Cleaning Primed Cases?

hounddawg said:
I shot mine without tumbling and the gun did not seem to care they were not shiny
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I'm more worried about the sizing die than the gun. When I get home I'll have another look and see if they are just darkened, or dirty.

hounddawg said:
Oh and don't waste money on a vibratory cleaner, your rotary can be used as a dry media tumbler. I run my Franklin rotary dry with walnut to clean cases that have been FL resized just to get the lube off. It is quieter and polishes the cases just fine
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Good tip, thank you!
 
As much as I love shiny brass, in your case I would take a bullet and see if it dropped into the case, if yes then they were not sized, if a bullet won't go in with finder pressure then they were resized. I would take one, load a bullet only and make sure it would chamber in the rifle properly. Tumbling them shpuldnt cause a problem, I am sure a few slip by me with a granule of media in the flasholea, no issues so far. Removing live primers on a press is also a non issue simplly press them out and go.on if you wish, I have removed many.
 
You "could" remove the de-capping pin on you neck sizing die and adjust it up so the size plug will NOT strike/contact the primer and knock it out of the primer pocket. RCBS NS dies are easy to do once you get the mandrel freed up.

If you decide to just knock the live primers out, just take your time, line the case up as good as you can, and ease the lever down after making contact with the live primer. Steady pressure and the live primer will pop out just like a spent primer. Just don't keep your face close to the press when the pin makes contact for safety purposes. A primer could go off, but unlikely. I de-primed more live primers than I really care to admit to.
 
Lbussy - I'm more worried about the sizing die than the gun. When I get home I'll have another look and see if they are just darkened, or dirty.
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How would they get dirty? I would assume you don't just toss them into a uncovered coffee can in a corner of a shed for storage

Wally World zip lock bags and Dollar Store 3 x 5 cards with dates etc are the ticket for storing cases. I live less than a half mile from salt water so my brass will dull out in a heartbeat even stored in ziplocks but it never gets dirty
 
I have a bunch of FA 49 30-06 case's with the original primer's in them. I was skeptic that they would even fire. Didn't make any attempt to clean the case's was more concerned with the primer's. Every primer so far has worked fine and I gave no though to cleaning the case's. If the case's looked like they really needed cleaning, de-prime and clean. Then you know there is no problem. Other than those FA 49 case's, I have never put primer's in case's and then stored them away!
 
springer99 said:
Can you safely do it? Yes.

Would I do it? No.

If the cases are already primed, there's too much chance of having the media plug the flash hole.
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Some time's I clean case's after sizing and some time's before. The primed after cases often have a bit of cob stuck in the flash hole. The case's I clean before sizing, always give me bits of cob when I re-size them and push the primer's out.
 
Okay so good news. I re-checked out the cases and got my calipers out. They are sized and just tarnished, not dirty. This was REALLY good news for me because right underneath that box was another one marked "1000" with more primed cases. I guess I felt froggy one weekend and primed them all.
 
Lee, thanks for staring this one. I did the same thing. I found 500 primed 223 in a plastic bag inside a plastic jar in my basement last Sunday. I sort of remember doing this about 1999 or 2000.

They all were the AN 11 headstamp so they are Lake City brass. I feel pretty sure I sized, trimmed, and reamed the primer pockets since they are primed. They all are the same length and fit my Wilson case gauge. I was planning to load them up and saw this thread.

I wonder what else I have squirreled away and forgotten about.
 
Tsquared said:
I wonder what else I have squirreled away and forgotten about.
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It's an eye opener. If you are like me you sometimes don't make notes/labels as people here have recommended. You think "I'm going to use these, no way I'll forget what I did." ... and then you forget. I'm definitely going to try to improve there.
 
"
Originally Posted by RC20 View Post
If they are primed then they have to have been sized."


"Not in my house ... I often prime with a hand primer while watching TV."

If you are priming then they must have been decapped? with my dies the decapping pin is in the sizing die. So I would say, yes they likely were sized.
The tool that primes them does not decap them, the sizing die with the decapping rod does.

Are you a reloader or just a bullshipper?
 
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jamaica said:
If you are priming then they must have been decapped? with my dies the decapping pin is in the sizing die. So I would say, yes they likely were sized.
The tool that primes them does not decap them, the sizing die with the decapping rod does.

Are you a reloader or just a bullshipper?
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Sir, I'll afford you a courtesy and assume you mean the best by your comment, or that you did not mean to be offensive and I misunderstood you.

There's two things you are failing to consider here:

  1. I may have purchased a large box of shells which were already deprimed and cleaned (this is the case here)
  2. I could have used the Lee Universal Decapping Die which does not size.
Perhaps before impugning someone's character you might gather all the facts.
 
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