I need to vent! Hornady brass crimped primers!!! Why!!???!?!?!?

[MuthaFunk]

A friend got a nice Daniel Defense AR15 in 300 Blackout. The subsonic rounds are so much fun to mag dump but as you can imagine, that gets expensive fast! Being a bullet caster I made a bunch of heavy lead bullets and started to reload all his Hornady factory brass. They're primers are all crimped!!!!!

I had to ask myself why the heck Hornady has done this? Most commercial ammo doesn't have crimped primers. If the military requires their ammo to be crimped then there must be a reason, I presume it's reliability but with that in mind commercial ammo has been produced for almost 100 years without crimped primers and been perfectly reliable.

I'm just venting because I now have to use my RCBS primer pocket swager on every round...

What do you guys use to open up your military crimped brass?

 

[Trinimon]

I just use a case deburring tool. A couple twists in the primer pocket and it's done. I used to swage the primer pockets but that was a lot of work.

 

[Ganderite]

I use a $7.00 (Home Depot or Home Hardware) countersink in my electric drill. I can kiss the crimp off in a second.

 

[vagrantviking]

I use a $7.00 (Home Depot or Home Hardware) countersink in my electric drill. I can kiss the crimp off in a second.

Same as this. Hundreds in a few minutes no problem.

 

[legi0n]

i'm using the Lyman reamer below in a drill

 

[bigedp51]

I buy once fired military Lake City 5.56 brass for my AR15 rifles because it is harder than commercial .223 brass. "BUT" I have to remove the primer crimp and put up with the extra work involved.

A full length resized case for the AR15 should have .003 to .006 shoulder bump. And the resized case body should be .003 to .005 smaller in diameter than its fired dieameter. This allows the case body to spring back from the chamber walls and extract reliably.

On a over gassed AR15 rifle and well used .223/5.56 brass with loose primer pockets, the primers can back out and fall into the trigger group and jam the rifle.

And thinner primers like the CCI 400 with a .020 cup thickness can have the firing pin pierce the primer. And these same thin cup primers can rupture at the edge and score the bolt face.

The military crimps its primers to keep the primer from backing out on longer headspace military firearms.

The good news is most ammunition with crimped primers meets military brass hardness and manufacturing standards. Meaning many commercial ammunition manufactures have military contracts to make ammunition.

NOTE, if you over ream the primer crimp like above a fired primer may look like a large rifle primer in a .223 case. And the same fired primer will be mushroomed shaped with the increased chance of rupturing at its edge.

How Hard is Your Brass? 5.56 and .223 Rem Base Hardness Tests
http://bulletin.accurateshooter.com/2014/05/how-hard-is-your-brass-5-56-and-223-rem-base-hardness-tests/

Bottom line, I buy 500 once fired Lake City cases at a time and spend a night or two swaging primer pockets. And any range pickup brass you find with a crimp primer is only once fired.

And welcome to the world of crimped primer pockets and the fact that military brass will last longer in AR15 type rifles.

 

[TrxR]

Ive done about 500 ivi crimped 556 brass with a dillon super swage and its easy and quick to use.

 

[jparent]

I shoot a lot of M855 ball or equiv and use the RCBS swager. Never found it to be that big a deal. Have found crimped primers in all kinds of factory 223/556 ammo, including Federal bulk 223. Never Hornady tho.

 

[MuthaFunk]

I use a $7.00 (Home Depot or Home Hardware) countersink in my electric drill. I can kiss the crimp off in a second.

I have these as well. Pretty much the same time to use the RCBS swager but perhaps I'll give it another go the next time around.

I buy once fired military Lake City 5.56 brass for my AR15 rifles because it is harder than commercial .223 brass. "BUT" I have to remove the primer crimp and put up with the extra work involved.

A full length resized case for the AR15 should have .003 to .006 shoulder bump. And the resized case body should be .003 to .005 smaller in diameter than its fired dieameter. This allows the case body to spring back from the chamber walls and extract reliably.

On a over gassed AR15 rifle and well used .223/5.56 brass with loose primer pockets, the primers can back out and fall into the trigger group and jam the rifle.

And thinner primers like the CCI 400 with a .020 cup thickness can have the firing pin pierce the primer. And these same thin cup primers can rupture at the edge and score the bolt face.

The military crimps its primers to keep the primer from backing out on longer headspace military firearms.

The good news is most ammunition with crimped primers meets military brass hardness and manufacturing standards. Meaning many commercial ammunition manufactures have military contracts to make ammunition.

NOTE, if you over ream the primer crimp like above a fired primer may look like a large rifle primer in a .223 case. And the same fired primer will be mushroomed shaped with the increased chance of rupturing at its edge.

How Hard is Your Brass? 5.56 and .223 Rem Base Hardness Tests
http://bulletin.accurateshooter.com...r-brass-5-56-and-223-rem-base-hardness-tests/

Bottom line, I buy 500 once fired Lake City cases at a time and spend a night or two swaging primer pockets. And any range pickup brass you find with a crimp primer is only once fired.

And welcome to the world of crimped primer pockets and the fact that military brass will last longer in AR15 type rifles.

Excellent post!!! I never thought about the primers backing out and that trigger group being right below the BCG. That makes some sense now. Thanks!

 

[spooksar]

I’ve had the primers fall out with Hornady factory loads in 460 S&W, when I called they said it was due to soft brass. Maybe this is why they are crimping the primers in.