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Primer selection in general
updated 3 years, 2 months ago
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Certain recipes call out particular primers with particular powders. Is it a bad practice to deviate or is a small rifle primer a small rifle primer? I do mostly .223.
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Do you have an example?
I mean, most of my books do a similar thing every chance they get. “Using your high quality Lee full length resizing die…” “Using your lok-N-Load Hornady Powder measure…”. “For best results follow up with Pantene’s moisturizing conditioner…”
But it doesn’t make a lick of difference.
What’s more important is that you’re consistent. The primers certainly flash differently, so switching primers could have some impact and might warrant a new round of verification.
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There are marginal performance differences between different brand primers of the same category (small rifle, large rifle, etc.). However, there’s no issue using a different brand primer than what a particular manual or recipe may dictate. Manuals simply list the primer that was used for testing that particular load.
The only time I care about what brand primer I’m using is if I’m using a particular load I’ve worked up in one of my hunting/long-range rifles that I know to be accurate and clocked at a particular velocity. If I’m just loading up pistol or .223 ammo, I just use whatever I have or can get my hands on. Since primers are a bit scarce right now I had to deviate from the usual CCI primers that are my go to.
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In my experience, it makes a difference in semi rifles due to the hardness of the cup to prevent slam fires. Besides that i am sure there are small differences, but probably not that noticeable. I stick with what others use for the most part.
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They are all the same. I prefer CCI personally. And i read that CCI small rifle and small pistol primers are the same exact primer, just labeled differently.
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Aren’t Rem primers a no go for semi auto use? Some thing about being too soft/thin resulting in gasses blowing out and destroying your bolt face and firing pin? I read something about that a few years ago after I had about 500 loaded and have been afraid to fire any of them.
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If you are loading for precision, you will want to find what works best and stick with that, or else tweak the load a tiny bit when you change brands. If you are just loading for blasting ammo, brand doesn’t matter. Unless you are loading around/above max load, don’t worry about it. I buy whatever I can get the best deal on at the time.
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I’ve always recommenced that competitive shooters test their best load with only the primer changing between batches. I still do. Competitive shooters aren’t loading the quantities that AR blasters load. For those, I recommend fire crackers. Much cheaper that components. 😉
Before worrying about primer brands -are all your other loading practices good enough that primer variation could matter? My first question always stirs up loathing.
Are you a good enough shot that any single change is noticeable?
How many times do you reload a batch before checking length or trimming to length?
Do you anneal often enough for that caliber/lot of brass?
Do you have a chronograph to reliably measure changes in primers?
Are you a good enough record keeper to demonstrate small variations?
If all other issues are dealt with, building a stock of most of the primer brands on the market isn’t going to cost or hurt you, so purchase a couple of hundred or every brand primer you come across. They’re small and store well.. -
Small rifle primers vary in thickness.. Check this chart: [https://www.accurateshooter.com/technical-articles/primers-and-pressure-analysis/](https://www.accurateshooter.com/technical-articles/primers-and-pressure-analysis/)
