Primer help,,,

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Skgreen

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Primers in question are all from (1) brick of CCI BR4
Never had ignition problems with this 223 bolt gun, and still don't using other primers.
Running as high as 10% failure to ignite. Those that work always ignite on hit 1, but those that don't will take 5 hits and still not ignite. Seems like I got a bad brick,,,

Have pulled close to (20) of the failed-to ignite rounds apart and they all had powder in them.
After todays trip to the Range, I removed (2) of the dud primers from the cases and took out the anvils.

I'm not sure what I should be looking for. Took a couple pics hoping someone here might have some insight.

Thanks in advance.

2.JPG a.JPG
 
Is the brass all the same headstamp or are the duds all a certain headstamp? I noticed I had a couple from some range pickup brass that seemed to have a little deeper primer pockets than others. They were a different headstamp from the rest of what I picked up, can’t recall what they were though. I would seat them with my hand priming tool and they had that “hotdog down a hallway” feel and like I had to bottom my “squeeze” out to feel resistance like normally primed cases. After a couple cases like that, I stopped, checked them out and they seemed to my naked eye to be deeper set. Grabbed the calipers and sure ‘nuff, they were deeper! Just something to look for a possibility
 
Brass is all new Starline.
Haven't measured the firing pin, but again, no troubles before, during, or after with anything else but this 1 brick of primers.
Picture is admittedly hard to see, but first strike has always been healthy enough for positive ignition. I can strike a dud an additional 4 times w/o ignition. The following rounds will all be 'one-strikers', until another dud pops up

I've sat primers shallow before, but usually an added strike is all it takes to fire.
Brass went straight from the shipping box to the press for sizing/priming. I've done the same with a previous order of Starline 357 w/o problems.

Brass did not feel any more 'slippery/oily' that the 357 brass did when taken out of the box new, but wondering if this batch may have somehow had enough oil clinging in the primer pockets to contaminate some of the primers.
 
Primer strike does not look very deep... especially if it has been struck multiple times as described in the original post.
 
I've had a few ftf with Remington primers lately. They were in 38 spl cases made by perfecta which I hadn't loaded before. Of the 3 ftf, 2 went bang when I hit them again an 1 dud. When I pulled the bullet, powder was present with no discoloration or clumps. I have had 0 issues ever with my loads and cci and 1 from a batch of 223 that my dad loaded. 20 out of 100 seems a lot, and I wish you the best getting it figured out.
 
Skgreen said:
Brass is all new Starline.
Haven't measured the firing pin, but again, no troubles before, during, or after with anything else but this 1 brick of primers.
Picture is admittedly hard to see, but first strike has always been healthy enough for positive ignition. I can strike a dud an additional 4 times w/o ignition. The following rounds will all be 'one-strikers', until another dud pops up

I've sat primers shallow before, but usually an added strike is all it takes to fire.
Brass went straight from the shipping box to the press for sizing/priming. I've done the same with a previous order of Starline 357 w/o problems.

Brass did not feel any more 'slippery/oily' that the 357 brass did when taken out of the box new, but wondering if this batch may have somehow had enough oil clinging in the primer pockets to contaminate some of the primers.
Click to expand...

Anytime something like this happens it is always good to check with factory ammo first.

See what happens with those.
 
Failure to ignite on restrike is common, so that's not helpful. If you've switch to another box, observed no failures, them come back to this box and seen failures. . . that's pretty good evidence of an issue with the primers themselves.

If you can, change rifles and brass, just to be sure.

Despite the very high reliability of primers, I do have one box from the 80s that's about 10% failure. This is across multiple rifles, cartridges, and years of loading. It's rare, but not impossible.
 
edwardware said:
If you've switch to another box, observed no failures, them come back to this box and seen failures. . . that's pretty good evidence of an issue with the primers themselves.

If you can, change rifles and brass, just to be sure.
Click to expand...

Wife has a 223 bolt. I'll give her some of the rounds in question / see if she has the same results.
Unfortunately, I won't be able to use these primers in different brass as the entire brick was consumed by 1,000 pieces of Starline.

No doubt about it, failure for a primer to ignite is most commonly due to something beside the primer, and bad primers are few and far between. I've looked into the most common reasons for ftf and none of those appear to be the issue in my case. I've also fired rounds (before/during and after) containing several different batch's/brand names of primers w/o a problem. It just seems to be associated with this particular brick and/or somehow with the brand-new Starline brass. (Bad Starline brass seems more unlikely than a bad box of primers, but anything can happen!)

Thanks everyone.

Mods, please close this thread.
 
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Skgreen said:
Wife has a 223 bolt. I'll give her some of the rounds in question. . .
Click to expand...
No, don't. Load different ammo, in different brass, with no common point at all except the primers. Then you'll be learning something.

Skgreen said:
Mods, please close this thread.
Click to expand...
Why? If we thought this thread was going to close as soon as you had your answer, no one would have bother to answer.
 
Looks like light primer strikes... which can either be caused by the gun or seating them too deep.

If they work in another gun just fine, you've found the culprit.

If they the primers are too deep beyond flush, you have another clue.

If it's the gun, you can either fix it with a new firing pin if that one is worn, a new spring... or sometimes a temporary fix is to try different primers that may be more sensitive.

Good Luck!
 
edwardware said:
No, don't. Load different ammo, in different brass, with no common point at all except the primers. Then you'll be learning something.


Why? If we thought this thread was going to close as soon as you had your answer, no one would have bother to answer.
Click to expand...

1. When I mentioned 'doing so wasn't possible' earlier, perhaps a more honest response would have been: I've no desire to pull apart quantities of already primed brass/reprime different cases to positively isolate a single cause from another,, at least not at this time. Another factor in my situation is that a brick of SR primers goes rather quickly here in the Houston winters. I don't compete, and it won't take but a couple range trips to burn through what's left of the cases already primed with BR4's. Shortly thereafter I'll be seating different primers in the Starline. If it's the brass, I'll know it then.

2. Lot's of well-intentioned and pertinent info has already been posted. Primer threads occur here frequently, and like many, they eventually devolve into repetition. (I mark that up to lot's of well-intentioned people) No need for anyone to take objection to or otherwise be unhappy with my desire to cut this one off at this time.
 
I've had a similar experience with a batch of CCI SPP. The experts here said the same thing , must be primer seating or the gun. But same rounds wouldn't fire in three different guns. Sorry to disagree with the experts, but I got some bad primers.
I will have to give credit to the statement about 99%.
I've loaded several thousand rounds of various calibers with CCI primers and only had a handful of failures, so the failure rate is definitely less than 1%, but not zero.:cool:
 
Last edited:
In summary:

It is bad primers
It is something wrong with the gun
The brass has bad primer pockets
The brass is not sized correctly
The primers are not seated correctly
 
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