I just returned from a elk hunt. On Sunday the weather was cold with some snow.
We started the truck. My rifle was in the truck and the heater was on. We got to the are we were going to hunt and the guy I was hunting with looked at my shell holder on the stock, and told me my primers were gone. I was missing two primers on the shell holder and two more came out in the magazine.
The brass was once fired winchester brass. I know the primers were in the brass. I take every shell I load for hunting and inspect it after loading and run it through the gun to make sure everything works fine for the hunt.
The inside of the truck was pretty warm and the heater was set on the floor. The rifle was on the seat with the butt down. The outide temp was probably in the middle 20's. Could the heater have caused the primers to fall out? I have reloaded for 17 years and I have never seen this. Also when I put the primers in I remember the fit was snug.
Any Ideas?
Thanks Ron

[ 12-18-2002, 18:13: Message edited by: Idaho Ron ]

Although the different metals (in the brass and primer cups respectively) have different expansion ratios it seems to me to be a combination of that and loose primer pockets.

I have NEVER heard of this despite living and shooting in some very cold climates and riding to those places in very warm trucks.

I would have thought loose primer pockets too. But this brass was for a fact once fired. It was originally fired from a remington 760, before I loaded them for my pre-64
Ron

Idaho I've hunted in temperatures as cold as minus 40 and have never had a problem with primers falling out.Whether once fired or fired 10 times those primer pockets are oversized. Could be from too much pressure or in the way the primer pocket was cleaned. I know a guy was using a reamer intended to remove the crimp from GI primer pockets to clean his primer pockets. Turned out the reamer was slightly oversized and he ruined several boxes of brass before he figured than out. I think you should be looking for some new brass. A few boxes of new brass are pretty cheap when compared to the cost of a hunting trip,licenses etc.

Never heard of such a thing either. Just as a guess, is it possible you accidentally used small rifle or even pistol primers? Bear in Fairbanks

Snowman, I use a lee primer pocket cleaner that only scrapes the bottom of the pocket.
Bear, I only use federal 210 primers. I don't even have any small primers.
That is the thing that is so strange about the whole thing. I have reloaded for a quite a while and I have hunted like this for many years. This is the first time I have seen this happen.
Could the 760 have a problem that might make the pockets larger?
Ron

WOW--this will cause some "pondering". Do you use a hand primer?? If not, and you try one, you'll never load without one. The feeling you get when seating is about 100 times better than using a press. A couple years ago a guy gave me some 300 wby brass that was "once shot". When I seated the primers I could feel the pocket was about half as tight as it should have been. When I handed him the reloads I said to him "let me guess, you shot these on a sunny day that was over 80 degrees." He looked at me in amazement and said how did you know??

I have had (recently) some winchester brass that had poor primer pockets--in this case they had to be reamed out to get the primer flush/below the case head. I think Winchester brass (or should I say metalurgy) is great but their quality control ranks with a Yugo car!

You never put the primers in there! I won a high average big bore league when my competitor "fired" a round without a primer. He was shooting right from his loading block and had never checked that every case had been primed! Someone found a round for him, he did not have extra, but the disruption resulted in a bad shot.

We all make mistakes so just try to check a little more next time.

I have that problem all the time!!!!!! For me its to much POWDER, and my primers come out kinda burnt?

Good luck
Chuck

[ 12-19-2002, 02:50: Message edited by: Chuck66 ]

Hey Ron, What is the cartridge? And what is the load you used in the first shot through the cases?

Savage 99, I know I checked the shells. I check every shell I hunt with prior to a hunt. I put every one in the gun and made sure they would chamber. I also put them in the shell holder on the gun stock. When I load shells I pre count the number of primers I need. I would have had 4 extra.
Hotcore, I got the cases from a guy I work with. He told me today that a friend of his that "tinkers" with making guns loaded them as new cases. The necks are clean and they have the new look not a tumbled look. They came out of a 270 win.
He did say that those loads never shot worth a damn in his rifle, and were about 15 years old.
Ron

[ 12-19-2002, 06:43: Message edited by: Idaho Ron ]

I should have added that I had a cow hunt. I got her that same day. The load was 270 win, 140gr hornady at 3000. I am not making excuses for not getting one I am just trying to figure out if I need to dump some cases. Ron

Ron, for me there's never any question how tight they fit, I can still feel how they go in with the Dillon press. Sometimes a little loose one comes along for some reason but it gets used anyway, unless it feels like it MAY fall out then it's pitched (rare). How did the primers feel going in?

