Well this is a first... failure to fire

[DoubleOught-BMA]

Went to the range today to do a seating depth ladder test and after about 20 rounds I had 2 fail-to-fire (light primer strikes?), followed by 1 good round, followed by another FTF. At that point I called it quits. I've never, ever had this happen. I've successfully handloaded several thousand rounds (various calibers) with my single stage coax press and micrometer seater dies... so I'm a little confused. A bit more detail:

1) This was with new brass. I did full-length resize before loading.
2) I've always used CCI primers... this is my first time using Federal. I'm about at #80 in the box... I'd say these were primers 80, 81 and 83.
3) The action is an Impact Precision... only about a year old. I've probably got ~1200 rounds through it.
4) Before this range trip, i had taken the firing pin assembly and ejector out of the bolt to help measure lands. I've done this several times before and it went back the same way it always had. First 20 shots were fine.

So... what do yall think it could be? Something gunked up somewhere? Firing pin spring issue? Sorry if this is a stupid question (it feels like one) but before I start messing around figured I'd ask you folks. Thoughts? As always... thanks.

 

[John Glidewell]

firing pin protrusion or primer seating. Primer should be seated .005-.008 below the case head. Most of the Smiths I have talked to recommend firing pin protrusion between .045 to .055.

 

[ajwcotton]

First guess would be primers not seated all the way. Second would be how much you sized the brass. All that is assuming the firing pin assembly and bolt are indeed clean and lightly lubed. Also check the firing pin hile for a piece of primer/debris that could be slowing it down.

 

[1500varmint]

First guess would be primers not seated all the way. Second would be how much you sized the brass. All that is assuming the firing pin assembly and bolt are indeed clean and lightly lubed. Also check the firing pin hile for a piece of primer/debris that could be slowing it down.

Agree. Firing pin assembly not cleaned/functioning properly and high primer are usually the culprit according to reloaders I've spoken to about this.

Happened to me once with 9mm pistol ammo. Turned out that there was a wear spot on my progressive press that had built up over time that resulted in primers not fully seating.

 

[Vodak]

Did you pull the rounds that didn't fire to check the primer strike? Did break down those rounds yet to check (assuming they didn't go on a second strike) to see whats going on inside?

I just went through a round of this doing load development myself. In my case I found that the primers I was trying to use (wolf srp mag's) were being hit with sufficient force and igniting, but that they were not sufficient to ignite the powder reliably. When I broke the cartridges down I could see that the primers had indeed lit. The powder kernels at the base of the cartridge were discolored and clumped together, but the were not lighting. So I'm going to be experimenting with different primers next to see if that cures it, or maybe the powder just can not be lit with the small flash hole brass I was using.

 

[kthomas]

What cartridge are you shooting? Are you by chance fire forming loads?

 

[bschneiderheinze]

I’ve had three federal gold medal primers not go off lately first time I’ve ever not had them go off.

 

[Steel head]

On the cartridge side, soft seated primers And/or headspace issues are likely culprits.

 

[DoubleOught-BMA]

Well, I pulled the firing pin assembly and it was a little dirty perhaps, so I wiped it down and very lightly lubricated it. I've dry fired it a bunch since then and it sounds/feels good... but it always has (I dry fire a lot). I really am perplexed here. I inspect the primer after each seating and I've never had this happen. It seems unlikely that the QA/QC on these would result in a batch of bad primers... but maybe? I guess if I switched back to CCI and it does it again that will rule out bad primer. COAL, primer seating depth all look good. I guess I could send my bolt/firing pin to a smith for inspection? Pic shows fired case, FTF, unfired. I dunno.

 

[Vodak]

If that center picture is of one that the pin struck there's definitely some sort of mechanical issue or dirt/debris was slowing it down or blocking full travel. The one of the right even looks like the pin may not have hit all that hard or with enough protrusion. Can we get a picture of the bolt face with the firing pin forward?

 

[PowellSixO]

From the pics, it looks like a primer seating depth issue to me. The fired one looks normal, as it would have moved back to the bolt face after firing. The other two look extremely deep to me. My two cents.

