Old primers

S

Scribe

New member
Hi,

After a 22 year pause I have started reloading .44 Special and Magnum. I am using 200 and 240 grain hard cast round nose flat points at, according to the tables, approximately 900 feet per second. I have done no chronographing yet. So far have just used Magnum cases. This is just for target shooting out to 50 or so yards with a Chiappa 20 inch barrelled 92 action.
However, a couple of thousand CCI large pistol and rifle primers have come way for nothing, the only problem is that they are all at least 20 plus years old. The packaging appears fine, no sign any where of water damage or residue and as far as I know they have not been subjected to extremes of temperature when stored.

My questions are :

1) are they safe to use?

2) can large rifle primers be used safely in a .44 Magnum case with non Magnum powder loads?

I have no plans at this stage to reload rifle cartridges, but if I did it would be .308.

So if this sounds daft, but I was taught a long time ago that the only stupid question is the one you should have asked.

All replies gratefully received.
 
Packaging looks good so I myself would use them.
Worst case is you get a bad one every so often just like old milsurp ammo.
As far as rifle primers in a pistol I have done it when forced too. I would back my load down by 10%.
It would be like using a magnum primer when it was not needed.
There are going to be many that will say never use a rifle primer in a pistol and that is exactly what every loading manual will tell you.
All I am saying is it can be done and I have done it.
The decisions of doing lays with you.
 
Primers should be fine. I would not use the rifle primers in the pistol casings, I believe large rifle and pistol are a different height...

When you run out of pistol primers, if you want to research and work up a load to try, that may or may not be reasonable. Sounds like Madmo has done it. I'd have to research it before I did it.

Or buy a rifle :)
 
Use em but fire slowly until you have utmost confidence it then, that way if one squibs youll hear and be able to stop and inspect.
 
Yeah I almost exclusively use "vintage" primers. I've bought out a number of reloading setups and I sell the new stuff and keep the old stuff. Most of my CCI primers look like this:

images


Recently I acquired some even older stuff, look like this:

167865_03_old_rws_and_cci_primers_640.jpg
 
My questions are :

1) are they safe to use?

Absolutely assuming they were well stored. This past summer I loaded handgun and rifle using primers I have from the early 90s and never an issue or problem.

2) can large rifle primers be used safely in a .44 Magnum case with non Magnum powder loads?

This is where you want to pay attention. Small pistol and small rifle primers share the same dimensions both width and height. However, that is not the case with large pistol and large rifle. Note the height differences:

Primer%20and%20Primer%20Pocket%20Dimensions%20SAAMI.png


You may want to keep that in mind when trying to swap large rifle and pistol primers around. Large rifle primers, having greater height are made for a deeper cup (pocket).

Ron
 
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