Pierced Primers

[Down South]

I was working up a load for my 44 magnum today using a 429421 boolit over 19 gr of 2400. Boolits are sized to .430. The revolver is a Smith 629 Classic 5” barrel. The primers were standard Federal large pistol primers. A buddy of mine gave me several hundred of these primers and they were what I was using. I don’t know how old they were but I’ve used primers that I’ve had in storage for eons without problems. After the second cylinder full I noticed a smutty head on one of my cases. After closer inspection I saw that the primer had pierced at the crown of the primer. It was just a very light pierce and hard to see. I shot another cylinder full and had another one do the same thing. I didn’t chronograph this load but its well within my load data. The primers are not showing any indication of high pressure and extraction is very easy. Actually the cases will almost fall out of the cylinder on their own. Looks like I’m going to have to pull some boolits cause I won’t chance any more of these loads with these primers. In almost 40 years of reloading this is the first primer failure that I’ve ever had. Have any of you folks ever seen a primer fail like this? From my experience a pierced primer usually blows where the firing pin hits. I’ve never heard of one blowing in the crown.
The primers seated what I would call normal. What I mean is just the right amount of pressure to seat and seated just below flush of the case head.

[Russ in WY]

Take a look at the area around the firing pin. I had this happen with some small rifle primers a couple yrs back, They cut the bolt face with little grooves, one actually went into firing pin hole. I was having the hole bushed any how. Sure made it easy to ID the gun it was fired in, it would leave a set of marks on every primer there after. Several other guys I knew that used that primer also had the same problem, once brought to the attention of Mfg, they did make things right. By "crown' I am assuming you mean the radius of the cup. There was no leakage at the point of firing pin strike. A black smudge was very obvious at the point of leak on case head also. Hope you don't have a lot to pull. Good Luck . Russ.

[Boomer Mikey]

Federal had a bad run of large pistol and large rifle primers with this problem many years ago. I've seen this many times in my heavy loads and other guy's heavy loads.

I still use Federal primers but limit their use to moderate power levels. I'll end up using the rest of my 20K or so old Federals on CAS loads.

You apparently got some of the old primers.

Boomer

[AZ-Stew]

I saw the same thing years ago with a batch of Remington Large Rifle primers I had. The leaking gasses left little pits in the bolt face. Since they were at the juncture of the primer and primer pocket, they didn't pose a problem, they just left an unsightly ring on the bolt face. In retrospect, I believe my load was a bit hot, but I've never seen this with any other primers.

Regards,

Stew

[Down South]

I pulled all of the rest of the boolits. I went to my local shop and rob and bought a couple boxes of CCI primers. $8.56 later and I was out the door. I’ll load some of these up and see how they do. I know this is too much to pay for primers but I just got this revolver and I wanted to load some of my own ammo. $36 and change from Wally World is just too much to pay for 50 rounds of revolver bullets. This is the first revolver I have that takes large pistol primers and I just haven’t had time to order any. All my local shop and rob had was large pistol magnum primers. I’ll have to swap powders to H-110 since my loading data calls for magnum primers with this powder and I have no data for magnum primers with 2400.

I do think this was a batch of bad primers. The rest of them will go in the burn barrel. I’ll enjoy the fireworks.

[felix]

Just use softer loads with those primers. ... felix

[Down South]

Hi Felix. Yes, I’ll start off close to a starting load with H110. The only problem with H110 is there isn’t much difference between the starting load and max load.

On edit. Maybe what you meant was to just use softer loads of 2400 with the mag primers. I may try that later. I’d really like to try H110 in this revolver and if it does well then my next order for primers will be for the mag primers. I got very good results with 2400 yesterday even with a primer problem. I only wish that I could have shot a few more rounds.

Thanks, Sam

[shotman]

i use mag pistol primer on all my loading 45acp too i just load 1 or so grains light there is some difference but it does not seem that much. I load a mag primer and 5 grs of tite group in a 45 acp and it does fine. I load the same with a reg primer and dont see anything different. It does seem to leave less unburnt powder rick

[happyret65]

I had the same problem with Federal Primers. They started out slow on blow backs from the primer, but after more loads they became more often. I used these primers in 3 or 4 rifles and after the same frequency in those rifles I noticed they were being cut by the firing pin. I had to pull all the rifle firing pins and round them back to normal. I had a 1,000 brick and I threw away about 700 primers. I also, checked my supply of other federal primers by the bad lot number of the 1000 primer container. Gas cut firing pins with cause problems in all other primers.

[44man]

Yes, it was a production problem. Something was corroding the cup on the inside and it would leak gas.
I believe they had a recall on them long ago. Don't use the old primers because they damage the recoil plate or bolt face.

[Edubya]

Hi Felix. Yes, I’ll start off close to a starting load with H110. The only problem with H110 is there isn’t much difference between the starting load and max load.

On edit. Maybe what you meant was to just use softer loads of 2400 with the mag primers. I may try that later. I’d really like to try H110 in this revolver and if it does well then my next order for primers will be for the mag primers. I got very good results with 2400 yesterday even with a primer problem. I only wish that I could have shot a few more rounds.

Thanks, Sam
I don't think that Felix was advocating lighter loads with your CCI mag primers (especially with 110 powder) but with your previously load Fed primered brass. You could load 17.5 of 2400 and posibly never see another pierced primer. Federal primers are probably the thinest walled primers on the market.
EW
EW

[Down South]

Golly, this one was an old one that came back to life. I’ve since ordered 5000 CCI LP Primers and have never had another problem. I trashed all of the old Federal Primers that was causing the problem. I do use Federal Primers in other loads but they are (New) Federal Primers.
I feel sure I had a batch of the old Federal Primers that were recalled. The buddy that gave them to me had quit reloading years ago.