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Posted: 4/23/2010 10:19:51 AM EDT
| First time reloading .223, long time reloader for pistol/shotgun. Using CCI #41 primers, looks like a good firing pin hit but it might take 3 strikes before they go. Same session, Remington and Wolf had no problems. Are the CCIs just that much harder or did I just get a bad lot of primers or maybe something else? |
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I have never had a problem with CCI. 99% of the time that is the only brand I use. Once... my hand priming tool "wore out" & wasn't seating them deep enough & that is what happened (2-3 strikes to fire). Discovered the issue w/ .380 rounds, but had to fix some .223's once I finally figured out what happened. NOW... I was at the range 2 weeks ago, and a guy was there shooting among other things... a .204 ruger. He was having the same issue. They were CCI 400's and were seated below flush. He had solid hits on the primer. I think he had 6 or 7 out of 50. Tried to fire the rounds 3 times, but they would not go off. He was going to try to disassemble them & look at the primers. I think he loaded them on a progressive, but I don't remember. I thought maybe the anvils were missing. Maybe there is an issue with CCI because of the hyper production levels? All I know is that in 25 +/- years, I've never had a problem with CCI primers that ended up being an issue with the primer. |
| I have heard of trigger springs being incorrectly installed and causing this problem. Light match weight trigger springs can do it too. More often than not the primer isn't fully seated to the bottom of the primer pocket. You should feel it go completely home. It won't hurt anything to seat them again, sometimes that's all that's needed. |
| Thanks for the input, keep it coming. Right now I am thinking that it is a primer seating issue, especially because I fired other brands of ammo at this session and everything else went boom. I know none of the primers were extended past the primer pocket. How far past flush does it need to be? I am loading these on a Rock Chucker and on priming I am sure the arm is as far up as it is going to go. |
| Harder primer means force force required to "prime" the anvil when seating the primer. It's taking multiple strikes because the anvil isn't as close to the cup as it needs to be because the primer wasn't properly crushed when installed. Put more force on the primers when you seat them. |
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Quoted:
First time reloading .223, long time reloader for pistol/shotgun. Using CCI #41 primers, looks like a good firing pin hit but it might take 3 strikes before they go. Same session, Remington and Wolf had no problems. Are the CCIs just that much harder or did I just get a bad lot of primers or maybe something else? CCI arsenal primers are harder than normal, but this shouldn't be happening. Common causes of primer ignition issues are: 1) Excessive headspace 2) Worn out / weak hammer spring 3) Out of spec or damaged firing pin I would look into these issues first. A properly built rifle should have no problems igniting CCI 41s. |
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Quoted:
I have heard of trigger springs being incorrectly installed and causing this problem. Light match weight trigger springs can do it too. More often than not the primer isn't fully seated to the bottom of the primer pocket. You should feel it go completely home. It won't hurt anything to seat them again, sometimes that's all that's needed. Hate to admit it but I've had this happen in a AR. Took the gun home and found that I had installed the hammer spring on backwards. Turned it around and she fired every round. Was using CCIs in my reloads (.223). r/avi |
I had my first reload dud at the range yesterday. It was a CCI #34 in my remi. 308 bolt gun. It had a good firing pin strike with ample dimple. Handled it gingerly, did not try a restrike, and plopped it in the range "Live Round" bucket. Probably made on night shift at CCI.
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Quoted:
Harder primer means force force required to "prime" the anvil when seating the primer. It's taking multiple strikes because the anvil isn't as close to the cup as it needs to be because the primer wasn't properly crushed when installed. Put more force on the primers when you seat them. My guess is the primers were not seated to the bottom of the primer pocket. You want primers .002 to .008 below the case head. The crimp may or may not been fully removed, making primer seating difficult. If you have a RCBS swaging die, you can use the swaging spud as a go / no go gauge to determine if the crimp is removed. 
Crimped primer pocket. 
Crimp removed. |
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I have heard of trigger springs being incorrectly installed and causing this problem. Light match weight trigger springs can do it too. More often than not the primer isn't fully seated to the bottom of the primer pocket. You should feel it go completely home. It won't hurt anything to seat them again, sometimes that's all that's needed. Hate to admit it but I've had this happen in a AR. Took the gun home and found that I had installed the hammer spring on backwards. Turned it around and she fired every round. Was using CCIs in my reloads (.223). r/avi I'm definitely not going to admit this has happened to me. jonblack |
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I have heard of trigger springs being incorrectly installed and causing this problem. Light match weight trigger springs can do it too. More often than not the primer isn't fully seated to the bottom of the primer pocket. You should feel it go completely home. It won't hurt anything to seat them again, sometimes that's all that's needed. Hate to admit it but I've had this happen in a AR. Took the gun home and found that I had installed the hammer spring on backwards. Turned it around and she fired every round. Was using CCIs in my reloads (.223). r/avi I'm definitely not going to admit this has happened to me. jonblack My buddy did that on his first AR build. Worked fine with Wolf ammo, wouldn't fire anything else. |
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First time reloading .223, long time reloader for pistol/shotgun. Using CCI #41 primers, looks like a good firing pin hit but it might take 3 strikes before they go. Same session, Remington and Wolf had no problems. Are the CCIs just that much harder or did I just get a bad lot of primers or maybe something else? CCI arsenal primers are harder than normal, but this shouldn't be happening. Common causes of primer ignition issues are: 1) Excessive headspace 2) Worn out / weak hammer spring 3) Out of spec or damaged firing pin I would look into these issues first. A properly built rifle should have no problems igniting CCI 41s. For reloaded ammunition primers not seated to the bottom of the primer pocket are a leading cause. If you had no problems with factory ammunition this is pretty likely. Matching factory primer depth may not work depending on tolerance differences between the factory primers and the ones you used. Add to primer differences normal variation in the primer pocket depth. The leverage in a reloading press is not conducive to primer seating, and the friction in the hand primer tools does not help either. A dot of molly grease on the hand primer were the hand piece pushes the ram helps. The RCBS bench primer tool (the straight arm one) works very well. You can easily feel when the primer bottoms out in the pocket. |
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