SEATING PRIMERS

[backcountryhunter]

I have a question I have not encountered in 36 years ... can you hurt a primer by seating it too deep in the case pocket ? I have a batch of WW .308's that have been extremely difficult to seat the primers in - I actually broke the handle off my old Lee and bought a Hornady hand held tool - Apparently I didn't understand the instructions and seated a bunch (400) to as bottomed out as one can get them - (I know what ya'll are gonna say and I deserve it) Anyways, I test fired a couple of groups and they seemed to work fine but is there any chance I crushed the internal anvil enough to render a misfire ? (probably damn lucky to be sittin' here writing this with my eyesight intact !!

 

[jmad_81]

I have been wondering this as well. I have a hand primer that will leave a mark on the primer if it seats hard, and if I use my press I have no issues. If you broke a priming tool yours are seating harder than mine, but I'm still interested to see what others have to say.

 

[Kodiak]

There are several types of priming tools out there. I have used a K & M hand-priming tool for years. It lets you "feel" the bottom of the primer pocket as you slowly seat the primer. And there may be a few 1000s difference in the depth of the primer-pocket in the same lot of brass cases.

Cost? Pricy, yup ... about $50 from Graf's.

 

[DrMike]

You can crush the anvil and ruin the primer by seating too hard. Effectively, what happens is that the primer is crushed so as to preclude creating a pressure wave sufficient to ignite the initiator.

 

[backcountryhunter]

would they just misfire or would that create an inconsistant pattern

 

[DrMike]

If you can't get the pressure wave, you get no ignition. Ergo, misfire. If you have ignition, the accelerator will ensure that you can ignite the propellant.

 

[backcountryhunter]

I wouldn't be asking so many questions if I hadn't primed over 400 cases ... I loaded 10 random rounds for test groups before I realized there might be a problem and they all fired and the groups were as they should be .. I guess what I can do is grab 20 or so random and test them - Thank you for your input

 

[Greg Nolan]

If the primers are that hard to seat there may be an issue with the primer pockets. It would seem that a primer pocket reamer and uniformer may be needed. Or the primers may be oversize but I suspect the brass. Of course at this point they are already primed. It would be a hard choice to deprime them all but it might give you peace of mind.

 

[DrMike]

Sometimes, if the primer pocket is shallow, seating leaves the primer proud. To address this, individuals sometimes try to press the primer in, exerting more pressure, crushing the primer in the process. Using the primer seating provided by a single stage press (especially) this is quite possible. Usually, with the hand priming tools provided by a number of manufacturers, this won't happen unless you use the wrong primer pin (e.g., a pin for small rifle primers when seating large rifle primers). This is an opportune time to encourage truing the primer pocket before loading virgin brass to avoid any such possibility.

 

[backcountryhunter]

I am "logging" every bit of info I am receiving here ... All the pockets were trued all I did was to squeeze the Hornady hand tool to the point where it "breaks" over center but you can see that the primers are flatter than would be "normal" but there are no marks on the primers & they are will below the surface - I will cap off 20 or so and if they all detonate I guess I'll just use 'em - any further feedback or comment would be appreciated ! thank you

 

[DrMike]

No marks on the primers? I doubt that you have crushed them. You want them to bottom out on the primer pocket, and it sounds as if that is what you have done. I don't think you'll have a problem.

 

[JD338]

I agree, I don't think you have a problem. It would take a fair amount of force to crush the anvil in the primer and doing so would most likely leave some type of tooling mark on the primers themself.

JD338

 

[backcountryhunter]

I capped off 12 of them that I picked randomly out of the box and they all fired and sounded the same so I'm goin' with it and chalking it up to a lesson learned - thank you to ALL for the comments and feedback, it is great to have this resource !!