Loading for the K31- Privi Partisan brass.

[Four Fingers of Death]

I picked up a bulk bag of 100 cases and Lubed, sized and chamfered 30 to work up a load today. When I went to seat the primer using an RCBS hand held tool, the first primer went in with a tiny bit of resistance and the a bit of a crunch. It looked fine. I then took the deburring tool and cut a small chamfer on the primer pocket. It seated abou tthe same. I then increased the chamfer and the next case fired across the room and the primer popped out on the ground. I put it all aside then.

I thought it might be the tool. Later today after returning from the range, I got out a tray of 22/250 cases and tried them, using the same RCBS Hand Priming tool. Easy Peasy, same brand primers went in smoothhhhhh!

I will go back and have a good look tomorrow.

Has anyone else struck this problem with PP brass?

[wallenba]

I find that too. Their pockets seem to be a bit small. I've been meaning to try my primer pocket swager on them, but not gotten around to it yet. I have seated many with CCI LR without much difficulty.

[Four Fingers of Death]

I have some CCI, thanks for the tip, I will try them tomorrow. I suppose they are military ammo makers and make all their stuff to milspec, ready for a crimp after they seat primers. I have an RCBS Primer pocket swager, I will try that if the CCIs don't work.

Thinking about it, I have bulk bags of 100x brass from PP in 6.5 Jap, 7.62x54R, 8mm Lebel as well as the 80 Highland (re branded PP for Australian sales) once fired 7.5Swiss cases. I hope I don't have to swage them all, :(

[tomme boy]

I think that the pockets are really loose on Privi 7.62x54r brass.

[KCSO]

I just ran a Lyman primer pocket tool in mine and went from there. Last I loaded was 8 loading on each case.

[Four Fingers of Death]

Privi Partisan brass is pretty much the only game in town if you want to shoot some of these mil surp rifles. I guess it will be a case of selecting suitable primers and / or pocket swaging.

I had an English friend in the 80s who had a K31, but because he worked in Europe somewhere when he bought the rifle, the military cartridges were banned. His was rechambered to 300WM. I don't know how strong his loads were, but they made plenty noise at the range, so I suppose they weren't too far off 300WM loads. Boy, Oh Boy! He used to shoot some small groups with it for a mil surp rifle with open sights. I have plenty of 300WM brass and it is easy to get. When I started out with the K31, this would have been a worthwhile re-chamber and would have saved me buying brass, dies (Redding at that given the chamber dimensions) and shell holder.

(It occurs to me that I haven't seen him for 30 years, can't even remember his name, I will have to track him down via the gunstore owner where he worked). Scheeooooooooooooot! I'm hi-jacking my own thread!

[Andy_P]

I've found the brass to be very good and to have tight primer pockets. In fact I went to Prvi for 7X57 when my 2012 manufacture Winchester brass had 10% with loose primer pockets.

The consencus seems to be that Prvi is overall very good brass.

[Four Fingers of Death]

It is now sold as Privi Partisan ammo here, previously labelled as Highland ammo. Very popular and good quality. The PP/Highland SP Spitzer ammo I shot in the K31, was scary accurate.

[MtGun44]

I have been shooting 7.5 Swiss with PP brass (Graf headstamp on most of it) for about 5 years in competition.
The only issue is that after about 5 reloadings I started to lose about 1-2 cases per cycle to neck cracking, so
I started annealing the necks. Cracking stopped. Primers have never been an issue, but I use CCI or Fed
Match primers, not WW. Some WW seem pretty hard to seat in .45 ACP brass from S&B, less so with CCI.

I can recommend 42-43 gr territory with IMR 4064 under a 175 Sierra MK very highly.

Bill

[mroliver77]

I run a primer pocket tool (looks like an end mill) in my brass to cut them uniform and square the pocket seat. Primers feel really good when the hit bottom. I dont remember the brand.
J

[Four Fingers of Death]

I've got some 175Gn Sierra MKs and some 4064, I'll try that, thanks. I also have a primer pocket thingo on my RCBS Case prep machine, I will have to dig it out and have a look.

