primers ?

R

rebs

New member
I have been using CCI BR-4 for my benchrest shooting with a Colt target competition AR. Is this a good choice or are there better primers to be using ?
I read that wolf small rifle magnums are really good but none to be found.
so what is a good replacement for the wolf small rifle magnums ?
 
For 223/5.56, my experience has been that CCI 400, CCI 450 & CCI BR-4 primers could be used interchangeably without impacting velocity numbers, function of the rifle or point of impact.

As always, follow safe reloading protocols any time you change a component and work the load up anew. That way you will know for sure whether the standard, magnum and bench rest primers work the same with your load in your gun.
 
If your groups are satisfactory, no need to change. When my 5.56 groups with ccw 400’s were looking way too big, I tried redeveloping with cci 41’s. Results were marginal still. Then with cci 450’s, wow huge groups size improvement...maybe 30% improved.
 
I use the CCI BR 2 primers never had a problem , you CCI BR 4 I think are perfect for your setup. . Try not to overthink . The quality control on those primers are very good. Your uniform your primer pockets , only have to do it once , you can check the flash holes with a proper size drill bit to make sure their the same size . That's what I would check but keep with the same primers . Hope I Helped in some way .

Chris
 
Thank you for the help, I will keep using the BR 4's
If I did want to switch to CCI 450's would I need to workup loads again ?
 
No difference , this was tested before . Even with large pistol pimers & Mag primers . I like to use the best primer for the specific round being used , I would use the magnum primers in a pinch . With the same charge .
 
I had bad luck with Wolf SRM primers, at least with ball powder. After one year I tried some ammo I had loaded with them, fully 25-30% had a slight but very noticeable hangfire. Sure made me work on my follow-through for that match.

I use CCI 450s and BR-4s, occasionally 400s but CCI does not recommend them for AR-style rifles. According to someone who used to work at Blount/CCI the 450s and BR4s are essentially the same primer.
 
If you call CCI they will tell you. The 450, BR4, and #41 all use the same primer cup and the same amount of the same priming mix. The BR4 differs only in the same way Federal match primers differ from standard primers, which is they are assembled by the most experienced workers with the idea they will be better at producing consistency. (That doesn't always work out, though, as I've had lots of Federal 205 primers that produced better consistency than the lot of 205M I had.) The #41 differs only in that the anvil has a steeper leg angle to reduce sensitivity to military specs for floating firing pin gas guns like the AR. The ones I have do need to be seated a couple thousandths deeper and with more pressure to get adequate reconsolidation and performance consistency.

The Wolf and TulAmmo primers made in Russia seem to have dried up and disappeared at Powder Valley and other vendors. I have no idea why. The ammo is still coming in and being sold by a number of vendors. But the original TulAmmo USA website is gone and I don't know what that's about. There was a rumor of import bans, but that's been knocked down.

The one downside of these primers was they have burrs on their cup edges the way CCI did back before the 1992 line revamp, making them require much more seating effort. If you have some of these primers and have trouble with their ignition consistency, it can usually be traced to inadequate seating of the primer.
 
I stocked up on the Tula 5.56M's before they stopped coming in. I still have 3 or 4 thousand more. Fiocci primers are being sold in blocks of 1500, 150 per tray, for the same price as 1000 of other brands. I have not used Fiocci primers, but I have shot their ammunition.
 
"my experience has been that CCI 400, CCI 450 & CCI BR-4 primers could be used interchangeably without impacting velocity numbers,"

Conversely, my experience when loading to a specific velocity, CCI #41 primers(magnum equivalent brisinance) required 1/2 grain less H335 to achieve the same velocity.
 
That can sure happen. Charles Petty did a test in 2006 firing the .224 55 grain Hornady V-max with 24 grains of reloader 10X in a 223 bolt rifle, changing only the primers, of which he included many from standard through magnum. His results spanned averages of 3150 to 3300 fps. He would have had to increase the load a full grain to get that velocity difference with his mildest primer (a Federal 205 standard primer; I've forgotten which magnum primer was warmest for him).

The magnum primer's main function to make more gas than a standard primer. This does the initial pressurizing of the case which is necessary to get adequately consistent ignition speed and to prevent powders with significant levels of deterrents coatings from squibbing out. The name "magnum" comes from the fact magnum rifle cases have more space in them to pressurize, but they are also appropriate in non-magnum cases either when the powder charge doesn't fill the case well (making more empty space to pressurize) or when the powder is hard to ignite as a number of older spherical propellants are.

That said, there are also times when magnum primers reduce velocity. This tends to happen in smaller capacity cases for which the primer can start to unseat the bullet and increase the volume before the powder gets fully burning. The .22 Hornet is notoriously sensitive to this. But any gun with a long throat can potentially have it happen.

Larger capacity cases are less sensitive to primer choice. You frequently see tests of .30-06 and other cartridges that normally use large primers done with different standard and magnum primers and for which you see so little velocity difference it is almost statistically insignificant. However, I have seen the adoption of the CCI #34 improve accuracy significantly in the M1 Garand as compared to a Federal 210M. Garand loads are typically poor case fillers in the 80-85% loading density range.

I can only advise that you test primers to see which one produces the lowest velocity standard deviation with your powder as an indication of which one is producing the most consistent ignition. The difference in accuracy in the case of the Garand was almost certainly due to the ignition time, which ads to lock time, becoming more consistent so the direction the muzzle was pointing experienced more identical disturbance from shot to shot.

I will add that the disappearance of the Tula primers has been disappointing as they produced the lowest velocity SD in the Garand of any primer I've ever used. I am still sitting on a full slip each of their small and large NATO primers, but am starting to load them and fear they will not return any time soon. If the Tula plant every figures out how to eliminate the lip burrs, they will probably be the best primers made anywhere. You can fault the Russians for many things, but not for their enthusiasm and dedication to target shooting competition and the materials needed for it.
 
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