Pierced Primers? Picture Inside, Help Needed

[bjordan]

I found these two pieces of brass while going through my shot brass from the weekend. These were the only two out of 80. I assume these have pierced primers, what would cause this? Gun is a Rem 700 XCR Tactical 308 26" barrel with 883 rounds down it. 283 rounds since last cleaning. Load is: Win brass on 5th firing, Win WLR primer, 43.3 grains of reloader 15, 175 SMK loaded 2.810” with .01” neck tension. Shot 2550 through the chrono @ 80 degrees. Shooting was done @ 40 degrees the past weekend. The gun has been shot with this same load for the past ~800 rounds. Any help will be greatly appreciated.
*EDIT, added a pic of the bolt face, it seems to have some pitting where the primer would be. I also added a pic of a shot brass without a "pierced primer" beside a loaded brass. It is noticeable that the loaded brass primer is recessed in the case and the shot brass seems to be sticking slightly out of the case.

 

[19Scout77]

Re: Pierced Primers? Picture Inside, Help Needed

Punch out the primers and see if there is a hole in the cup. If no holes, then loose primer pockets are the likely culprit.

 

[turbo54]

Re: Pierced Primers? Picture Inside, Help Needed

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: 19Scout77</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Punch out the primers and see if there is a hole in the cup. If no holes, then loose primer pockets are the likely culprit. </div></div>

No.

Winchester has been making bad primers that do this, lately.

Switch primers, and, contact Winchester with your primer lot numbers if you loaded these yourself.

 

[holy cow]

Re: Pierced Primers? Picture Inside, Help Needed

If not above what scout77 said could be the culprit. I do not shoot large amounts of ammo through my bolt rifles so being in no rush i have always used the Sinclair hand primers and the newer 20th centry hand primer. These type primers i feel are the best out their. You can load quite a bit of ammo with them but are slow if you load alot of pistol or AR ammo. The feel of the primer going into the pocket and when they bottom out is the best. If i feel a primer pretty much fall into the pocket, it is discarded meaning loose pocket.

 

[19Scout77]

Re: Pierced Primers? Picture Inside, Help Needed

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: turbo54</div><div class="ubbcode-body"><div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: 19Scout77</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Punch out the primers and see if there is a hole in the cup. If no holes, then loose primer pockets are the likely culprit. </div></div>

No.

Winchester has been making bad primers that do this, lately.

Switch primers, and, contact Winchester with your primer lot numbers if you loaded these yourself. </div></div>
What do you mean "no"? How the fuck can you tell from those pics if there is a hole in the primer or if the gas leaked around the primer. OP stated there are 5 reloads on the brass...which could loosen up the pockets. It would be irresponsible to blame winchester for bad primers before you ascertain the problem. Once you punch out the primer you will be able to tell if it is the primer or the pocket.

 

[gau17]

Re: Pierced Primers? Picture Inside, Help Needed

from the pictures above it looks like there is a small hole on the primer. You can see it better on the right one.

 

[turbo54]

Re: Pierced Primers? Picture Inside, Help Needed

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: 19Scout77</div><div class="ubbcode-body"><div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: turbo54</div><div class="ubbcode-body"><div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: 19Scout77</div><div class="ubbcode-body">Punch out the primers and see if there is a hole in the cup. If no holes, then loose primer pockets are the likely culprit. </div></div>

No.

Winchester has been making bad primers that do this, lately.

Switch primers, and, contact Winchester with your primer lot numbers if you loaded these yourself. </div></div>
What do you mean "no"? How the fuck can you tell from those pics if there is a hole in the primer or if the gas leaked around the primer. OP stated there are 5 reloads on the brass...which could loosen up the pockets. It would be irresponsible to blame winchester for bad primers before you ascertain the problem. Once you punch out the primer you will be able to tell if it is the primer or the pocket. </div></div>

By "no", I meant that your answer was incorrect.

Based on personal experience as well as having been privy to at least 5 situations where winchester LR primers have done EXACTLY what the OP's did, in addition to the fact that Winchester themselves have admitted they sold a number of lots of bad primers, I am absolutely confident your analysis is incorrect.

I'm ready to eat a plate full of "crow" if I'm wrong, but I'm not.

