones in the photo are gold/brass colored.

I just looked at the ones I have. They are gold.