Converting Berdan primer pockets to Boxer

[NEVADABACKROADER]

Have you tried filling the berdan primed cases with water and using a dowel that just fits the case neck? You hit the dowel with a mallet and use the water pressue to deprime the case.

[Rangefinder]

^^^ YES, but the point is not to remove the entire berdan primer, but use it as a bushing to convert the case to use box primers.

[richhodg66]

I have a decent lot of brass Berdan cases for the 7.62x54 I was planning to drill out and use 209 shotgun primers, but now I'm going to do this when I get around to it.

I never would have thought of this! Do these present any problems with full power loads, i.e., does that swaged in part ever want to back out? Also, will a small rifle primer ignite a fully charged case uniformly? If not, I can always set these aside for reducxed loads and save my boxer primed stuff. I have a drill press and an RCBS primer pocket swager, just gotta get the time now.

[nanuk]

...
On a side note, I can't help throwing my $0.02 in. There is such a vast wealth of knowledge here at CB that it really does amaze me sometimes--often, actually. In my neck of the woods I'm considered one of the few experts (not a title I willingly raise my hand for--there just isn't a large pool of reloaders that know a thing beyond wives tales, so I "appear" to be one of the bright ones ). Then I come browse through all the stuff you guys are doing and playing with and am always fascinated by the things I find. It sure does put into perspective how far and wide our obsession with 'things that go bang' can run. Good-Lord, I love this place...

RF: I agree 100%
I am humbled also that the members here (well, except for one, perhaps two) who freely share their knowledge with the rest of us.

And the TALENT??? I have followed threads where, with simple hand tools, and some minor power tools, members have created some pretty cool stuff.

and the INGENUITY!

all I can say is Wow! and THANK YOU!

I'll get off my box now

[JIMinPHX]

I fooled with this sort of thing a while back. Some of what I tried worked & some of it didn't. My results were OK, but my methods required a machine shop. Larry's method is a good example of doing more with less.

The details of my exploits along with useful replies from Buckshot & others can be found here - http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?t=50789

With the exception of the one press ring that was too loose, I was able to get several firings out of all the brass that I converted. They are still in use today. They have see only low level powder charges though.

One thing to remember with Berdan primers is that they are not uniform in size like Boxers. With Boxers, they are either large or small & that's all there is. With Berdans, there are many subtle variations in size depending on what shells you have.

[Larry Gibson]

richhodg66

I have a decent lot of brass Berdan cases for the 7.62x54 I was planning to drill out and use 209 shotgun primers, but now I'm going to do this when I get around to it.

I never would have thought of this! Do these present any problems with full power loads, i.e., does that swaged in part ever want to back out?

Don't know yet, so far they have worked fine w/o the bushing backing out when used with 2 firings of my normal heavy cast bullet load. I will fire one more cast bullet load and then test with a full service load with 4895 under a J bullet.

Also, will a small rifle primer ignite a fully charged case uniformly?

I guess we'll find out. Shouldn't be a problem, especally with SRM primers with normal powders like 4895 but might not be enough with s slower burning powder, especially a ball powder.

Larry Gibson

[Reload3006]

I have a case of olympia 7.62x54r Greece manufactured. I have not done this with that yet. But I started looking for Ideas when I got that ammo because when I bought it I saw brass cased and figued Boxer primed ...Wrong. but no matter I have a bunch of 3006 cases that were berdan primed so I converted them. At first i just drilled out the berdan primer anvil after having the primer removed then swaged it to a flat bottom but as you know the hole was too large a diameter So I took a ball from a bering and peened down the top of the hole ran them up to full power 06 loads with out problem but was not that reliable. So then I had read somewhere that people were soldering a bushing in the primer pocket and that got me to thinking why not just drill out the primer and swage it to size. It worked and as the OP has shown works great. all the way up to full house 30-06 loads. I have had some of the berdan bushings come out when I de primed after full house loads but nothing while firing. Hope this helps. And yes when I have a chance I will be converting all my Olimpia brass 7.62x54r

[lavenatti]

If the primer rings used as bushings (brilliant idea by the way) backed out -they could always be soldered in place before swaging the primer pocket. You'd want to be careful about the amount of heat used so the brass wasn't annealed but I think it could work.

