44 mag with small pistol primer pocket?

[paraord]

So I was minding my own business tonight, priming away, and I get a 44 mag case that won't prime. I look, and yup, no old primer. I go to try again. No dice. This bugger looks like it has a small pistol primer. What on earth kind of trickery is this?? I wouldn't think with its size a small primer would be sufficient. Its an S&B make.

[Bulliwig]

S&B dos often make their primer pockets a little smaller than normal specifications. I think they do this to sell their own primers, because they even make them little smaller than normal. In my experience the S&B brass isn't worth the work making normal primers fit.

[376Steyr]

"Sellior & Bellot" is a firm in the Czech republic. S&B brass is well known for having overly tight primer pockets. Sometimes American primers fit in S&B brass, and sometimes they don't.

[GONRA]

GONRA just finished case prep on with 9mm Luger S&B "Range Brass".
After using a Lyman Case Prep unit to REAM the VERY SMALL crimp out of primer pocket entrance,
small pistol primers seated Just Fine.
Ring crimp is small and difficult to pickup/see but its there!

Pretty sure that's why some believe S&B primer pockets are smaller diameter.
In my experience, they're proper .175 inch ID.

[mold maker]

My only problem was the head of the primer broke loose and left the rim in place. It took a really close inspection to see what the problem was.

[Hickory]

What is, "the head of the primer" and how did it break loose?
In order to understand your problem we need to know exactly what you are talking about.
Pictures are helpful.

[rondog]

FWIW - every .303 case that I've experienced a head separation with in my Enfields has been an S&B case. I'm getting rather disillusioned with S&B.

[WALLNUTT]

I've used quite a few S&B primers in Starline brass w/o issue. No brass though.

[ShooterAZ]

I have a couple of thousand S&B 45 ACP brass that someone who doesn't reload gave me. They did have really tight primer pockets, until I ran them all through my Dillon Super Swager. Problem solved. It's hard to turn down free once fired brass, even if it does need a little work at first.

[mold maker]

What is, "the head of the primer" and how did it break loose?
In order to understand your problem we need to know exactly what you are talking about.
Pictures are helpful.
I know of no terminology depicting the Head/cup/top/cap of a primer. Since there are only the primer cup and the anvil involved I thought anyone smart enough to cast and reload would figure it out. The only explanation I can give is that the de-prime pin pushed the head/cup/top/cap along with the anvil of the primer and tore it from the rim of the primer. This left the primer rim still in the primer pocket. Only close inspection with magnification IDed the problem. At first, it appeared like an undersize primer crimp that couldn't be swaged. I tried drilling them out but had no proper sized bit.
Being less than 25 cases, I just trashed them.
BTW These were also S&B .44 mag cases and I've run into the same problem with military 5.56 cases of foreign brands.

[Hickory]

Aaahhhh, I see, I see, said the blind man!
Now, I know what you are talking about.
I've had this happen a few times with crimped in primers.