I found some Remington primers that wouldn't work in my 454 Casull, they just wouldn't stay in. New brass and everything, they were just too loose. First time I tried them though, I never use Rem primers and never did after that either so... Good luck. I don't see how they'd fall out though on a press fit. Suck to have to use superglue on em too.

I think Hot Core has exactly the right procedure to follow. Be sure to not reload this brass with the loose primer pockets. Junk it, the cost could be far more than $12 or so for another batch of cases.

Whatever happened it seems to me that you have some extremely loose primer pockets or did NOT seat the primers. It is amazing what people will overlook if interrupted. (I now lock the door when reloading) Also, this is not uncommon even with some new brass (I just had the same experience, with at least one case I could seat primers to the bottom with my THUMB!)

BTW, I did some experimentation with the product under heat (fired primer cups). Even in fairly loose pockets the primers would not come out when heated to extremes. This was using the aforementioned brass where I could seat primers with my thumb.

Idaho, now that you're home, did you check the primer pockets with some new primers to see if they are loose? It sounds to me like the cartridges were fired with excessive loads which stretched their pockets, or the pockets were oversize to begin with, and you did not notice the looseness when loading them. That is about the only explanation that makes sense!! Primers of correct dimensions don't fall out of normal-size primer pockets!! The only other explanation is that St. Hubert doesn't want you shooting any of his animals!!

Hot Core, No I never purchased reloads from anyone. I got these empty cases from a guy I work with. They were loaded for him a long time ago. He didn't know the orignal load other than they didn't shoot well.
The load I spoke of is my load that I loaded my self. It is the 140 hornady with 59.5 gr of H4831 at a chronographed exact speed of 2998. I have some cases that I have loaded several times. Other than this time, I have never had a brass problem at all.


eldeguello, You wrote,
"Idaho, now that you're home, did you check the primer pockets with some new primers to see if they are loose? "
No I didn't untill you mentioned it. They pushed in with my thumb. The pockets are loose!
I used my press to put the primers in with. I don't remember right now about tightness of the pockets. I think I will go through my brass carefully and toss everything that looks questionable.
Thanks guys, Ron

As Holmes would say, "Aha!! Just as I deduced!!"

Apparantly that first load that was shot with those cases was a duzie!!

I have been watching this thread and that is what I suspected all along, that is about the only thing that will enlarge a primer pocket, a too hot load........

I ABSOLUTELY WILL NOT PRIME WITHOUT MY HAND PRIMER!! It tells me very clearly how many loads are left in the brass I'm loading--AND if I've been naughty in the past.

Before you throw out that brass, it might be interesting to measure case heads from the outside. Maybe the first time these were fired, it was a hot load or in a chamber that was a little too big to support the case heads.

Or this could be just a batch of brass that's too soft. Most times I've heard of somebody getting a batch of cases that were too soft, it's from a high-end outfit in a nonstandard caliber, but I suppose Winchester could have turned out a bad run of 270 at one time.

In any event, the outside diameter of the case head would be an interesting measurement. Then chuck 'em.

H. C.

Is it possible the 760 Remington that fired the rounds first had an oversized chamber? The brass could have expanded more than you thought. I have a 760 in 300 Savage and a bolt action in the same chambering. Rounds that are fired in the 760 won't size down small enough for the bolt gun.
Just a guess.

Bob257

Throw all the brass away and write it off to experience. I have loaded with all sorts of tools and you don't have to load strictly with a hand held primer to know what you are doing seating primers. In fact, sometimes I think you can do an INFERIOR job with a hand held tool.

The important thing to remember is that regardless of the TYPE priming tool you use, each method of priming has it's own "feel." Whatever the "feel" for your priming method is, if it doesn't feel right...especially loose...that should tell you right off there is a serious problem with the case.

Sounds to me like you bought some well cleaned up junk.

Ron this has happened to me too in my 7mm rem mag I use winchester brass, but not in my 300 win mag or 375 h&h mag where I use Remington brass. So I called winchester and they said use winchester primers and that will stop happening.then I call cci and they said the loads were to hot and to drop the weight down. I dropped the power .5 grains and it stopped

This is one reason that I only use brass that is new or that I have used since new soI know it's history.I also throw away any brass that the primer goes into too easily.