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Posted: 11/24/2012 6:09:50 PM EDT
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I was reading another thread in the reloading sub-forum and someone mentioned pitting of the breach face on their pistol. In that case, the use of small magnum pistol primers was suggested as a cause.
I've never used magnum primers in any of my 1911's yet one of my pistols does show the pitting on the breach face (small circular pattern of light pitting). What might be some other reasons for this pitting? Is it something to be particularly concerned about? |
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Quoted:
I was reading another thread in the reloading sub-forum and someone mentioned pitting of the breach face on their pistol. In that case, the use of small magnum pistol primers was suggested as a cause. I've never used magnum primers in any of my 1911's yet one of my pistols does show the pitting on the breach face (small circular pattern of light pitting). What might be some other reasons for this pitting? Is it something to be particularly concerned about? You kind of have me at a lose?? 1911 has very little breach face, since you have either the hood, or the bottom throated area of the barrel. If the hood, then that is an interaction of the barrel to the breach of the side (debris or set too tight) and if at the throat-ed area, then erosion for lack of cleaning or corrosive ammo. As for the slide breach face, if you are talking about the ring around the primer, that is due to the primer not sealing off correctly, and allowing hot gas plasma erosion/cutting of the slide breach face. Here, it could just be as simple as the brass primer pocket just worn out, or the primers not seated enough to be expanded to the pocket during loading instead. Even with switching from large primer to small primer brass, the primer still has to seal off to the primer pocket, or you still going to get plasma cutting. |
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You're right, I should have been a little more clear.
It's the breach face on the slide. If it is the result of loose primer pockets, yikes, I've got thousands of pieces of brass I've been using. Most have been reloaded about 5 times. It was my understanding that pistol brass lasts a very long time. I don't know how in the hell I'd identify and isolate any pieces that have loose primer pockets. I would likely have to toss all the older brass and replace. |
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Quoted:
You're right, I should have been a little more clear. It's the breach face on the slide. If it is the result of loose primer pockets, yikes, I've got thousands of pieces of brass I've been using. Most have been reloaded about 5 times. It was my understanding that pistol brass lasts a very long time. I don't know how in the hell I'd identify and isolate any pieces that have loose primer pockets. I would likely have to toss all the older brass and replace. Don't know if I would toss the brass (only if the primers was falling out of a loaded round), but would help to know what machine you are using to reload/primer brass with to start with. Also, if this is military brass, then could have been that the primer pockets where over sized swagged to remove the primer stakinigs as well. |
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The joys of a progressive machine!!!!!!
Let me take a guess, being that you are tumbling the brass with the spent primer still in the case, then de-priming and priming all at the same time. All the while, not cleaning the primer pockets bottom fouling before the new primer is seated. Then the next joy, being that both the 550 and 650, like the LNL, requires that back check of the handle rod to seat a primer in the pocket, instead of the primer seating depth being more unified like that of the downward stroke instead like on the 1050. Granted that the back section of the primer may be a bit peen now as you set the primers, it really the front/most inward of the primer cup section that needs to get a good seal to a clean primer pocket, instead of the exposed cup side alone that you may only be peen now. So on that note, may want to two step the brass. Being that you de-prime and size the brass through the first pass of the machine (bolt on sizer from Dillion would work to size as well in that first pass), throw the brass back in the tumbler a second time to allow the media to clean the primer pockets (or go in by hand with a primer pocket cleaner and unify the primer flash holes if you have not done so yet), then run the brass through the machine a second time to actually load the brass on that pass. This is how I load 9mm major (even with a Lee FLD in play for final crimping and don't need to unify trim), hence spend the extra time/brass prep; even when I know that I going to let the brass fly since it will never be loaded again due to the pressures that the load put on the brass. |
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Wow! That's a helluva thing.
I now wonder why this hasn't been a bigger, more publicized issue. While I've only been reloading for 3 or 4 years, this has never been on my radar (with pistol cartridges). I know that more care is usually given to loading rifle cartridges, but your method (although reasonable considering the issue) kind of defeats the purpose of a progressive press. I've never seen this method of modified progressive reloading discussed in any other publications or forum. I'm not necessarily doubting you, I'm just surprised. Thanks for the input. |
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another solution clean the primer pockets with a primer pocket cleaner from rcbs i se the machine for all of the prep work for deburring and chamfering and cleaning the primer pockets Dillon offers a trimmer that can be added to the tool head to do case trimming as the cases are being reloaded/going through the machine, but never have seen anything that can be bolted/added onto a progressive machine to do primer pocket cleaning during the reloading progress. If such did exist (with maybe even a primer channel unifier as well), it would solve a lot of grief, and by pass the whole PITA brass processing that needs to be done before the cases are actually loaded. |
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I don't know of anyone who trims, deburs, and chamfers pistol brass. I suppose some do, but it's my understanding that this is largely unnecessary.
