I just read...

"Another new product offering this year from Lapua will be their 308 Winchester Palma brass with a small primer pocket. There will be a big demand from both 308 shooters and wildcat reloaders. We should see this cartridge arrive in a few months."

Out of curiosity, what would be the advantage to use a small primer in a 308 case?

I can only imagine that it would be uniformity, but how so?

Benchresters and other extreme accuracy freaks tend to follow fads. A few years ago, the idea that small rifle primers, with their presumably lighter charge of fuel, would provide some advantage in precision shooting came into vogue and remains popular with some shooters. The theories on just why this works, if it does, are as varied as the shooters who use them. There are benchresters (and some varminters) who swear by small primers, and others who regard it as witchcraft. I doubt that there are probably any extensive or reliable statistics on its efficacy, but we shooters never let that stop us from following our whims.

Hence, there is significant demand for small primer pockests in cases for cartridges which typically use a large primer. Hence, the response to that demand by manufacturers.

Thanks for the response.

If consistent igition can be found in the 308 Win with small primers, it makes me wonder why magnum primers are even necessary in the larger cases (excluding the truly massive cases ie 600 N.E.).

Some would probably say magnum primers avoid hangfires in cold weather. Many reloading manuals also say it is for use with ball powders while other manuals do not. I'd like to know the real answer but probably never will.

I wonder if small rifle primers can give a consistent ignition on a 308W load in really low temperatures....

It's for benchrest guys...the theory is that the lightest ingnition possible helps keep from 'disturbing' the powder, or perhaps said another way, a less violent start to the process??? At any rate, I wouldn't even try fooling with it for hunting loads in a sporter!

Friend of mine and fellow shooter decided to use a 7mm08 for the 600yd prone matches and just had to have some of the small primer versions of the brass. Looked for quite a while and finally was able to find some and quite pleased with himself I might add. His scores did not improve.

Remington manufactured quite a lot of small primer pocket .308 brass in the early 1980s. I bought 1,000 rounds and experimented with it for 10 years.

Then I sold it all.

My conclusion was that it was, on average, over the span of all "regular" loads, not as "good" as large primers.

The Remington URBR brass was manufactured to produce the 22BR/6mmBR/7mmBR Remington,1.520" length family of cartridges to compete with the PPC family of cartridges.
Remington later produced their BR family in factory ammo & reloading brass.
The 6mmBR Rem brass was offered without a flash hole,then offered primed.

The small pocketed URBR 308 parent brass weighs 155gr,has very consistent.0105" wall thickness & produces the most consistent SD & ES that can be counted on one hand usually & verified across an Oehler 35P chronograph of any available brass to include Lapua large pocket brass.

Rem URBR brass is the only brass that I use in NRA OTC & LR 243/260/7-08/308/7.62 match rifle chambers.

I've bushing & body sized URBR brass 25+ times & it's still going strong.

I have 4500pcs of virgin URBR brass for my 2 life times!!!

quote:

Originally posted by MFD:
Friend of mine and fellow shooter decided to use a 7mm08 for the 600yd prone matches and just had to have some of the small primer versions of the brass. Looked for quite a while and finally was able to find some and quite pleased with himself I might add. His scores did not improve.

I bet if he practiced the same amount of time he looked for the brass his score would have improved.

Lapua designed the 6.5x47 Lapua with a small rifle primer for the very reasons discussed above.

LWD