Gold colored primers

[SciFiJim]

Does anyone sell gold colored primers for reloading. I was sorting through some range pickup brass and noticed the gold colored primers. If they are only used in commercial loading and not sold to reloaders this would indicate once fired, correct?
The brass was all Winchester.

Jim

[farmerfish77]

CCI's are gold colcored i believe

[SciFiJim]

The CCIs that I have are silver colored.

[redneckdan]

Winchester used to be silver colored, now they are gold colored.

[twotoescharlie]

remington

TTC

[farmerfish77]

Yep rem's, not CCI's had to go look

[sargenv]

The Remington primers I have are silver colored.. the only gold (brass actually) primers I have are the Winchesters.

[jar-wv]

Winchester Small Rifle Primers I've been loading lately are gold colored.

jar

[Calamity Jake]

The only reason they are gold colored is the cups are made from brass and are no longer nickel plated. Saves $'s don't ya know

[SciFiJim]

This was .45acp brass. When depriming, it took a little more force than the rest of the brass. It didn't feel like depriming crimped brass though.

[RayinNH]

The newer blue packaging Winchester's are gold colored. The older white packaging Winchester's are silver colored...Ray

[SciFiJim]

I had to go look myself. I have a brick of blue package Winchester primers that I hadn't opened yet. Yep, they're brass colored alright.

I was hoping for an easy way to spot some once fired brass.:rolleyes:

[winelover]

CCI = silver on outside--gold on inside

Winchester (blue packaging) = gold

Winchester Brass (factory primed) = gold

WINELOVER

[August]

All the Remington, Federal, and CCI primers I have -- or have ever seen -- are silver colored (nickel plated, presumably). All the Winchester primers I have -- or have purchased in the previous five years -- are brass colored (i.e. "gold").

From the data I'm dealing with, you have winchester brass that was (probably) factory loaded with winchester primers, suggesting it is once fired as you suspect.

[MtGun44]

how about "brass colored". Nobody is going to use gold in ammo. ;-)

Bill

[357maximum]

All my remington small and large rifle primers that have come out of the orange/green boxes are brass colored. All my "new" blue box winchester pistol primers are brass.....everything else in the stable is nickel plated.

Your "EASY" method is foiled.[smilie=1:

[trk]

how about "brass colored". Nobody is going to use gold in ammo. ;-)

Bill


Silver maybe, but not gold.

[winelover]

how about "brass colored". Nobody is going to use gold in ammo. ;-)

Bill

If you can find them these days, their priced like GOLD!

Winelover:mrgreen:

[deltaenterprizes]

how about "brass colored". Nobody is going to use gold in ammo. ;-)

Bill

You mean my Gold Dot ammo is NOT made with GOLD?

[higgins]

This is one of those things that was consistent for decades (like IMR powder in Remington factory loads), then ammo manufacturers started making their own primers as cheaply as possible, and no doubt some started contracting out their primer supply. Winchester's reason for dropping nickel plating primers years ago was for "improved sensitivity", but I'd be willing to bet it was to skip a manufacturing step, resulting in "improved cost". I probably pay more attention to this than most since I am a dedicted scrounger of all things brass at the range. The situation is complicated by commercial reloaders who use new rifle brass, usually in non-military calibers, and load the "wrong" color primers from another supplier.

[HeavyMetal]

Keep in mind that Plating is an eviromentaly bad business.

Almost all the materials need to nickel plate are extremely poisonous, ans well as contain "heavy metals" that are also very bad for us.

If Winchester is no longer doing nickel coatings it's more than likely a cost versus enviroment thing, the savings of any labor or cost is just a fringe benifit which would have helped make the decision to go with brass primers.

Be aware that the old primers may have been stainless steel, remember seeing the Staynless logo on Winchester primers? Cost of stainless is huge and may also be a deciding factor in primer production.

All in all I think the change is good! Paying attention to primer color on range brass?

I think you'll go nuts trying to figure once fired from everything else by the color of the primer alone.

[scb]

My Rem 7 1/2's are brass/gold colored - they used to be copper (colored/plated), years ago.

[SciFiJim]

I figure that most of the brass I pick up is once loaded anyway. I mean, what reloader would leave good brass just laying there? I do check for split cases and look for head separation.

[RayinNH]

Jim, that's a pretty good assumption. No self respecting reloader would leave good brass. Any reloader that leaves brass is because it has been reloaded umpteenth times, and that usually shows in dings, dents, scratches and staining. A check of the trash containers usually turns up the box that contained the shells. If the box is dogeared and beat someone is purging of many times reloaded brass, if the box is new it's more than likely once fired. Just my observations...Ray

[shooterg]

Winchester dropped the nickel plate when they went to the ble boxes - late 90's ?
I'm still shooting white boxes from 1994 with the nickel plate. Don't know what else changed but same load (in service rifle) shoots better with the older primers(for me, anyway)

[evan price]

Wolf primers are gold colored also.

I usually use Winchester or Wolf primers, but I deliberately buy Magnum primers in nickle plated (usually CCI) so I know for sure if a load is a Magnum load or not.

I have seen new, factory R-P and WIN ammo loaded with BOTH nickle plated (silver-colored) and non-plated (brass-colored) primers from the factory boxes. Obviously, not both in one box, but various boxes. I bet like all big companies they use what they get cheap this month.

[MtGun44]

Staynless was for non-corrosive, nothing to do with stainless steel. As far as I know all
primers are brass, some have been nickle plated, as noted Win stopped plating theirs
a few yrs ago - coincided with switch to blue boxes.

And, sad to say, I am confident that my favorite 'Gold Dot' bullets contain very, very little
gold. :bigsmyl2:

Bill

[Tom W.]

I have a bunch of old Federal LP primers that are copper colored....

[AZ-Stew]

Bill is correct about the "Staynless" trademark. If the cups were stainless steel, they'd be too hard to accept a firing pin dent.

The Remington #6-1/2 small rifle primers I have (green and orange box) are nickel plated. The Remington #7-1/2 small rifle benchrest primers I have are brass colored. I also have some Remington #9-1/2 large rifle primers that are brass colored.

All my CCIs are nickel plated. All the primers I've ever seen from CCI were plated, though can't speak for their Mil Spec primers, as I've never see any.

I still have a few WW primers in yellow boxes that are all nickel plated.

I've only ever had a couple hundred Federal primers and I believe they were nickel plated.

Regards,

Stew