1st misfired primer ever..

[arjacobson]

I got some brass back from a buddy of mine and he said one wouldn't go off at all. (he gets me lead and I supply him with small batches of loaded .45's) I have had this happen bunches of times with rimfire rounds but never in a centerfire round..?? Anyone else get many of these. I would have to check my records but I believe the primers were winchester large pistols.. The gun was a taurus 1911 .45 231 powder. Good large firing pin strike. I guess after all these years it was bound to happen.. Input?

[kyswede]

I found a primer that was missing the 3 spoke anvil when reloading. Spotted it when primers were put in a primer tray and lightly shaken. Don't recall the brand or size.
kyswede

[CWME]

Just a thought but if loaded on a progressive you may have had a primer pull back in. I see that every now and then.

[462]

Stuff happens. Still, and all, I can't think of anything else that is more consistantly reliable than a primer.

[arjacobson]

This was done with a rockchucker single stage.. Puzzles me still??/

[Huntducks]

I have been loading for 54 years now and have had more then one I have never kept track how many but it just happens, heck I have had several factory rounds not go bang.

[nicholst55]

I've had several rounds of military Match ammo with bad primers over the years; invariably, the lacquer used to 'seal' the primer also killed the primer! Can't say that I've ever had a round reloaded (by me) with a bad primer - and I've used some primers that I had very little confidence in due to age or (very humid) storage conditions!

[frkelly74]

Too much sizing lube might kill a primer. I have used castor oil and it will kill a primer.

[3006guns]

Any un-noticed oil or grease will kill a primer......and it might be from the factory, not your fault at all.

WD-40 will kill them immediately and castor oil SURELY will! The older reloading manuals caution about sweat on you fingers too.

I was once give a box of CCI's that suffered failures of about two in every ten. However, the box was so old it was black and white....probably one of their first runs back in the 1960's....and God knows how they'd been stored before I got them. On the other hand I have primers from the thirties, with the wooden separated trays, that still go bang.

As 462 mentioned, I can't think of anything more reliable than a primer!

[blackthorn]

Quote: Any un-noticed oil or grease will kill a primer......and it might be from the factory, not your fault at all.

WD-40 will kill them immediately and castor oil SURELY will! The older reloading manuals caution about sweat on you fingers too.

I was once give a box of CCI's that suffered failures of about two in every ten. However, the box was so old it was black and white....probably one of their first runs back in the 1960's....and God knows how they'd been stored before I got them. On the other hand I have primers from the thirties, with the wooden separated trays, that still go bang.

As 462 mentioned, I can't think of anything more reliable than a primer!

Old time primers --maybe--BUT--don't bet your safety on oil (or anything else) killing modern primers!!!

[1Shirt]

If you load and shoot in quantity, you will over time have misfires for a multitude of reasons which include but are not limited to primer problems. It is just a reality check!
1Shirt!:coffee:

[montana_charlie]

I've never had a 'dead' primer, but I found a 'blown' primer, once.

It was in Vietnam, when my buddy and I were 'practicing' out on the perimeter.
At one point his M-16 went into full auto fire with no pressure on the trigger. He dumped the magazine, and the rifle went to sleep.

I took it up to the hooch for examination, and found a fired, orphan primer wedged under the disconnector or the sear (can't remember, now) which meant nothing was trying to catch the hammer as it cycled.

I have always thought that must have been a one-time-in-eternity occurrence.

But, looking at lists of AR-15 accessories, I see something called a 'rug' which seals off the lower receiver to prevent 'blown' primers from getting under things.

It surprises me that the occurrence is common enough for somebody to invent a 'cure' for it ...

CM

[3006guns]

Charlie......the primers weren't crimped?? I find that odd as it's S.O.P. for most military ammo. Maybe not for the 5.56mm...don't know.

[troy_mclure]

ive had several. ive also had 3-4 times that in factory ammo fail.

[CJR]

Every now and then, my progressive press will crunch a primer while I'm attempting to seat it into a case. If the priming mixture, in a primer, is cracked that can affect ignition reliability after the firing pin hit. So what I do is deprime that case and reprime it just to be sure that the primer is as good as it can be.

Best regards,

CJR

[Gunsmoke4570]

Just a thought but if loaded on a progressive you may have had a primer pull back in. I see that every now and then.

I've seen this too. I got in the habit of loading in 100 round batches so when I'm through the 100 bullets, I shouldn't have any primers left over!

[songdog53]

In all the ammo have shot in my life excluding rim fire , I have had one misfire due to primer and i knew when i reloaded it that it might happen. I failed to set LP primer in 45acp deep enough and sure enough when hammer fell, firing pin punched hole thru the primer and no bang. Other than that reloading and even factory ammo has always gone bang and know only one person ever had factory ammo not go bang. I have been lucky with my reloading for are so many things can kill primer and after all man made them and if man made it can fail.

[jhrosier]

I had never had problems with primers until the recent unpleasantness.
When the supply of Federal primers dried up, I switched to the only available brand, Winchester.
Since then, bad primers are not uncommon.
I can buy Federal primers again, at a premium price.
I pay it begrudgingly..
I have reason to suspect that the current Winchester primers are imported, not made by Winchester.

