Possible Primer Problem?

K

Katsumi Liquer

New member
Earlier this year, I purchased several bricks of Sellier & Bellot small pistol and small rifle primers from Cabela's when they were on sale for the very palatable price of $20 per brick.

I loaded up a small test batch of .454 Casull cartridges using my standard recipe that has served me exceptionally well through the years (a 250 gr. Nosler JHP atop 29.2 gr. of H110/W296 at an OAL of 1.695", good for around 1420 fps out of my 7.5" Ruger Super Redhawk), except with the S&B SR primer instead of the usual Winchester SR primer. This test batch was loaded on my single-stage Lee press at the same time I was loading a larger batch of my regular .454 Casull cartridges with the Winchester SR primers, so the same components (other than the primers) were used for both batches.

Last Friday at the club range, I started off with five rounds of the regular cartridges with the Winchester primers. As expected, all five lit off with no problems. Then I loaded five of the S&B-primed rounds. The first one "squibbed" and drove the projectile about two inches into the barrel with most of the unburned powder behind it. Hmmm, okay, that was interesting. I tapped the lodged projectile out with a dowel and brushed most of the powder off the frame. Reloaded, lined up for another shot, and pulled the trigger. Pfft! Another projectile lodged in the barrel with a bunch of unburned powder right behind it.

At this point, my thought was that the powder was bad, but after dislodging the projectile, I managed to shoot off the rest of the Winchester-primed rounds with no problems.

Since the dowel was doing a good job of dislodging the stuck projectiles, I was very tempted to shoot the rest of the S&B-primed cartridges in an attempt to isolate the problem. But rather than waste expensive powder and projectiles, I've decided to just disassemble the rounds and reload them with Winchester primers.

But I am stumped. Is it possible for a primer to detonate with enough force to drive a projectile into a barrel, yet not generate a flame hot enough to ignite the powder? I realize H110/W296 have a reputation for being difficult to ignite, but the Winchester SR primers seem to have not problem with that. Is this going to be an issue when I use the S&B SR primers for my .223 loads?

Any comments, insights and/or suggestions are welcome. And an obligatory image of the primer package with the two .454 Casull rounds that failed to ignite:

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I Thought you are supposed to use magnum primers for Win 296. I guess you just proved why. The Winchester primers must be hot enough to ignite the powder but not the S&B.

Even though you are using rifle primers I'm pretty sure the magnum primers are hotter. Rifle primers have a thicker cup to contain the pressure but I believe that pistol magnum primers have more brisance.
 
This load has worked for you without fail, and did so this time, except for the S&B primers. Sure, it's the primers. And yes, a primer alone can drive the bullet out of the case and lodge it in the barrel.

Now, will the S&B work with your .223? Really only one way to find out. Just take extra care, load one at a time and make sure the barrel is clear for each shot. BTW, I have used CCI 400 (small rifle, non-magnum) with H110 in 32-20 rifle loads with zero failures. Of course, that's a much smaller case than yours.
 
I've run over 20K S&B thru a 9mm without issues. You can use magnum primers for standard pistol, but not the other way, especially for heavy magnums like the 454. Also do not use any pistol primer in an AR15, they are too soft. That's why when you clear an un-fired round out of an AR, it leaves a dimple from the floating firing pin. That's also why you should not run small rifle primers in a pistol, it will lead to light strikes.
 
It's probably a formulation difference, though whether it is the formulation itself or whether your firing pin isn't hitting them hard enough, I can't say without measuring. Some rifle primers, if they have military sensitivity h-test specs, can be hard for a revolver to strike adequately and can then burn over a longer period, lessening flame intensity. The late Creighton Audette wrote his last work on this general topic of the "analog" nature of primers. Failing to seat deeply enough or failing to set the bridge adequately in the primer can have the same effect.

