Primer question

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Atroxus

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I finally found some primers. I was so happy I just bought them thinking "any small pistol primer should be good". I got winchester primers though and I was reading the box and now I am not so sure. On the box it says "Handle one at a time;NOT in bulk or primer feed devices." Anyone know whats up with that? I really don't want to have to pick primers out one at a time by hand. Is there another brand of primers that does not have that warning?
 
I suspect many of them do this to keep their lawyers happy. Lee's lawyers let them say it is OK to load Win primers 50 at a time in their various priming tools.

They do warn about Federal though.

Tom
 
Cool, thanks for the info. I have a Lee press on it's way to me with the saftey prime primer feed. Wanted to make sure before I do anything though since the primer box contradicted what the Lee web site said about their saftey prime.
 
CYA. I've fed 10s of thousands of primers through an RF-100 and into my progressive presses. Never has a single one gone off, except when I put htem in a gun and pull the trigger. Primers are dangerous but so are many of the chemicals in your house. A little common sense and saftey precations will take you far in life.
 
Lee makes a big issue of limiting the number of primers in feeders, especially Federal spp (light strike).
Their basis for this is the potential for a 'chain' ignition of all the primers in some feeders.

They also say their Safety Prime is ok to load up max. I use Federals spp and load 100 or more at a time in the Safety Prime.

The couple of times a primer has been pressed into a case "sideways" hasn't caused a Federal to go bang yet. :)
 
AFAICT, all statements such as you cited, Atroxus, are perverse CYA legalese. They are perverse because nobody I know of tweezers single primers out, but if you don't and have an incident, they now have a gotcha for your lawsuit.

We may place primers individually--but many of us run primer-feeding devices exactly as 1SOW indicates. FWIW, I only use Winchester and CCI primers, and even when a primer is mis-installed (sideways and crushed, upside down) I've never had one pop off--again, just like 1SOW.

Jim H.
 
As others have said, its legalese. Even so, some of the various primer feed devices out there do increase the chance slightly of setting off a primer. I've been handloading for 15 years and I have never set one off on a press, but it could happen. The only incident I have ever had involving a primer explosion was with the Lee Whack-A-Mole handloading tool. On the other hand, a friend of mine recently set off a Federal primer in his Dillon 550, so it can happen.

That said, the Lee Safety Prime system makes it nearly impossible to have such a problem, and even Lee, notorious for their ban on Federal primers in their other priming devices, approves the Safety Prime for all brands and types of primers. You will be fine using it with Winchesters, or whatever you use in the future.
 
Pure legal mumbo-jumbo. Let me interpret: Please don't drop-test them from the 25th floor onto the street below.

Those may become your favorite primers. They install with a good "feel". They're reliable. They're tough. They're hard to set off outside of a loaded chamber.


Use them in good health.
 
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Cool, thanks for the info. I have a Lee press on it's way to me with the saftey prime primer feed.
Click to expand...
With a Lee Safety Prime I've loaded a full box (100) small or large pistol primers at once and have never had one go off. I'm not telling you to do so I'm only telling you what I've done.
 
Primer seating.

When you seat any primer, in any tool, do it in a smooth, fluid motion. No slam, or jerk during the process. The only primers that I have had go off were in the Lee Loaders, during the hammer seating process.:eek::what:
 
rfwobbly said:
In other words, lay off the strong coffee !! :evil:


Say, how many pages will you get this thread out to ? :D
Click to expand...
Smooth firm motions, not jerks...kinda like trigger control eh?

I almost asked that question in the other thread just to keep it alive....but I decided to share the love instead. ;)
 
Let's recount what we have here...
• No lawyers allowed
• Share the love
• Nothing but decaf
• Keep the jerks out of your reloading room

That about covers it. :D
 
I wear safety glasses when reloading. I personally know folks who've reloaded enough to have primers go off in the tray. Two in a Lee progressive, one in a Dillon.

When the Lee tray went off my buddy was picking pieces of plastic out of his face for a couple weeks. When the Dillon went off it sent the tube into the drywall in the ceiling, no injuries occurred, other than ears rang for a week.


Protect your eyes. Wear safety glasses.
 
Hand Primers

I've used both type of Lee hand primers,(I am of the belief, right or wrong, I can get a more consistent pressure when loading bench rest ammo using a hand primer than lifting up on the handle of a reloading press) the older one being without a tray or other device that allowed me to have more than one primer in the tool at a time.

If nothing else, after several years of using this primer I developed a habit of ALWAYS checking the position of the primer in the tool before inserting the primer in the case and this has not changed when all I could find was the type with a tray when I had to replace "old faithful" after several thousand rounds.

I wouldn't "worry" about the warning on the box as it's only an attempt by Winchester to make reloading safer and for some people their advice should be taken. But if you are in the habit of checking the position of ALL primers before seating I see no problem with using a tray which is not only faster, it also eliminates the handling of any primers with some substance such as resizing lube on your fingers. Personally I am not aware of any primers being set off by inserting upside down or sideways, but I sure it has probably happen on more than just a few occasions so when using this type of priming system it is important to develop the habit of not only checking the primers before being seated, but also after the process is completed and a charge and bullet have been added.

So basically if you are the type of person who is not in any big hurry and need to turn out hundreds of rounds, if you make it a practice to check before and after seating using a tool holding multiple primers should not be a problem.

F. Prefect
 
fprefect: Your right of course, slow and sure is the safest and surest way to go. The same argument holds true with using a single stage press.

The problem is many shooters ARE shooting a large number of pistol rounds every week, a faster method is required.

On the LEE Turret Press, you actually do manually operate the primer feeder for each primer inserted in the press. You can check that it is inserted into the 'lever primer assembly' (a small steel cup) face up and you can check for a proper seat after pressing it in.

What you can't check is that once in a great while, the primer will flip on it's side juuuust before it's pressed in. This is probably caused by an irregular or too fast of a push on the handle -and maybe slowing the handle down too fast before actually pushing it into the brass. Operator error.

The Lee Turret Press does a safe and very consistent job seating pistol primers if the operator lets it.
 
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