Jack

[montana_charlie]

Charlie......the primers weren't crimped??
Your guess is every bit as good as mine. I never spent any time in Vietnam looking at how ammunition was constructed. If it was clean, I loaded it in magazines and fired it ... that's all.
That primer 'materialized' in my buddy's rifle, and I didn't even know how long it may have been in there.
I have spent almost fifty years thinking it never happened to anybody else ... then yesterday I see the 'cure' in a list of AR accessories.

If a cure exists, there must be a disease out there, I guess ...

CM

[454PB]

Actually I'm impressed how reliable primers are. I've probably fired 1/2 a million, and can only recall about 5 that failed to fire that couldn't be blamed on something OTHER than the primer itself.

Years ago, I was given a mason jar full of loose primers my BIL bought at a garage sale. The original owner had removed them from the original packaging, dumped them loose in the jar, then stored it on a window sill that was in the sun all day. About half of those were duds.

[swheeler]

Every now and then I have a misfire in handgun ammo, yep primer seated upside down. It happens, but don't remember many seated right side up that didn't pop.

[captaint]

I can't say I've had a bad primer, ever. After having a Dan Wesson tuned I got about 2% failure, but after switching to Federal small pistol primers, that went away completely. The gun is 1000% reliable with the FedSP's. I have pierced a couple over the years though....... My fault..enjoy Mike

[ColColt]

The only misfire I ever had was in a Glock 40 S&W with Federal ammo. The primer was indented but nothing happened. I don't recall even a bang sound. I've never had this happen since I first started reloading in 1969 except with the above scenario. I've used primarily CCI and sometimes Federal primers and never had a misfire or hangfire. This one misfire was with their highly acclaimed ammo as well...it happens once in awhile. I'm glad my one time wasn't when I needed the pistol most.

[prickett]

Something nobody has mentioned...

I occasionally get primers that aren't fully seated (seems to happen only in my .45's. My 9mm's don't have this problem). The first strike dents the primer. The second strike fires it just fine.

Maybe it wasn't fully seated?

[HangFireW8]

Any un-noticed oil or grease will kill a primer......and it might be from the factory, not your fault at all.

This has been the prevailing wisdom even before Phil Sharpe wrote it down in 1937 in his guide to reloading.

Happily, it is no longer true.

A fellow named Tom Nelson, and another who goes by the handle of B Squared, have tested modern US made primers with all manner of oils and solvents. The only way to deactivate they could find was to completely wash away the primer pellet with a continuous spray of solvent. Tom tested primers for months after being washed thoroughly with several kinds of oils, and all fired on every test.

Let's put this one to bed.

-HF

[starbits]

Back in the early 70's my buddy and I bought some old boxes of 30-30 that been reduced in price to about the cost of new brass. Took them to the range and half way though the first box 2 had failed to fire. I pulled the trigger, heard the firing pin hit and after a long pause, nearly a second, the round fired. Only hang fire I've ever had. We pulled the rest of the bullets and fired all the primers. Some were fine others were very weak sounding.

Starbits

[arjacobson]

I think what I'm going to do is pull the bullet and powder and try to deprime the brass slowly to see if the anvil is missing or contaminated??

[gwilliams2]

Had bought a batch of 5000 Winchester small pistol primers last year and had a failure of about 1 in every hundred... I've never had that problem before or after. Was probably just a bad batch or something, but I haven't bought Winchester primers since then.

[arjacobson]

these were winchesters... maybe they just had a bad batch.. Like I said before this is the first time I have seen it happen..:-?

[nicholst55]

Your guess is every bit as good as mine. I never spent any time in Vietnam looking at how ammunition was constructed. If it was clean, I loaded it in magazines and fired it ... that's all.
That primer 'materialized' in my buddy's rifle, and I didn't even know how long it may have been in there.
I have spent almost fifty years thinking it never happened to anybody else ... then yesterday I see the 'cure' in a list of AR accessories.

If a cure exists, there must be a disease out there, I guess ...

CM

All U.S. military ammo intended for combat use has crimped primers, and has had since the 1920s - with a few minor exceptions (Match ammo used by snipers). They even crimped the primers in M41 .38 Special Ball ammo. AFAIK, all USGI 5.56mm ammo has always had crimped primers.

High Power shooters sometimes run their .223 ammo on the ragged edge, especially when loading long range ammo. This sometimes results in blown primers. The Army teams run or ran a 600-yard load called the 'V-8,' that they would only load on brass intended for Ball ammo, complete with crimped primers just for this reason.

This is normally the cause of blown primers in AR-15s, and the reason for 'the rug' device that you mentioned.

Your buddy must have been exceptionally unlucky to have a blown primer with Ball ammo. USGI ammo is normally of very high quality, at least in my experience.

[casterofboolits]

Primers are extremly reliable. I've fired over 250,000 large pistol in competition (IPSC) over 23 years and had three that misfired and were completly dead. Winchester LP.

A buddy had a box of 1,000 Remington LP's that 9 out of 10 were defective. probably contaminated at the factory.