Small Primer .45 ACP?

[Potsy]

This has probably been brought up before, but I was at a shoot last week and a
fellow had some of these.
It occured to me that the bulk of my .45acp brass is used range brass. This small primer stuff was promoted as "range ammo".
Hence, it would lead one to believe, if this is a growing trend, soon, most .45ACP brass may be small primered.
Obviously, you can reload it with small primers. I never really understood why the cartridge needed a large to begin with (a whopping 5-7 grains of powder); correct me if I'm wrong about that.
My two questions are:

A) Why the switch to begin with?

B) Are there any problems using this brass with current accepted data that uses large primers? I can't think of any. But that don't mean they ain't none!!!

Thanks!

[375RUGER]

I think it has something to do with a primer mix that is "more" indoor range friendly or something.

[Silver Eagle]

This has been brought up here many times. New primer compound (DDNP) that is lead free caused the change due to it pushing out the large primers. Do a search here and you will find a few threads about it.
Sort them out carefully as it will cause problems if you try to stuff a large primer in them. So far it seems most are loading with the same powder charges as large primer brass.
Wikipedia article on the new primer compound: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DDNP

Silver Eagle

[Cmemiss]

Pretty much what Silver Eagle said, with so much large primer brass around people around here are using the small primer stuff as "drop" brass--leaving it at the range. That may change with the availability of LPP, but who knows what is happening in the supply chain.

[MtGun44]

Consider that experts have recommended that brass that has been modified by drilling
out the flash hole larger for primer-powered plinking ammo (rubber or wax boolits) should
not be used for regular ammo due to the large flashhole making the brass behave differently
from normal flashhole sized brass. You apparently would need to significantly downcharge
to keep pressures in line.

Now - the small primer .45 ACP brass has larger than normal flashholes, so this effect might
be an issue. If I was loading this loathesome stuff, I'd sure back off the loading data at
least 20% and work up to ensure that the larger flashholes with std primers does not cause
pressure spiking.

Bill

[SciFiJim]

On the third hand, it wouldn't hurt to have some of it put back in case of a LPP shortage.

[MtGun44]

I'm sorting mine out and keeping it. I may eventually work up a load for it - gingerly
because of the flash hole issue - or sell it to someone that likes it.

Bill

[Matthew 25]

Mine is getting sorted into the big green dumpster. Nothing like learning of this little issue while reloading with tired midnight eyes.

[redhawk45]

send all of the sm primer 45s to me i like it

[ReloaderFred]

This issue has been cussed and discussed numerous times on many forums, including this one. Using small pistol primers in .45 acp causes no issues. In fact, I have European .45 acp brass headstamped 1957 with small pistol primers, so it's not new.

The change in the U.S. was brought about by the introduction of Diazodinitrophenol (DDNP) as a Non-Toxic (NT) priming compound as a replacement for Lead Styphnate priming compound. The brisance of the DDNP is so much faster than Lead Styphnate, it caused the primers to back out faster and flatten against the bolt face before the pressure from the burning gasses had a chance to drive the case back and reseat the primer, as happens with the "standard" primers.

The first "cure" was to enlarge the flash holes to approximately 1/8", which helped, but wasn't considered a satisfactory problem solver. The next attempt was to crimp the primers in place, similar to military ammunition, but with a somewhat heavier crimp, in most cases. The final iteration was the conversion to small pistol primers, hence less priming compound. This worked, and since there was never a need for a large primer in the small volume of the .45 acp case in the first place, it was adopted by several companies. The first were the ATK owned companies, i.e.: Speer, CCI and Federal.

I've been loading the small primed .45 acp cases since they first appeared. There is approximately 25 fps less velocity using them across the chronograph, and no discernable difference on target. There is no mystery to them, so just use your regular loading data and have more brass to shoot. Throwing them away is a waste of brass in my humble opinion.

There have also been reports from bullseye shooters of better consistancy using small pistol primed .45 acp brass, and those are the guys who would know. The 50 yard line will tell you if your ammunition is really accurate or not.

Hope this helps.

Fred

[windrider919]

Send all the SP brass to me if you don't want to sort n shoot it. Personally, my old series 70 Colt LOVES it and using 6.2 gr of Universal and 200gr Hornady XTP...it is the most accurate load ever shot in the pistol ( mounted in Ransom rest OR in hand ). Same load in brass with LP is twice the size groups!