 

[DoubleOught-BMA]

It's an Impact Precision action... here is the bolt face. As far as showing the bolt face with the firing pin forward... (stupid question coming)... how would I do that? Doesn't it cock 50% upon opening?

 

[powerspc]

First guess would be primers not seated all the way. Second would be how much you sized the brass. All that is assuming the firing pin assembly and bolt are indeed clean and lightly lubed. Also check the firing pin hile for a piece of primer/debris that could be slowing it down.

What he said .

It's highly unlikely to be a bad primer unless they got submerged in water or something. Primers are 99.9997% reliable, you would have to fire 300,000 rounds to encounter a bad one. One guess is that they are not seated properly in the pocket. If there is a slight air gap between the primer and the bottom of the primer pocket it acts as a cushion even with a hard primer strike (the energy from the firing pin is absorbed by fully seating the primer when it strikes it). I would make sure you are seating your primers deep enough (you should be measuring/checking this anyway). It should be .002" to .009" below flush, but in any case seated to the bottom of the pocket.

 

[DoubleOught-BMA]

After studying the seating depth, I tend to agree these look seated a tad deeper than I'm used to seeing with my CCIs. I'm going to try seating some CCIs and comparing the 2 depths. It never occurred to me that Federal primers might seat deeper? I'm using a Forster Coax press.

 

[Vodak]

Check the depth first. Now that it's been brought up the one that was struck, but did not fire does look deeper than either of the other two in the picture.
I'm not familiar with the Impact cocking mechanism so the following may not apply. Sounds like you managed to get it taken apart for cleaning, so I'm betting you'll be able to work with what I'm going to say to sort it out. Pretty much every bolt action has similar design. You should be able to rotate the cocking piece into the ramped cut out so it falls forward. it will bottom out either on the end of that ramp, or on the firing pin collar on the pin itself. The pin will now be at it's maximum protrusion which is normally .035"-.055" depending on the action. I would expect that the impact is probably more likely to be on the lower side of that.
If you have calipers or a depth micrometer measure from the top of the bolt face to tip of the pin, and to the bottom of the bolt recess, the difference between the too being your pin protrusion. There are fancy gauges and such to getting an exacting measurement, but ballpark will be fine for troubleshooting.
Then the fun part, wrestling the thing back into the cocked position so you can get it back in the rifle! If you've never done it before here's a little advice on that as well. Use the edge of a block of wood or edge of your work bench (not the wifes granite countertops) to push the cocking piece back up, and rotate it into position. Think through how you're going to need it to rotate and where your knuckles are. It's a fair amount of force to compress the spring, and a little surface to apply it to. Pretty easy to slip and scratch up your bolt or remove all that unnecessary skin off of your knuckles.

 

[NighthawkCG]

After studying the seating depth, I tend to agree these look seated a tad deeper than I'm used to seeing with my CCIs. I'm going to try seating some CCIs and comparing the 2 depths. It never occurred to me that Federal primers might seat deeper? I'm using a Forster Coax press.

I am pretty sure powerspc was implying the primers were too high (not far enough in), not too deep. .009 is a pretty deep primer, and from the picture, yours don't look that deep. Have you measured the headspace with Comparator? Compare your fired case to the one that didn't fire and see how much difference is there. Like the primer, if there is too much headspace, the round can shift and absorb the impact.

 

[powerspc]

I am pretty sure powerspc was implying the primers were too high (not far enough in), not too deep. .009 is a pretty deep primer, and from the picture, yours don't look that deep. Have you measured the headspace with Comparator? Compare your fired case to the one that didn't fire and see how much difference is there. Like the primer, if there is too much headspace, the round can shift and absorb the impact.

Correct, not seated deep enough. You can get a small air pocket between the primer anvil and the bottom of the primer pocket. When you strike the primer cup the air pocket acts as a cushion; likely the primer looks well struck which tends to cause people to rule out a light primer strike but still leaves them scratching their head. You should be measuring the depth of the primer pocket, know the dimensions of the primer itself (refer to chart above) and measuring the depth they are seated at to be sure you are seating deeply enough.