That said, I would be very interested in whether anyone who uses a progressive (like a Dillon 550B) actually uses the following method for PISTOL brass: Step 1: tumble/clean fired brass Step 2: size and de-prime Step 3: tumble clean a second time to clean the primer pockets Step 4: reload....prime, drop powder, set bullet, etc. When one is reloading in bulk, like 200 to 500+ rounds in one session, it seems like a lot of extra work. If that's what it takes to ensure that the reloads aren't pitting a breech face, I guess that falls under the heading of "it is what it is." Does anyone follow this methodology when reloading for pistols? A few follow up questions.....can the pitting be corrected short of acquiring a new slide (1911)? And, how problematic (realistically) is a pitted breech face? Does it really matter? edited: learned something new, breech is the correct spelling for this discussion. |
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Would help to post a photo of your slide Breech.
If its the ring around the Firing pin channel, then that is plasma cutting from the primer cup not sealing off the primer pocket correctly or fast enough. But yes, When I loading 9mm major ammo (unlimited class through a $3K pistol), complete brass prep first, then a second pass through the machine to actually load the cases (and this is on brass that will only get fired once, and let it fly since it's not safe to load a second time for 9mm major loading due to the pressures generated by the round and what is does to the brass). |
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Quoted:
Would help to post a photo of your slide Breech. If its the ring around the Firing pin channel, then that is plasma cutting from the primer cup not sealing off the primer pocket correctly or fast enough. But yes, When I loading 9mm major ammo (unlimited class through a $3K pistol), complete brass prep first, then a second pass through the machine to actually load the cases (and this is on brass that will only get fired once, and let it fly since it's not safe to load a second time for 9mm major loading due to the pressures generated by the round and what is does to the brass). This would seem to be exactly the case. I'll try to snap a photo soon. But it seems clear this is the problem. Do you know if this is something that can be 'fixed' or if, eventually, I'll need a new slide? What is the long term downside? |
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Light Plasma cutting of the breech face is not really a problem in general, but what is the problem is if it cutting quick and fast, then you are dumping a lot of hot gas into the firing pin channel as well, and once that gets over-sized, it pretty much game over for the slide.
Again, photo would help and maybe even your load since it could be as simple as the powder too slow to really get the primer to seal off to the pocket,if the primer pockets are on the clean side and not causing the problem. Myself, in 45, only have two loads I use. One is a target load bases on 200gr jacket bullets using either Clays,or N-320 to hit 166MPF, while the other load is P+ with 230Gr flying ashtrays loaded with HS-6. Both of these loads bring the pressure up quick to the top of the Saami allowed pressure ranges (21,000 psi), and don't have the primer pocket leak problems with clean primer pockets. If you are running low pressure loads, may be the reason that you are getting primer leakage as well. |
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Quoted:
Quoted:
Would help to post a photo of your slide Breech. If its the ring around the Firing pin channel, then that is plasma cutting from the primer cup not sealing off the primer pocket correctly or fast enough. But yes, When I loading 9mm major ammo (unlimited class through a $3K pistol), complete brass prep first, then a second pass through the machine to actually load the cases (and this is on brass that will only get fired once, and let it fly since it's not safe to load a second time for 9mm major loading due to the pressures generated by the round and what is does to the brass). This would seem to be exactly the case. I'll try to snap a photo soon. But it seems clear this is the problem. Do you know if this is something that can be 'fixed' or if, eventually, I'll need a new slide? What is the long term downside? Your slide can be fixed by having a pistolsmith bore out the bad and insert a bushing. This is done on occasion to fix firing pin alignment and problems like yours. Similar to bushing a bolt face on a bolt action rifle. Btw the last bolt I had done cost me $70. |
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Dano, Thanks for all your input.
