Home made snap caps

Onagoth

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I know many have posted their ideas on these, just thought I would spring my own thoughts given that I am too cheap to spend the $20 that Azoom wants.

Anyways, using 1F brass, I ejected the spent primer and pressed it into an eraser, (the Staedtler kind) carefully cut out the imprint, slightly bigger than required.

Shave the cutout to the appropriate seating depth and forced it into the primer pocket using my finger and first, and auto prime (gently) second. Loaded bullet after that and the rest is history.

It was actually much simpler than I thought and it only took about 25 minutes while I was watching House.

Tested them out and they seem to work fine.

Sorry no pics

Anybody have any of their own designs??
 
I have done this for years as well. I don't know if the "primer" they use is better in the long run, but the eraser seems to work well for me.
 
I would suggest painting the bullets a REALLY noticable color so there's no doubt at all about which is which.... or am I just being paranoid? There's also some brass blackener chemical sort of like steel blueing that could be used to darken the casings so they are highly identifiable as your snap caps.

It would really suck to get a live round mixed up with the snap cap versions.

I thought about doing some unloaded snap caps just as you've done but the fear of confusing the caps with a possible live round made me think a bit about some way to clearly colour them differently.
 
something that works WAY better then the eraser is to fill the primer pocket with a glue gun.... let it dry and then trim flush.

lasts way longer then the eraser method.
 
something that works WAY better then the eraser is to fill the primer pocket with a glue gun.... let it dry and then trim flush.

lasts way longer then the eraser method.

I thought about doing that with some 5 min epoxy, perhaps next time. Also, I tried to mark the rounds with perm marker, but it just rubs off and feel tacky.

I think I will drill holes to mark them.

Cheers
 
Epoxy is more brittle than the stuff from a glue gun. I'd second Westicle's idea in this case over using epoxy. Even then the glue gun plastic will tend to deform and retain the dimple. I'm wondering if some RTV rubber wouldn't be good. I KNOW that will bounce back OK.

The holes in the casings isn't a bad idea as long as the size that ends up being large enough to really notice easily doesn't result in fail to feed issues.
 
I used a leather punch as pictured below that I bought from the craft section at walmart for $10 (has a number of punch sizes as you can see, for different calibers which is awesome):

hxxp://www.outfitterssupply.com/images/WLF223.jpg

I used those really hard black washers used in shutoff valves, and compression faucets in your house. Dirt cheap, and very durable. Use the punch to cut a circle out of the washer, then use a straightened paper clip or something long and think to eject the cut piece out of the punch. Use epoxy or your choice adhesive to secure it in the primer pocket.
 
I have a lathe, and thought about turning some... but the snap-caps have nice piece of mind, being immediately identifiable as "safe"
 
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