If you look at picture of most domestic primers igniting in a dark room, they have enough metal in them to throw white spark showers, and these seem to help light the Western Canon series of spherical propellants from the St. Marks plant (of which WC296 is one; both Winchester 296 and Hodgdon H110 are this same powder in canister grade). Many foreign primers, like the Russian primers sold by Wolf and TulAmmo don't create that spark shower and have a far less white flame. The S&B primers may be more like those, the Czech Republic having once been a Soviet Block country. Usually this is good. Mild primers often allow the most consistency in rifle velocity, but that assumes an easily lit powder.

What is happening in your gun is likely that not enough powder starts burning at once, whether due to the firing pin energy being inadequate, the seating being sub-nominal, or just the formulation being inadequate, and when the bullet passes the barrel/cylinder gap, it is able to bleed down the pressure enough that the powder extinguishes. Most people don't realize that can happen because they know the powder supplies its own oxygen. But smokeless powder combustion is an oxygen deficient reaction, and without enough heat and pressure, the powder can suffocate itself because it is unable to release oxygen fast enough under those conditions. It will burn in open air because it's internal oxygen is supplemented by the air, but in low pressure confinement it can go out.

CCI was the first to recognize ignition was particularly difficult with the Western Cannon line of powders. In 1989 they reformulated their magnum primers, both rifle and pistol, to handle igniting these powders specifically. Most other primer makers seem to have mimicked this now. But I've seen several instances in which accuracy improved and velocity variation with these powders decreased when CCI magnum primers, specifically, where employed. I'm not saying others can't perform as well now; just that I don't have data on that, so the CCI's are my first recommendation in this situation. Use their SRM primers if your revolver can ignite them properly. Use their SPM primers if it can't (the cups are thinner). Use a chronograph to compare the results and pick the primer that produces the most consistent velocity for you and/or the highest velocity for you. It is producing the best ignition.
 
late

I realise this thread is very old but the exact same thing happened to me with the same powder and primers so obviously S&B primers aren't for reloading 454 Casulls lol.

I'm adding a few pics for reference to see that the primer was indeed struck with enough force and what happened to the Hodgdon H-110 powder. I'm guessing the fused clump comes from the powder that was right in front of the flash hole
Btw this was done using a S&W 460 magnum

Edit: specifics: The funny sand color in the powder is a mystery to me, the powder was from a brand new 8 pounder keg kept at a 35% moisture level and was all black before the ignition. I lit up a bit of it on a piece of metal it burt as it should. Cases are brand new never fired Starline brass and no tumbling was done prior to the reloading.

Thanks again.

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Close up of the first pic
 
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The color is the color of singed technical grade nitrocellulose. The graphite coating has burned off as the stuff started ignition. The clump is because, like any plastic, nitrocellulose will melt and fuse. The grains have essentially been scintered together by the heat, so they reflect having occupied a warm spot before the bullet started moving.

Since this post it has come to my attention that some of the primers from overseas have burrs on their cup edges, same as CCI did before the revamp of their manufacturing in the early 1990's. Before that, it had been very difficult to get my Dillon Square Deal to seat their LP primers completely. There were lots of high ones. If you found the S&B's harder to seat than your usual primers, it may be you and the OP failed to set the bridge of priming mix between the anvil and cup bottom adequately.

For US primers, bridge set of 0.002" to 0.004" is usually considered best. This means that once the anvil feet of the primer have touched the bottom of the primer pocket, the cup needs to be forced and additional 0.002" to 0.004" deeper. Unfortunately, the tolerances for primer height and primer pockets provided in the SAAMI standard are so wide, you actually have to determine this for your lots of primers and brass by measuring. Much bother, but there it is. Also, I don't have manufacturer's spec for the S&B primers. I see if I can't find out about it from them via email.

To make the measurements, measure your primer heights in your calipers. Next, measure you primer pocket depths. That's the harder part. The depth probe that sticks out of the back of the beam of a caliper may be used, but is hard to seat it perfectly square against the bottom of the pockets, so you have to do this until you get a feel for it. You can also measure pins that insert into the pocket and subtract the combined length of inserted pin and case from the sum of their separate lengths.