Note - I AM using Small Rifle primers, CCI #41's to be exact.
This is a MAX load and you should NOT use it without backing off the amount of powder and working up to a safe load in your firearm. I am not liable for your use of this information, use at your own risk.


Seriously, I'll pay the shipping for it! Speer brass prefered.

[Alan in Vermont]

I can't help but wonder if some of the negatives I'm reading about the SP 45 brass is just, "It's new/different, therefore it is bad". It used to be that a shotshell reloader had to sort hulls as some were primed with 57* primers. Somehow we survived that, I expect we will survive the SP 45s as well.

With that said I just went through fits loading 200 rds of SP brass. I don't blame the brass but some combination of factors was causing the spent primers to occasionally stick on the decapping pin. When that happened the spent primer would get sucked back into the primer pocket hard enough to stick there before the decapping pin would pull free. At the priming station (RCBS Pro 2000) the old primer would get reseated and the new one left in the priming punch. I feel my way through the priming step so I caught most of them but a few managed to sneak past. Then I would have two primers on the punch for the next round. Overall it made for a miserable loading session.

The only thing I can see that could be causing it is some sort of mis-fit where the primer anvil is somehow grabbing the decapping pin. Never had it happen with other small primer cases. Dies are all RCBS, I don't think they use but one size decapping pin for all primers sizes.

I haven't fired any of the reloads yet so I don't know if the problem is going to be there on the next go-round or not. Cases were Federal and I used Federal primers in them so if the issue shows up again I'll try CCI primers next time. Sure hope it's not the Federal primers as I have 1800 of them left to burn up.

[zxcvbob]

I don't load 45ACP, but I can see where it would be really handy to have a bunch of the small-primer cases for when I want to run a batch but the press is all set up for small primers already.

Instead of cussing the SP brass and throwing it away, cuss at it and throw it in a bag and save it. Eventually you'll hae enough to be worthwhile. And if all the new .45 brass goes to small primers someday, you'll be ahead of the curve.

[Bullet Caster]

Yeah, send it all to me. Lol. BC

[bcp477]

I have lots of both...... LP and SP. I can't say that I have a preference. Well, yes I do (on second thought). I'd prefer all of it to be SP, so to have commonality with my 38 Spl.

I certainly have not noticed any functional difference. I just make sure to keep the LP and SP cases separated (so I don't load, store or shoot them together).....and all is fine.

[ole 5 hole group]

Nothing against the 45 ACP small primer pocket except it's a royal PITA when using a progressive set up for the LP.

[Dframe]

For all of the reasons above, I toss mine into the bin of brass that'll be sold to the metal recyclers. They can be loaded and fired just fine, but in the "Hassle to Benefit Ratio" the hassles outweigh the benefits. So in the recycle box they go.

[Alan in Vermont]

For all of the reasons above, I toss mine into the bin of brass that'll be sold to the metal recyclers. They can be loaded and fired just fine, but in the "Hassle to Benefit Ratio" the hassles outweigh the benefits. So in the recycle box they go.

Toss them in a seperate box and when you get enough to make it worthwhile I'll pay you more for them as shooting brass than a scrapper will.

[W.R.Buchanan]

The whole reason that .45 acp cases have large primers in the first place is because the case is nothing more than a .30-06 case cut off to .900 ish long.

That's how Browning made the first ones.

The case head and rim dimensions are essentially the standard 12mm case head as defined by the Mauser rounds 8x57/7x57 that were it's origin. Lots of cartridges use this exact case head design.

The large primer, even though not really needed, came along for the ride. There was no need to change it, and there still isn't. However I have been told that eventually all .45 ACP ammo will have small primers just like the NT versions do now simply because there is no need for two different priming compounds and two different size cups.

Kind of like R12 versus R134 refrigerant for car AC units. The original R12 stuff has been pretty much completely replaced and if you can even find it, it is very expensive.

Randy

[Dframe]

Toss them in a seperate box and when you get enough to make it worthwhile I'll pay you more for them as shooting brass than a scrapper will.

I haven't encountered any in a while, and have none in my reloading room right now. But I'll keep you in mind the next time a find a few. If you're real patient, and send me your addy by PM, I'll be glad to PIF them to you if I find any more.