 

[DoubleOught-BMA]

Correct, not seated deep enough. You can get a small air pocket between the primer anvil and the bottom of the primer pocket. When you strike the primer cup the air pocket acts as a cushion; likely the primer looks well struck which tends to cause people to rule out a light primer strike but still leaves them scratching their head. You should be measuring the depth of the primer pocket, know the dimensions of the primer itself (refer to chart above) and measuring the depth they are seated at to be sure you are seating deeply enough.

OK - great feedback. I'll give that a shot. It's really pissing me off that I can't find the right recipe with these DTACs. I'm loosing my patience and this sudden wrinkle isn't helping. I really appreciate y'all helping though!

 

[357Max]

I would disassemble the light strike round and put a piece of electrical tape on the back. Trim it to cover back of case, see if bolt closes? If it does add another piece & try again. Each piece = about .006", this is your head space.

You can get more accurate with clear scotch tape = .004 -.005" depending on brand. For reference, if it closes easily with 1 piece of scotch tape, your shoulder bump needs reduced.

When fired the back of the brass stretches back to meet the bolt face. The more it has to stretch the quicker you'll get the death ring.

I suspect the shoulder is bumped back to far. Your spring loaded ejector button will push the case forward until shoulder contacts the chamber, thus creating a gap between primer & pin.

 

[DoubleOught-BMA]

I would disassemble the light strike round and put a piece of electrical tape on the back. Trim it to cover back of case, see if bolt closes? If it does add another piece & try again. Each piece = about .006", this is your head space.

You can get more accurate with clear scotch tape = .004 -.005" depending on brand. For reference, if it closes easily with 1 piece of scotch tape, your shoulder bump needs reduced.

When fired the back of the brass stretches back to meet the bolt face. The more it has to stretch the quicker you'll get the death ring.

I suspect the shoulder is bumped back to far. Your spring loaded ejector button will push the case forward until shoulder contacts the chamber, thus creating a gap between primer & pin.

I guess my confusion is to why... after approx 1000 rounds through these particular dies and this particular gun... would primer seating and/or bump back errors occur suddenly. Maybe it was just an issue because I did a full resize (including shoulder bump) on this batch of virgin brass that hadn't been fired in my chamber yet? Maybe that did it? And maybe I was just lucky that the first 20 I fired (virgin but resized) just magically worked? It would make sense if something was mechanically impeding the firing pin which is why it went from a non-existent problem to one that suddenly pops up.. but even still... it wasn't that gummed up (if at all). Man I'm so confused at this point.

 

[357Max]

Try the tape!

6xc was a Tubb wildcat before Norma made brass. Was your rifle chambered with a Norma spec reamer???
All I'm saying is you've got Norma virgin brass (that may already be on loose side in your chamber) and then you bumped shoulder back .00?

From the information given, simplest answer is loose head space. Tape will confirm and costs nothing. If, however head space checks good, then you've narrowed it to primer depth, firing pin, or spring.

 

[DoubleOught-BMA]

I will definitely try the tape.

 

[NighthawkCG]

I guess my confusion is to why... after approx 1000 rounds through these particular dies and this particular gun... would primer seating and/or bump back errors occur suddenly. Maybe it was just an issue because I did a full resize (including shoulder bump) on this batch of virgin brass that hadn't been fired in my chamber yet? Maybe that did it? And maybe I was just lucky that the first 20 I fired (virgin but resized) just magically worked? It would make sense if something was mechanically impeding the firing pin which is why it went from a non-existent problem to one that suddenly pops up.. but even still... it wasn't that gummed up (if at all). Man I'm so confused at this point.

I've had dies loosen up in a string of reloading before. Also had factory rounds have anywhere from 1-4 failure to fires in a box of 20 due to improper headspace on the casing. Sometimes they go bang, sometimes they don't. One exceptionally bad factory round that didn't go bang when put in a headspace/cartridge gauge.

