“Burnt” primers?

[divingin]

water goes - UP - when it evaps
perhaps turn your cases over and let the standing puddles evap upward out of the case mouth taking the path of least resistance ?
trying to evap through the flashole is more difficult to go UPWARD through
even more difficult if the spent primer is still in there trapping a cloud of vapor

Missing my point. Water vapor goes up; pooled water remains affected by gravity. By turning cases base-up, you eliminate most of the pooled water (which can be significant with bottleneck cases laying on their sides, regardless of primer in or out.) That leaves just the surface moisture to evaporate, rather than having to evaporate the pool.

 

[markm87]

I grab a handful of rifle brass and shake out the water as much as possible before laying the brass on its side to dry.

I used to dry with annealing, but I don't anneal anymore. It was a cute fad, but I'm over it.

 

[Webster]

Hell of an eye!

It looks like the paper foil disc is still intact?

 

[LCazador]

I think the primer was not seated completely and the force of the firing pin ejected the anvil. Primers need to be seated with full contact to the bottom of the primer pocket. Sounds like your brass is in need of some pocket uniforming. The corners of the pocket bottom should be straight and square to the sides of the pocket.

 

[ELR LVR]

I g

Missing my point. Water vapor goes up; pooled water remains affected by gravity. By turning cases base-up, you eliminate most of the pooled water (which can be significant with bottleneck cases laying on their sides, regardless of primer in or out.) That leaves just the surface moisture to evaporate, rather than having to evaporate the pool.

I guess it depends on how you may be evaporating the moisture
---
I set them base down on top of my wood stove
that way the vapor can naturally rise up out of the case
takes about 30 mins, the stove don't get hot enough to affect the brass
---
Similar to how when I clean my brass bucket containers
if i turn them upside down the inside never dries out
if I flip them over so the top is open, they dry out quickly
the brass does the same
---
If you just left them out in the environment to dry then yeah, I suppose its a different story and they would hold moisture for days

 

[divingin]

I guess it depends on how you may be evaporating the moisture

As I stated, I used racks to hold the cases base-up in a dedicated food dehydrator set to 70C. They were dry in a half hour, but it since it took about a third the number of button presses to set for a full hour, that's what I ran.

 

[AICS308]

I had a similar situation happen when testing some 30 year old primers. Thought I would try some small rifle primers that were kept in my loading room. When I shot the rounds the velocity was varying by over 100 fps and the target looked like a shotgun. Only shot 4 rounds and the bolt would not close. I found an anvil in the chamber along with black residue. When deprimed the 4 primers looked like they were blown apart like in the OP picture.

Could this have been caused by accumulated moisture over the years?

The other rounds were broken down and never tried again. The primers came from a case of 5000 so with the high price and availability at the time i really wanted to use them.

 

[Webster]

I g

I guess it depends on how you may be evaporating the moisture
---
I set them base down on top of my wood stove
that way the vapor can naturally rise up out of the case
takes about 30 mins, the stove don't get hot enough to affect the brass
---
Similar to how when I clean my brass bucket containers
if i turn them upside down the inside never dries out
if I flip them over so the top is open, they dry out quickly
the brass does the same
---
If you just left them out in the environment to dry then yeah, I suppose its a different story and they would hold moisture for days

It's not complicated. It doesn't hurt to leave them for a few hours at temp to make sure they are dry.

 

[Timon]

I have used the Lyman case dryer for a number of years now after wet tumbling. It works great I let them go for about an hour and a half, to two hours and they come out totally dry. Works very well.

In regards to that primer, with the anvil sitting that high in the primer body, it was not set deep enough. The powder does appear to be partially burned, but it did not come from the same case as the discussed primer. The media in the primer is not burnt, so it could not have partially set of the powder.

 

[ELR LVR]

It's not complicated. It doesn't hurt to leave them for a few hours at temp to make sure they are dry.

depends on ambient conditions
---
funny story
It was raining for a few days straight here recently
and I kept going outside for wood but kept thinking it didnt actually feel as cold as it should
when I checked the Humidty gauge it read 35% (Makes sense that it doesn't feel cold then)
but after 3 days of rain and it read the same- I kept thinking it was broken or off
How can it rain for 3 days straight and be 50F but only 35% humidity
---
So after some "re-education" I was reminded that
"it has to first be warm enough, for the water be it rain in the air or collected water on the ground
to actually evaporate in order to increase the humidity
---
if the temp isnt high enough to evap standing water, it will not evaporate very soon
---
so I can set a washed glass outside opoen top up and it will be dry in a day
washed brass cases, will remain wet for days inside if even just tipped on their side
since the rising humid air is not allowed to rise out, and keeps hitting the roof and collects
---
the physics of water vapor rising -
humid air is less dense than non humid air - having more hydrogen than nitrogen - so will rise
which I agree with you, should not be that complicated to understand

 

[Fast14riot]

I grab a handful of rifle brass and shake out the water as much as possible before laying the brass on its side to dry.

I used to dry with annealing, but I don't anneal anymore. It was a cute fad, but I'm over it.

Lol, that's how I feel about tumbling brass. I don't anymore.

Wet powder often looks like that.

 

[markm87]

Lol, that's how I feel about tumbling brass. I don't anymore.

Wet powder often looks like that.

I just have to work with clean brass. Functionally no gain, but psychologically, I need it.

I actually had some old handload .223 ammo that did similar to the OP. It looked like the priming compound blew into the output charge. I posted a thread about it here. 2 rounds that I never did figure out what happened.

 

[New264gunner]

OP said in anorher post.
"I have a pre ‘64 Win. M70, .264 WM Trying to preserve the barrel by working up more mild loads with flat base, lighter bullets, such as 100 gr. Sierra..."

When powder starts burning & stops, something is very wrong.
Needed-
1. Mag priner.
2. Faster burn rate powder.
3 Bullet base at neck soulder junction.
4. Good bullet hold. This increases start pressure.

Old discontued H450 BALL powder started burning in my 22-250, about 50 years ago. Was using a mag primer.
Pulled bullets showed part of the powder burnt, turned golden and clumped together.

If the OP would comment on the exact load / Rifle? May help?

Other wise, i can just guess.

Thank you all. I do appreciate the knowledge and input.
1961 Winchester Model 70
Nosler, once fired
123gr SMK
H4350-54.5gr-58gr (just started to work up a load, .5gr increments)
CCI 200
.002 NT
Out of 38 rds fired, I had 1 ftf, and 3 hang fires.
Obviously doing something wrong, however, cases were not washed so H2O is not the problem.
I’m a big dude, just retired commercial electrician. Big meat hooks for hands.
I’ve read about guys using too much pressure when priming.
Because of this I was very “aware” when priming.
Also, checked for high primers 3 separate times.
I know I’m a FNG to reloading but I truly believe that improperly seated primers were not an issue. Then again it’s sometimes difficult to admit a “dick dance” when you’re trying to get it right so, there’s that….

Thank you all again
264 WM

OP said in anorher post.
"I have a pre ‘64 Win. M70, .264 WM Trying to preserve the barrel by working up more mild loads with flat base, lighter bullets, such as 100 gr. Sierra..."

When powder starts burning & stops, something is very wrong.
Needed-
1. Mag priner.
2. Faster burn rate powder.
3 Bullet base at neck soulder junction.
4. Good bullet hold. This increases start pressure.

Old discontued H450 BALL powder started burning in my 22-250, about 50 years ago. Was using a mag primer.
Pulled bullets showed part of the powder burnt, turned golden and clumped together.

If the OP would comment on the exact load / Rifle? May help?

Other wise, i can just guess.