CCI BR2

[stapher1]

I was at the range with my 280AI awhile ago just burning up deer ammo i made so i could test a different load for this year and i had 6 delay fires and 2 no fires. The 2 that didn't go off were in my rifle, on the 1st day of deer season All primers were from the same lot and new but i was wondering if anybody else had issues like that with CCi's or any other brand? I always used federal gold matches until the Obama scare and couldn't get them so i switched to CCI.

 

[JohnnyJohnson]

The Obama thing hosed a lot of people. I switched to Wofle large rifle magnums with very good results. My varmint load in my 6MM shoot sub .5 MOA if I do my part.

CCI is just too proud of those CCI BR2's.

 

[Larryh128]

I have burnt somewhere in the neighborhood of 1/2 million CCI primers in my miss spent adult life. Most were 209 shotshell primers but I can state for a fact that I never have had a mis fire from a CCI primer. The reason that I shoot nothing but CCI's is because they had by far the best quality control when I started reloading shot shells. You could buy brand x or z & no two were the same size. One would litterally fall out of the primer pocket & you would have to force in the next one on the same case. CCI's were all the same size. I'm sure that QC has improved over the years cut I still shoot CCi's in everything & suspect that there is an underlying issue with the rounds. I had a simular incident & traced it to a firing pin that was .010 short on protrusion. Check it out with a depth mic. You could also have a few cases with deep primer pockets or a speck of tumbling media in the flash hole. I'd tear apart the 2 that didn't fire & carefully examine everything.

 

[mkihne]

Along with the primer seating and possible firing pin problem, if the cases used were resized(possibly even for a different rifle of same caliber) your headspace may be too short(oversized for your chamber). Check the headspace on a reliably fired round and compare to the FTF case, being sure to measure cases without primers or on the misfires a non protruding primer. CCI or not, that many misfires are unlikely due to primer brand and it's difficult to try to contaminate primers to cause that many misfires.

 

[stapher1]

They were all brand new nosler 280ai brass, i didn't want to mess with fire forming cases for it.

your headspace may be too short(oversized for your chamber).

Could you explain what you mean? I'm not understanding how this could cause a delay fire? ???

 

[rogn]

Had some problems with hang and non-fires with another brand of primer. The problem seems related to small dia. firing pins and perhaps less energetic strikes. A larger pin w/ enthusiastic strike(Rem 700) cured the problem. Another potential source of trouble could be the depth of seating of the primers, slightly high primer might cause missfires.

 

[260Ravage]

Hmmm..I wonder what going on! I use CCI BR2 primers exclusively and have never had a missfire,,Never! In the past couple months I have run across several shooters online that have problems. Do You suppose the new run or the lastest batch is the problem? Late last fall I ran out of my stash of primers,,,so just recently I bought a new brick. Wait and see I guess.

 

[fullersson]

Up until recently I used BR2 primers and only had 1 misfire out of approx. 2000 shots, and I know that it was moisture that I left in the case after annealing. I have since changed calibers and I am using small rifle primers, but I'm still using CCI's without any problems.

 

[dan06]

+ 1 for head space with Ackley ......make sure your not setting the shoulders back too far. It is easy to set the shoulder back too far when FL sizeing. It won't give the cartrige a good soild stop to keep it from moving forward when the firing pin hits the primer.

A good way to check your die setting in a 280 ack is to take a 30-06 case and size it in your 280ack die createing a false shouler with the neck on the 30 cal case. start with the die about .200" up off the shell holder. Keep adjusting the die down and resizeing the case until the 30-06 case will just fit in the chamber and be able to close the bolt. set the lock ring on your die and you have it. It is like a head space guage for your die.

 

[TonyR]

+1 on the headspace theory. The only misfires I have had with the BR-2s were with new cases that had about 0.008 inches excess headspace. Something like a third would not go off while every once-fired case went off with the same primers. I put a false shoulder in the unfired cases with an oversized expander mandrel and resizing. No more mis-fires. Sometimes a hard bullet jam will also solve the headspace problem if you have enough neck tension but it didn't with these cases.

 

[mkihne]

If you still have some of the new, non fired brass, you could do a headspace check comparison to the fired cases. If you have a chamber that is SAAMI spec on the large size and ammo that is understandably sized to lower end of spec(to allow chambering in all rifles) this still may contribute to the problem. Another thing to check is the firing pin imprint on the primers that fail to fire, compared to the delayed firing primers and to those that are reliably ignited. If cratering or piercing occuring or the imprint varies, this could be a firing pin problem as alluded to above, regarding size and/or contour of the pin tip. Occasionally the firing pin spring may become unreliable and need replacement. Firing pin centering on the hole in the boltface can cause some issues as well. A gunsmith can check this for you.

 

[wapiti25]

You state that it was "new" (un-fired) Nosler brass. I think it is short in your chamber. Seat the bullets into the rifling when fireforming your brass and that might hold the round back enough for firing. The 280AI is not a SAMMI chambering, I would check the head space with a 280 Rem GO gage, it sould not close on it. Improved chambers should be .001 to.002 short of a minimum std chamber.

 

[mkihne]

Regarding SAAMI specs of 280ai, the link below may be helpful. At least part of your problem may lie within.

http://gunsmithtalk.wordpress.com/2010/01/13/280-ackley-improved-alert/

 

[stapher1]

I have found the culprit...moisture! When i pulled the bullets out of the ftf's the powder was discolored and rolled up like a dry rat turd. I had to break some of it up with a o-ring pick to get it out.

 

[260Ravage]

Whew! good deal

 

[mkihne]

Interesting find. I recall that within the past couple of weeks someone posted with a similar finding. It was related to a specific powder. What powder did you use? You might try a search to see if their conditions matched yours. Found it. Its in the reloading forum.

A non-benchrest, but interesting reloading problem, Help?
« on: 11:00 PM, 01/02/07 »
Reply Quote
I took my Marlin 1895 in 45-70,I told you it was non-benchrest) out last week and had this problem, perhaps someone can help.

I use Reloder 7 for this round. I got some hangfires and complete failures of the powder to ignite. On the complete failures, the primer has ignited but the powder has not. The primers are CCI large rifle, non-magnum. In those rounds, the powder is at least partially clumped and stuck together,like rice, although the powder is dry) and also is a greenish/yellowish/grayish color. I lube the cases with Hornady One-shot spray lube, and my first thought was that lube was getting inside those big mouthed cases and contaminating the powder. Hornady’s materials say it will not do that, but I still suspected it to be the case. I have deliberately sprayed One-shot into a case and then filled it with Reloder 7, but that experiment did not result in clumpy, yellow powder after leaving the powder in that case for two days.

The loads that showed the hangfires and failures to fire also strung vertically very severely. I can shoot that rifle accurately,1.5" to 2” groups at 100 yards), and the most recent time this occurred, I had groups that were 2” horizontally by 12” vertically. I suspect inconsistent ignition, and therefore inconsistent velocity.

Any thoughts? What else might contaminate the powder in this way? Is it something else?

 

[stapher1]

I was using varget, i've great luck with it so i always make sure i keep a fresh can around.

 

[Larryh128]

There had to be a good explanation, glad you found it.

 

[whiskey08]

is it possible that the clumped together powder is melted together from an imcomplete ingition?

Ive had a few cci misfires but contributed it to the primers pocket being to deep. Once I tossed those cases no more misfires.

here is an article that tested frozen rounds and experienced hang fires with cci

http://www.accuratereloading.com/primer.html