The ring around the firing pin hole is pretty distinctive, so I have no doubt on that issue. My reloads are pretty standard. 4.5 grains of Win 231 under a 230 gr. Berry's RN. Is that considered a "low pressure" load? This weekend, I went through the exercise of de-priming a few hundred cases. The primer pockets were reasonably crudded up. Since I don't have any primer pocket tools, I just tossed them back into the tumbler for some hours of work. While that did clean up some of the fouling in the pockets, it clearly didn't do the whole job. Pocket cleaning tools are currently on the way from Midway! I just dread the exercise of manually cleaning every one of thousands of pieces in my 2, 5 gallon buckets full of brass (most of it once fired). I'm still wondering if I've worn out the pockets on those that I've reloaded half a dozen times. You'd think the brass (being softer than the breech) would suffer more than the breech face as any gas escapes around the primer. I really won't know if my cleaning efforts will have corrected the issue with the possibly overused brass. The pitting is already there; it'll either get worse or stop. So I'm still considering dumping/recycling my older/used brass, as a precaution. BTW, having inspected most of those I de-primed, there were no signs of any gas escaping. None, whatsoever. I would have thought some residue/crud would have shown itself around the primers. ETA - got the picture: 
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Man, where to start.
I guess lets start at the ball powder, and the fact that it takes a very hot primer to get it ignited correctly. With low pressures of around 12K if you can it ignited correctly, might be fine, but there is that whole deal of getting it ignited correctly from the start. Truth is, when you use the right/hot enough primer to get ball powder to ignite correctly, then you start running into deviations in speed due to the variances in the primers alone. Having said that, you are loading about the same MPF/speeds that I am, and would be better served with clays powder instead. Not only does it burn clean, but easy/consistent to ignite as well (don't need a magnum primer to get it burning correctly). Short of that, then there is always bullseye, but it a very dirty burning powder. There is also N-320,but unless you are loading 40cal to MPF as well, then leave it on the store shelf due to the cost of it (N-320 is my limited class load powder of choice to hit 166mpf with a 180gr jacket round). To short bus it here, when loading for the 45 target, you want all the powder to burn out well before the bullet leaves the barrel,and to do so very uniformly. So even when working with slower speed loads, keep the working pressure on the higher side. Running the loads at Saami limits is not gong to wear out the pistol any faster/lead the barrel up faster. Primer pockets, was a time before I came up with my special media/ additive mix that cleaned primer pockets correctly, so before that, it as a RCBS wire primer pocket cleaner on a drill, then switched over to the Lyman solid primer pocket cleaner on the drill instead instead (was wearing out the brushes too fast). Chemical, don't do is since all it does is makes the brass brittle very quickly. As for the slide, yes it ugly, but not at the point to be concerned yet. Getting a load worked up that is not spewing gases out through the primer power that is going to ignite faster/create higher pressures faster should be able to solve most of the problems with clean primer pockets. Also on a side note, not sure the round count of the barrel/time before rebuild, but the face of the slide breech can be cleaned up on the next rebuild when that comes. To sum it up, looks like powder alone may help the cause, and even double checking to make sure that the primer pockets on some of the cases are not worn as well. Primer pockets, if you are noticing that they are very fouled, then your going to need to clean them up at least this batch before reloading. After switching over to clays, double check the primer pockets again in a sample lot, and may find that you may be able to load them a lot more before you have to re-batch back to double stepping the loading process of having to manually clean the primer pockets again. Hope this helps. |
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Quoted:
Man, where to start. Yes, indeed. First, I misstated my load. Dyslexia's a bitch. I use 5.4 grains (not 4.5) of Win 231. I guess lets start at the ball powder, and the fact that it takes a very hot primer to get it ignited correctly. I did not identify my primers, they are Win SP. I assume that is not considered a "very hot primer." Would the Win magnum SP primers be a better choice at this point? I'm not overly concerned with speed, as you mention in the next sentence. With low pressures of around 12K if you can it ignited correctly, might be fine, but there is that whole deal of getting it ignited correctly from the start. Truth is, when you use the right/hot enough primer to get ball powder to ignite correctly, then you start running into deviations in speed due to the variances in the primers alone. Having said that, you are loading about the same MPF/speeds that I am, and would be better served with clays powder instead. Not only does it burn clean, but easy/consistent to ignite as well (don't need a magnum primer to get it burning correctly). Well......I've got another 9 or so pounds of Win 231 to burn up (and