7.65x53 failure to fire

[jimb16]

I suspect it was just bad primers. A few years ago, I had 8 bad primers out of 100 in a batch of Winchester srps. I sent them back to Winchester and they sent me a couple hundred replacements. It happens; rarely, but it does happen.

[K43]

Larry, the packaging was and is in good shape. I always handle the primers because I don't have any mechanical primer feed. My hands are clean and dry when loading, but I can't rule out contamination....

It's pretty hard to dud a primer deliberately, much less do it by picking them up with dry hands. Multiple threads on the 'net about people failing to dud primers they don't want. Your hands would have to be dripping in solvent, oil, or some caustic solution to do it. Despite all the warnings in the loading books, it just doesn't happen by picking them up with clean hands.