[MtGun44]

Depending on how much throat erosion your barrel has, you will have
to seat them WAY deeper than seems right. K31s have zero throat,
just a 45 deg chamfer on the back of the lands. GP11 ammo uses
a two diameter boolit, about .298 in front of the cannelure, .308
behind it. Conventional single diameter jbullets need to be seated
deep. I think I use 2.860 LOA, but that is from memory, plus the
noses are a bit irregular at the hpt.

[Four Fingers of Death]

Good to know, I have a few bags of 100 bulk Sierras, when I get rid of them, I will start casting for it. Given the zero throat, I have some RN Hornadys from memory, they should go ok (if they feed).

[HollowPoint]

I bought my K31 back in 2005. I bought two hundred rounds of Privi ammo at the same time and along the way I picked up some new Norma brass because it was said to be very well made brass for the 7.5x55 swiss load.

I've shot the Privi brass almost exclusively from that time to the present. I think I've annealed that Privi brass about four times since then. It's good stuff. The Norma brass has turned out to be good brass but, I only use that when I'm shooting full power jacketed bullets. As of right now the norma brass has been sitting on the shelf as loaded rounds for about a year and a half.

Because I'll rotate their use, I'm not sure how many times I've reloaded these Privi cases. I generally load about fifty to sixty at a time, then after shooting them I'll load a different set of fifty. If I had to guess, I'd say I've reloaded each case at least fifteen times. Never had any spit necks but, I do have one piece of Privi brass that has a loose but useable primer pocket.

At the time I bought it, it was good cheap brass. It's not so cheap any more but, still good brass.

HollowPoint

[Four Fingers of Death]

you sure got your moneys worth out of that brass.

[seagiant]

I run a primer pocket tool (looks like an end mill) in my brass to cut them uniform and square the pocket seat. Primers feel really good when the hit bottom. I dont remember the brand.
J

Hi,
Sinclair!

[MostlyLeverGuns]

Check for a tiny burr raised in the primer pocket when you chamferred the primer pocket. I've used Prvi .303 Savage with excellent results.

[Four Fingers of Death]

I tried CCI LR Primer tonight, no different then chamfered the primer pocket on a case and tried to seat a primer. Applied pressure, then a bit more than normal, then just about to give up and it popped in with a bit of a jerky movement. On examining the primer, it looks like it is flattened, almost like a hot load flattened primer without the primer hole. I put them aside and will swage the primer pockets in a few days when I get time.

I tried the Lyman Primer Pocket Uniformer and it went in ok????

[Lead Fred]

I fed my 91/30 PU only PPU cases, never had a problem with primer pockets

[Four Fingers of Death]

I was thinking of digging my old Lee Auto Prime out I thought that the RCBS may have been presenting the primers incorrectly. I couldn't find them, but I used the tool on some PMC 22/250 cases and the primers went in like they were lubricated, smooth as. It has to be the primer pocket size. I'm heading off to Sydney tomorrow to visit my elderly Mum, I will try the swager when I get back.

[3006guns]

MEASURE THE O.D. OF YOUR CCI PRIMERS. I have a batch that gave me fits on several different calibers. Swaging and reaming only helped a little, so I measured the primers and found them to be .001" larger than any of the other brands I use. Since I use CCI pretty much exclusively it was quite a surprise as they've never given me problems before.

Now, this is an older batch but it is entirely possible that more slipped out of the plant at some point.

[Four Fingers of Death]

Thanks, so far I have tried Winchester, Federal and Remington and a packet of CCIs that I bought yesterday, no luck so far. I have a packet of CCI Magnum Primers that must be 40 odd years old, I will try some of them, maybe the older ones are smaller.

It is not the primers I think, they are going into other cases without problems.