about 1500 rounds of .45 loaded), so I won't be switching powders soon. Since I haven't seen the effects on any of my 9mm pistols, I suppose I could use up the 231 on those for the time being. I chose 231 in the first place to try not to have too many kinds of powder on hand. Obviously looking for simplification. Short of that, then there is always bullseye, but it a very dirty burning powder. There is also N-320,but unless you are loading 40cal to MPF as well, then leave it on the store shelf due to the cost of it (N-320 is my limited class load powder of choice to hit 166mpf with a 180gr jacket round). To short bus it here, when loading for the 45 target, you want all the powder to burn out well before the bullet leaves the barrel,and to do so very uniformly. So even when working with slower speed loads, keep the working pressure on the higher side. Running the loads at Saami limits is not gong to wear out the pistol any faster/lead the barrel up faster. So, given the current loading of 5.4 gr. of 231, and based on both the Hornady and Sierra manuals, it appears I could up the load a few tenths without getting into the maximum loads listed (both list 5.7 gr. as maximum). Do you think that would help with the issue/generate higher speeds? Would upping the charge and using the magnum primers be wise? or acceptable? Primer pockets, was a time before I came up with my special media/ additive mix [care to share your recipe?] that cleaned primer pockets correctly, so before that, it as a RCBS wire primer pocket cleaner on a drill, then switched over to the Lyman solid primer pocket cleaner on the drill instead instead (was wearing out the brushes too fast). Chemical, don't do is since all it does is makes the brass brittle very quickly. As for the slide, yes it ugly, but not at the point to be concerned yet. Getting a load worked up that is not spewing gases out through the primer power that is going to ignite faster/create higher pressures faster should be able to solve most of the problems with clean primer pockets. Also on a side note, not sure the round count of the barrel/time before rebuild, but the face of the slide breech can be cleaned up on the next rebuild when that comes. The current round count on the pictured slide is about 16,200, the first half of which were factory. This seems like a dumb question, but, do you have any ideas on whether there is anything at all that one could use to seal the current pitting temporarily, even with successive applications? I can't think of anything that wouldn't just get jetted out after the first shot or two. Just trying to think of a way to limit further damage. To sum it up, looks like powder alone may help the cause, and even double checking to make sure that the primer pockets on some of the cases are not worn as well. I would guess that determining whether or not the pockets are worn, or worn out, would be a difficult exercise. Sounds like a lot of detailed caliper work. Primer pockets, if you are noticing that they are very fouled, then your going to need to clean them up at least this batch before reloading. After switching over to clays, double check the primer pockets again in a sample lot, and may find that you may be able to load them a lot more before you have to re-batch back to double stepping the loading process of having to manually clean the primer pockets again. Hope this helps. Yes, it does. I thank you again for your detailed input. I'm somewhat new to reloading (a couple of years, or so) and some of this kind of detail is not easily gleaned from the usual resources. Regards, ppknut ETA: This thread now probably belongs in the reloading forum. haha |
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ppknut,
At your current load, you already over the top by .1 grains, and have a power factor of 194. http://data.hodgdon.com/cartridge_load.asp 230 GR. LRN Winchester 231 .452" 1.200" 4.3 699 12,200 CUP 5.3 834 16,900 CUP Throwing in a mag primer is just going to put you way over the top, And since we at talking lead cast bullets, got to wonder what is happening as you barrel starts to lead up. Really here, got to ask you if you are seeing any signs of over pressure on the primers, hence flatten out against the edges of the case primer channel. Also a word of advice, do not use Jacketed bullet loads for lead cast bullet loads. Lead bullets seal off to the barrel a lot better/faster, and will cause higher working pressures. |
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The bullets I'm using are Berry's Plated, 230 gr. Round Nose. While they are not FMJ, I wouldn't think they'd be classified as lead cast bullets. Leading has not been an issue.
Both the manuals I cited above show the maximum grain weight at 5.7 grains for Win 231 powder. So I'm a little confused here. At 5.4, I'm below the max. Chrono shows velocities in the ranges listed in those manuals for that load. 750 to 800 fps. I've not seen any signs of over-pressure such as flattened primers. |
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Treat plated bullets the same as lead bullets.
The plating is not thick as jacketed, so you get the same quick sealing of the bullet to the barrel as you will get with a lead casted bullet. As for the breach, leave it alone for now. If and when you do replace the barrel (have one fitted), the breach can be faced to clean it up, then the rest of the parts now fitted to the slide as well. |
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