First I'll lay out what I have. A Winchester 94 "Ranger" in 30-30 - I bought this a year ago and I don't think it had been fired. One of the later ones I believe and it has the "cross pin safety" receiver.
I just started loading the 30-30. I bought 1X fired Winchester brass - full length sized it - and then after firing, all I'm doing is neck sizing. Using a 120ish, 10ish and 170is lead cast out of my molds.
I hand prime my casings with a Lee ergo hand primer. I check to insure the primer pockets are clean and I double check to make sure the primers are fully seated.
I'm using a variety of powders to play with - Unique, Red Dot and Green Dot and have been working up loads.
AND . . . when shooting, I make sure the lever is pulled up tight to the wrist to push the safety pin in.
NOW . . . for my problem. "Primers". I have been using CCI Large Rifle Primers. in my area, that is what is usually on the shelf at the two LGS . . once in a while they have Winchester primers. For all of my pistol loading, I use the CCI small and large pistol primers and have never had an issue with them.
I had 60 rounds loaded up the other day for the 30-30. 10 each of different powders/boolits. When I was shooting on the range in my back yard, I would load five, shoot five, go down and check the target (50 yards). Much to my dismay, out of the 6 batches of 10 cartridges, I ended up with at least one cartridge in each batch of 10 that would not go bang. The others . . . all shot with no problems. Those that would not go off on the first trigger pull, usually went off on the 2nd strike. I had one that took three strikes and I ended up with two that would not fire at all. Those two had very good firing pin impressions in them.
So . . . of course I checked the primer strike and all had decent strikes and a fairly substantial dimple in them. I was somewhat baffled why they didn't go off. After the first round would not fire, I checked each cartridge to make sure that the primers were seated . . . top of the primer was below the end of the casing and obviously seated all the way in. At first, I thought I might have some primers that were not seated all the way and the first strike was seating the and the second strike was firing them. Not so from what I saw.
I have heard and read about CCI primers being "hard" and giving problems. What I can't figure out is that I've used LR primers out of the same case of 1K for my old GEW98 Mauser and have never had any fail to fire in the 8 X 57.
Am I missing something? It's not a case of the cartridge having problems with powder position - it's a problem with the primer just not going off. The firing pin appears to be putting a substantial dimple in the primer - just not going bang. Being a rimmed cartridge, it should headspace on the rim and with the majority of the cartridges firing just fine . . . I'm sort of eliminating this down to the primers.
The next time I go to the LGS (tomorrow) I'm going to pick up a couple K of Winchester primers and see how they do if they have any in stock.
Am I missing something that I'm not realizing or that I'm not doing correctly? Or, is it just a case of the CCI LR primers and some being too hard or "duds"? I store them in a cool/dry place so I'm not looking at exposure or contamination.
All lI'm doing is "plinking", but with the number of primers I had (roughly 10%) that required at least a second hit with the firing pin or failure to fire at all, I'm glad I am not hunting or depending on this for self defense! LOL
Thoughts, suggestions, advice???? Primers? Something I'm not seeing? Or a problem with the Winchester Ranger?
Many thanks.