 

[Thud]

Take the rounds apart carefully. Check it see if the primer was fired,
Check the flash hole to see if any corn cob or polishing media is in the hole(if you vibrate the cases) I have donethat and hadsome ftf.
Check if there is powder in the case, did that also.
Before taking the rifle apart do some simple stuff first. I always start with the ammo first.
Let us know what happened.

 

[natdscott]

Yeah, I mean one time I was playing softball and slid into third, sorta jangled up the boys. Thought it was fine, but that night with the ol lady..

oh shit.

Wrong forum.




I WILL say though that sometimes SR primers don’t like the gigantic FP tip in most Remington actions, especially is FP fall or protrusion is a little on the shy side. A Tubb kit, or similar, can bandaid it, but the best solutions are either a smaller pin, or going to primers.

 

[E. Bryant]

I'm having problems with the incorrect-headspace theory. If firing pin protrusion is anywhere near spec, then it would be very difficult to push back the shoulder so far as to prevent ignition. That's the sort of stuff that usually happens when someone tries to run .40S&W through a 10mm or any number of other similarly-poor ideas. It's not what happens when I run shouldered rifle brass into my full-length die a couple extra thou. I'm sure that I could do it, but it'd take more than a casual error.

Insufficient ignition from improper primer/powder combinations normally shows up as an unacceptable variation in velocity, not misfires (at least in my experience with pistol reloading; I've never encountered it in a rifle).

My probability-based bet is that there is a mechanical problem with the primer seating, or possibly an issue with the firing pin (much more likely to be the former than the latter, since that was the variable which changed). I'm assuming that it wasn't cold enough in the OP's AO to cause ignition problems because the firing pin lube was excessively thick, but I'll still throw it out there in case the dude lives somewhere that still sees sub-zero temps in March.

 

[morganlamprecht]

What he said .

It's highly unlikely to be a bad primer unless they got submerged in water or something. Primers are 99.9997% reliable, you would have to fire 300,000 rounds to encounter a bad one. One guess is that they are not seated properly in the pocket. If there is a slight air gap between the primer and the bottom of the primer pocket it acts as a cushion even with a hard primer strike (the energy from the firing pin is absorbed by fully seating the primer when it strikes it). I would make sure you are seating your primers deep enough (you should be measuring/checking this anyway). It should be .002" to .009" below flush, but in any case seated to the bottom of the pocket. View attachment 7282332

speaking of primer reliability/durability....one time i had a batch of 200 cases to prep...for some reason i cant remember, 3 of them had been sized and primed, but werent annealed like i was planning to do to the rest...

i just threw all of them in the wet tumbler and figured the water would kill the primers...after 45 min of wet tumbling, i put all the cases into the annealer and fired it up...all 3 of the primed cases ignited, nice POP...the first 1 scared the crap outta me, the next 2 i was ready for lol

 

[natdscott]

speaking of primer reliability/durability....one time i had a batch of 200 cases to prep...for some reason i cant remember, 3 of them had been sized and primed, but werent annealed like i was planning to do to the rest...

i just threw all of them in the wet tumbler and figured the water would kill the primers...after 45 min of wet tumbling, i put all the cases into the annealer and fired it up...all 3 of the primed cases ignited, nice POP...the first 1 scared the crap outta me, the next 2 i was ready for lol

Yep.


Kroil.

 

[2aBaC̶a̶]

Well, I pulled the firing pin assembly and it was a little dirty perhaps, so I wiped it down and very lightly lubricated it. I've dry fired it a bunch since then and it sounds/feels good... but it always has (I dry fire a lot). I really am perplexed here. I inspect the primer after each seating and I've never had this happen. It seems unlikely that the QA/QC on these would result in a batch of bad primers... but maybe? I guess if I switched back to CCI and it does it again that will rule out bad primer. COAL, primer seating depth all look good. I guess I could send my bolt/firing pin to a smith for inspection? Pic shows fired case, FTF, unfired. I dunno.

Pictures can be deceiving but those primers look like they are on the edge of being too deep.