Once you have both measurements, subtract the height of the primer from the depth of the primer pocket, then further subtract your target bridge set (say, 0.003"). The result is how deep the primer should be below flush with the case head after seating. You can also measure how deep you got them with your caliper depth probe. This will tell you if inadequate primer seating due to burr interference is to blame. If it is, you may find that using a primer pocket uniforming reamer or a primer pocket swager on your brass helps loosen the pocket enough to make these primers easier to seat.
 
As Unclenick explained, the appearance of that powder is par for the course with incomplete/failed ignition.
Clumps, yellow/tan coloration to powder granules, and a seeming absence of graphite.


I've seen it most often with super-light charges of powder that were unable to ignite in experimental applications; because the primer dislodged the bullet from the case, increased the chamber volume, caused a decrease in chamber pressure, and resulted in the powder not being able to maintain temperature and pressure adequate to be self-sustaining.
Second to that, would probably be experiments with contaminated powder and primers, where water or oil retarded ignition enough that even a full powder charge could not produce the heat or pressure required to be self-sustaining.

Obviously, it can also happen with full charges of seemingly uncontaminated powder, as you've experienced. I haven't seen much of that, though.
 
I've ordered a box of winchester primers as stated in the Hodgdon reloading data recipe, hopefully everything will go better at my next range session.
 
Incidentally, a lot of benchrest shooters seem very excited to get their hands on extra mild primers. If you have a bolt rifle in a small rifle primed chambering and a load that uses a well-filled case of about any kind of stick powder, but especially ones that aren't too slow, you might give these primers a try in that. You may get very low velocity SD from them.
 
I had the same experience, only I was using hand cast bullets. In my case, I was using WC820, which is close to AA#9 in burn rate. I was using CCI400 primers and only had about 50% actually leave the barrel. I then switched to CCI450 (magnum) primers, and then had FTF on about 30%. I was using my Ruger SRH for these rounds, but I also own a Taurus Raging Bull and a Freedom Arms 83, both in .454 Casull. When these same rounds using the CCI450 primers were fired in the other two guns, everything was fine.

My conclusions......the Ruger SRH does not have enough hammer spring to reliably detonate the CCI 450 primers.
 
I've had this exact same problem recently with a batch of S&B primers and 223.

I was wondering what was happening.

So are you saying that the primer isn't seated deep enough? Rather than tediously measure the primer depth, can I just seat the primers deeper, until the problem stops? I will never have primer depth uniformity because I use a mix of brass and I never clean primer pockets. It's just too tedious of a chore.
 
I'm only saying that's one possible source of the trouble. When the primers have burrs they can be hard to seat fully, and that can cause hang fires and poor firing. Try just seating them pretty hard and see if that makes a difference. If not, they are just too mild for spherical propellants and should be relegated to loads of 4227 and the like.
 
Gun Powder colours

Gun Powder colours.

In my experience (scavenged shotshell powder of various brands) yellowish discolouration or any discolouration is unburnt/partially burned gun powder.

The powder simply did not ignite or burn.

I load exclusively pistol rounds and only with Winchester WSP primers. These till now never have failed me one single time.

If the projectile (like an 12 ga shotshell load reduced it's lead Charge) is light and the powder is not encountering enough resistance from the bullet weight then there will be unburnt (yellowish residual pieces) powder.
If you load 3 grains powder in an 38 spl filled right with birdshot the payload is too light and unburnt powder is present. Same for the case of homemade less-than-lethal loads in shotshells (powder just does not burn all).

It seems therefore the powder Needs a certain pressure to ignite correctly and an hot enough primer (enough flame).
In your case the primer is too weak.
 
So based on the info in this thread, I adjusted my press to seat the primers deeper. It didn't help.

I just got back from the range and this is what happened regularly...

Is this a bad box of primers? They're S&B primers also. I've never had this problem with S&B primers before. Maybe it's just a bad batch. Any ideas on how to fix the problem? Throw away the box of primers?



I checked all the primers prior to firing. After the above would happen, I noticed the primers were then pushed out.

 
Dear Machineguntony,

I repeat: It is unburnt/partially burnt powder. The powder didn't burn.

It is NOT a primer SEATING Problem.