ETA: I can certainly see there are holes in these primers, not to mention, when a primer leaks (a "smoked" primer), it leaves a circular soot ring all the way around the primer in every instance I've ever seen.

 

[19Scout77]

Re: Pierced Primers? Picture Inside, Help Needed

Turbo...your reading comprehension skills are woefully inadequate.

 

[former naval person]

Re: Pierced Primers? Picture Inside, Help Needed

19Scout77...no matter how many posts you have, Turbo is correct. There is a hole at the edge of the primer. Seen it. Done it. Winnys do that sometimes, and more frequently in the near past. My experience. Sorry 'bout that. As we used to say.

 

[19Scout77]

Re: Pierced Primers? Picture Inside, Help Needed

jesus, this is not about post counts---its about reading comprehension skills---something both engineers and doctors alike seem to lack

. At no point did I say turbo was incorrect...nor did I ever say that the cause of the problem was anything other than faulty primers. Read my post...as I cannot see holes with any degree of certainty, nor did the OP state that there were visible holes...I suggested he remove the primers to see if in fact holes exist.

 

[bjordan]

Re: Pierced Primers? Picture Inside, Help Needed

Thanks for the help so far guys, I haven't had much time to do much checking, I did add a couple more pics of the bolt face and a shot case beside a loaded case. When I get a chance I will pop a primer out and inspect the cup. Any other thoughts of anything that could have changed. These loads have pulled 175 smk's I bought off the hide (first time I've loaded them) and all have new primers I picked up at Gander Mountain. Another thing that is different with these loads are that I used my new Redding dies to resize and load them instead of the LEE dies I've used every time before now.

 

[MtnCreek]

Re: Pierced Primers? Picture Inside, Help Needed

I had similar issues w/ Win LR primers recently. Switched to CCI's and no more problems.

You said the fired primers backed out some. May want to check your sizing die to make sure you’re setting cartridge headspace correct.

 

[RTH1800]

Re: Pierced Primers? Picture Inside, Help Needed

Mtn could be on to something. I think the shoulder could be pushed back too far allowing the primer to back out and thus leak. ( This is not certain, but possiable.) When the pressure builds, case pushes back against bolt, reinserting the primer most of the way. Loose pockets could make this worse. I see no holes for certain in the cases. I do see areas that COULD prove to be holes. That bolt face is telling you that something is FAR wrong. I would get it figured out PRIOR to futher shooting with those loads. BTW I am a doctor and will put my reading comprehension skills up against anyone's.

 

[Fuzzball]

Re: Pierced Primers? Picture Inside, Help Needed

A 'pierced' primer is normally one that the firing pin hit is holed.

What those two cases show is a defective primer that's blown out a pin hole on the unsuported curve of the cup. It happens when the brass stock providers ship rolls of deffective brass to the primer makers and no primer maker is immune to it.

Last brick I had that did that several times was Remington, lot before that had been CCI, both were many years ago. I just used the rest of each brick for low pressure cartridges like .30-30, .35 Rem and cast bullet loads.

The burn holes in that bolt are ugly but harmless, the bolt face supporting both the case head and primer is quite sound. It looks like you've had about ten of those events.

 

[former naval person]

Re: Pierced Primers? Picture Inside, Help Needed

As fuzz says. The roll of brass is punched, blanked, formed and trimmed. If a defect is in the roll, it carries over to the primer itself. If it happens we decry the maker. What is marvelous is that the damn things are so reliable that we kvetch when a fault occurs. Just identify the problem. Let the manufacturer know. Don't damn the whole manufacturer for a faulty piece of thin brass that somehow got through the inspection process. JMHO

 

[Smithcollector]

Re: Pierced Primers? Picture Inside, Help Needed

Had the same thing happen with a 280, using a moderate load with twice fired Rem brass with Winchester primers. Like the above poster,I switched to CCI and have had no further problems. I was afraid I had screwed up the bolt face, but some scrubbing finally cleaned it up.

I had read that this was a known issue with Winchester primers of more recent production. I didn't want to take any chances so I switched.

 

[bjordan]

Re: Pierced Primers? Picture Inside, Help Needed

Thanks everyone. I'll give Winchester a call first of next week and see if they've had any issues with this lot number of primers. I'm also gonna check the shoulder length. I'll report back one I learn more.