As much as +/- .001" can be all the difference between fire and no fire.

Put a small straight edge on the back of the case and compare.

 

[NighthawkCG]

I'm having problems with the incorrect-headspace theory. If firing pin protrusion is anywhere near spec, then it would be very difficult to push back the shoulder so far as to prevent ignition. That's the sort of stuff that usually happens when someone tries to run .40S&W through a 10mm or any number of other similarly-poor ideas. It's not what happens when I run shouldered rifle brass into my full-length die a couple extra thou. I'm sure that I could do it, but it'd take more than a casual error.

Insufficient ignition from improper primer/powder combinations normally shows up as an unacceptable variation in velocity, not misfires (at least in my experience with pistol reloading; I've never encountered it in a rifle).

My probability-based bet is that there is a mechanical problem with the primer seating, or possibly an issue with the firing pin (much more likely to be the former than the latter, since that was the variable which changed). I'm assuming that it wasn't cold enough in the OP's AO to cause ignition problems because the firing pin lube was excessively thick, but I'll still throw it out there in case the dude lives somewhere that still sees sub-zero temps in March.

I don't disagree with your thoughts on mechanical problem (seen lube do that in above freezing temps), but the headspace should not be ignored and may be easier to figure/rule out. The issue has been well documented with 300 BLK, particularly from Hornady, Barnes and Remington ammo and the Ruger American Ranch rifle. There were plenty of cases of what could be considered tolerance stacking where the rounds were short, the chambers long and no booms. My round pictured above is one example had plenty more laying around at one point.

I'd start at the ammo, rule that out and then move to the hardware. OP never even indicated if he tried factory rounds after this issue. I'm making an assumption here, but any reloader should have the right tools to measure their ammo and at minimum compare rounds. It should be a quick and easy check without having to disassemble anything or measure FP protrusion etc.

 

[NighthawkCG]

Pictures can be deceiving but those primers look like they are on the edge of being too deep.

As much as +/- .001" can be all the difference between fire and no fire.

Put a small straight edge on the back of the case and compare.

The back of caliper works too, to measure the depth (it was designed for that). No eyeballing off of a straight edge required.

 

[Pewpew12]

OP you’ve probably figured this out by now but I had a similar issue and thought I would share—

I think you mentioned this was New Brass. I had a bunch of rounds fail to fire in my new CZ. On close inspection the primers were not seated deep enough.

thanks to pandemic and gun-grabber-fearing masses I’ve been Forced to use S and B primers. These plus new brass equal a very chunky primer insertion. It required full effort on the handle to seat. If I tried the same with used brass, it was much much much easier and smoother to get em in. the new brass probably had very tight pockets and much more resistance when inserting primers

I equate this to the primer pocket size of new vs used brass, and s and b primers that vary a bit more in thickness than the good ole USA primers we are all used too.

Hope you got to the bottom of it

 

[918v]

The middle case on the pic shows what the problem is: the fp barely touched the primer. Why? Answer that question and you’ll solve the problem.

Maybe it’s the fp assembly dragging on something. Perhaps something in the trigger?

Maybe it’s hs? Have you checked the shoulder length on the problem cases?

Did the barrel unscrew itself?

 

[Hawk in WY]

Did you try firing one of the FTF rounds a second time? High primers will sometimes seat on the first strike and fire on the second.

TriggerTech trigger maybe? There are reports of delayed firing pin release. I have had two. Both replaced with no fuss.

 

[acudaowner]

maybe a tiny bit of water left in the case does not take a lot to keep a primer from sparking even two or three days later . besides getting a dehydrator I have been using cheap dollar store que tips to make sure there was no water left so far only had 5 rounds ruined go click and not bang because of water . Good luck to you what ever finding what caused your malfunction .

 

[m1match]

I would not ignore the possibility of the new brass being short on headspace leading to misfires. I just got done firing 223 reloads made from factory new LC 11 brass. I had about 25 misfires and the factory new brass had shoulders that were 15 to 20 thousandths under SAAMI minimum which to me indicates lousy QC on GI brass.