The primer is not strong enough for the powder or the powder is bad. It is an systemic issue (think of the ammo-gun as a System. As well the primer-powder-case is a System. Think of it as a machine). As well don't Forget the pressure (crimp) neccesary to get the powder to start burn (like an Diesel engine).
Even with no crimp (very Little pressure) the powder at least should burn and push out the proyectile.

To Little flame (primer) or bad powder.
 
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Here is my opinion. yes, heave the old primers. figure out a place that will take them as toxic or dangerous waste and get rid of them before you get hurt.


Your brown and lumpy loads are loads that choked out as the primer failed.
The flame is not sufficiently hot and doesn't penetrate the load, it pops with a little fart and the powder charge fails to reach the critical state of burn that is necessaary to create a self sustaining chain reaction of the powder nearthe primer catching fire with a blast. That big blast is the only way to ignite a big charge from front to back for consistent burn.

You will always hear me say don't buy cheap. The extra cost of a premium brand is almost always worth it. What was the difference between a box of cheap foreign primers and CCI? Was the $10-20 a good deal when you wound up with misfires and probably a lot of hangfires that you didn't notice? the risk of a squib and a subsequent blowout? There are products that will perform perfectly when you spend an extra 10-20%, and lots of them that will fail miserably if you buy bargain brands, just like buying cheap frozen pizzas. spending the extra money is hard to do. Some sacrifices can be made. This is not a place to sacrifice quality.

There are genuine experts on every aspect of shooting here. there are gunsmiths, metallurgical engineers, lawyers, men who have spent decades in competition, genuine, born to the world rocket scientists even. One of the guys here retired from nuclear industry as a high risk reactor engineer. You can read every post and get a lot of information, most of it good, but like unkle, there are people who can spell out in absolute practical and factual information what you are looking for. This place is the friend in the field that you need, and when you hear it from the experts, you need to listen.

pay attention to what I call "duhhhh monents." people who learn as they live will always be finding things that go counter to what they have learned or experienced, procedures that have worked for years, but aren't actually the best, or even safest way to do things. I have them all of the time. I for one used to keep primers in a tightly sealed ammo box. I kept twenty or thirty pounds of powder cans/kegs all together on a single shelf. Old house, old wiring, some slight risk of a fire. A stack of powder piled together will create a very serious situation if a small flame gets loose. 5,000 primers going off in a tigthtly sealed steel case will go off like a bomb. I even went to the trouble years ago to install a sprinkler in my gun room.My powder is now placed in several shelves at different ends of the room. When I am working, that can of powder is always put behind the measure to prevent misidentification.

Duhh moments. Things that should have come to me before. things that i may have learned from here, other people, even just by realizing that something that I had been doing was STUPID.
 
Sellier&Bellot is not cheap brand. Although I never used a single one of their products (They don't come to Southamerica).

According to their Webpage they are a Czech Company. Now they seem to be part of or own an Conglomerate of which following companies are part of: Taurus (yea or nay, depends on the Reader), Magtech (produces gun powder in Brasil), CBC (gun powder Company in Brasil), and 3 others I never heard of (their primer Company supposed to call Nontox).

Sellier&Bellot by all means should not be an "El Cheapo" Company.

As I understood Primers do not expire (getting old).

I use allways exclusively Winchester WSP primers. These I store in their original 5 brick cardboard box (within them are the 1000 box and within that are the primers in 100 Piece sleeves). As I buy them per 5000 box I store them as well in an metallic locker.
I have loaded already more than 600 WSP primers and non of them ever failled me.
I live in a dry Zone (semi desert).
 
Post number 14 says seating the primers harder is one exploreable option, that's why I tried it.

It didn't solve the problem, so I threw out the box of primers, used a new box and problem solved. It was probably a bad batch of primers. S&B primers are not cheap. I've used over 50,000 of them without this problem, until now.

Interesting thing came up from seating the primers deeper: the timing on my gun was thrown off, resulting in light strikes when in F/A selection at about the 3rd-5th round. In semi, rounds and gun worked fine, no light strikes in 90 rounds. I didn't know primer depth could affect timing.
 
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