I'm sure we all have a little lead and tin laying around we could use for solder.

[JIMinPHX]

Have you tried filling the berdan primed cases with water and using a dowel that just fits the case neck? You hit the dowel with a mallet and use the water pressue to deprime the case.

See the link that I posted above

[Larry Gibson]

Have you tried filling the berdan primed cases with water and using a dowel that just fits the case neck? You hit the dowel with a mallet and use the water pressue to deprime the case.

I've tried that on numerous ocasions in my far distant past. I succeeded in getting water all over me, my bench and everything else within reach. I got very few berdan primers out.

Larry Gibson

[LowPE]

I have found that once you get the initial military primer out, using the rcbs can opener is very easy on subsequent primers with both cast boolit loads and full power jacketed loads.

Pulling the pin on a RCBS x-die is very easy and takes less than one minute.

Kudos to your effort and ingenuity. If my supply of berdan primers every goes away this seems to be a very viable method to reuse that brass.

Thank you for posting this very clear article.

[1874Sharps]

Very cool idea and great execution of that idea! I would like to announce, however, that Graf & Son just started selling Wolf brand Berdan primers. It may be easier to buy some of these Berdan primers from Graf.

[20nickels]

Very cool idea and great execution of that idea! I would like to announce, however, that Graf & Son just started selling Wolf brand Berdan primers. It may be easier to buy some of these Berdan primers from Graf.

Not to drift but How do you prime using Berdans? Are they not larger and out of round?

Larry you never cease to amaze.

[1874Sharps]

20Nickels,

Depriming is easy: Just fill up the case with water about half way, support the case on some washers or the like so the primer has somewhere to exit and put a well-fitting dowel in the case mouth and give it a whack with a mallet. The hydraulic pressure will push out the primer. You can reprime by pressing the new Berdan primer into the primer pocket (after cutting the military swage) to get it started. Then take a wooden dowel into the mouth of the case with the base and high primer on a piece of pine or soft wood and gently tap the dowel to further seat the primer. The primer will still be a bit high, but at this point the primer will be seated deep enough so that it can be put in a press with a large primer seating tool to finish the seating of the primer.

Larry,

You are truly amazing!

[Gunto]

Looks great!
Glad to see that others are using 7.62x54.
I am using 7.62x53R.

[ilcop22]

Very insightful and well documented, as always, Larry. This looks like a good idea for the berdan primed 30-06 cases I have. I can neck those down to 8x57, and with this method, easily identify the cases with no guess work. Thanks again.

[brstevns]

Have you used full throttle loads doing this? Say in the 303 Brit and 308 win?

[Larry Gibson]

Have you used full throttle loads doing this? Say in the 303 Brit and 308 win?

I have fired these same 19 cases 4 times now with the cast bullet load, no bushings have backed out. I did reswage 2 of the cases that looked odd but it really didn't change the "odd" look and they took the SR primer without problem. I have the cases loaded with my service "L" duplication load which is a 150 gr .311 bullet loaded over 48 gr milsurp 4895. We shall see how that works, I'll report back.

Larry Gibson

[Larry Gibson]

Well I slipped off to the range to shoot those 19 rounds of service level loads. It was 39 degrees so I didn't bother with a target, just shot darks spots on the 200 yards berm. All went bang just fine and accuracy appeared normal. When I got home I deprimed them using a lee deprime die. The resistence was greater but all the SR primers popped out without a single bushing coming out

Looks to me like they are good to go. I am cleaning the cases now and will continue to load the same cast bullet load and test fire. I will stop at 20 firings, case failure or loss of a significant number of the bushings and report back.....so far, so good

Larry Gibson

[brstevns]

Thanks for the information I will have to give it a try.