can casings with crimped primers be deprimed? do you need a special tool?

thanks
lojack

Over a period of time I have inherited about a thousand pies of brass and loaded ammo that needed pulling and depriming.
For DE-PRIMING I used my regular die, brought the die down until it touched [feel] the primer. Then I litely tapped the handle until the primer exited. Don't forget the SAFETY GRASSES.

Removing crimped primers is not a problem but seating new primers into crimped cases requires the removal of the crimp.

Several options are available for this job. Reamers are made by several mfgrs. as are primer pocket swages. My favorite tool for this job is the Dillon primer pocket swage. While more expensive than the other tools available, if you do a lot of GI cases, the Dillon is the fastest. If you do not expect to do a large volume, RCBS makes a swage for use in any press that works, just not as convenient as the Dillon which is complete with it's own small press.

Regards,
hm

lojack, just to be on the safe side, a couple drops of oil in the flash hole will help prevent primer detonation. Just be sure to clean the cases before reloading.

packrat

Maybe I misunderstood lojack's question. Are we talking about live primers or just removing fired primers?

Live primers can be pushed out but there is always the danger one will detonate, so glasses are necessary safety precaution as Madison has stated. Oil may or may not kill the priming compound so don't count on it 100%. Easy does it.

Regards,
hm

nope not live primers. was going to deprime them, but when the pin got to the primer it started to get difficult to push, so i stopped in fear of breaking the deprimer pin.

As long as pin does not work loose, it will usually not break. They do break occasionally, even w/non crimped primers, however so good idea to keep a few spares on hand. Piano wire works great as decapping pin unless your pins are special w/head on one end.

Regards,
hm