Peterson brass .260 Small Rifle primer brass

[loud_noise]

Hi everyone

I’m sure this is a daft question but what is the benefit or difference in using a small Rifle primer for Calibres like the .260Rem over a conventional size primer pocket?

I came across some Petersen brass for .260Rem available with a small rifle primer pocket and was curious if anyone had used it, results and if the results were good enough to warrant having another set of brass?

Thanks in advance for your help
Simmo

 

[msinc]

As I understand it the smaller primer is supposed to be more accurate and it is proven in benchrest shooting, but you would probably have to be shooting full blown benchrest to really see it. In a hunting or general shooting rifle I guess yeah, get them if you absolutely feel like you have to attain every possible advantage....just don't expect any significant returns. If small rifle primers were magnificent then they would make brass for everything.
I had an extremely very accurate 6.8spc once upon a time and brass was easily available with either primer. I couldn't tell by group size in that rifle which primers I was shooting. I suspect you will probably see the same thing in a 260. That said, the PPC and the Remington BR line of cartridges all use small primers to the best of my knowledge and they are known for accuracy.
I think I read where the smaller flash hole is supposed to make ignition more consistent and admittedly things can improve considerably when you correct ignition problems. That said, I wouldn't look for small primers to correct things like poor, inconsistent striker hits, the striker spring binding in the bolt, etc.
I am in the Alex Wheeler school of thought that it all starts with ignition and that proper consistent ignition is always a positive thing. One of the biggest reasons guys like to buy expensive aftermarket brass is the fact that, for the most part, it has good consistent sized flash holes. I personally shoot a lot of Lake City brass and it is not bad, but my biggest complaint and the reason I would probably not try to compete with it is the sometimes very poor quality of the flash holes. Many are way over sized and if I sort my brass for flash hole size and consistency I end up not using more than half.

 

[loud_noise]

As I understand it the smaller primer is supposed to be more accurate and it is proven in benchrest shooting, but you would probably have to be shooting full blown benchrest to really see it. In a hunting or general shooting rifle I guess yeah, get them if you absolutely feel like you have to attain every possible advantage....just don't expect any significant returns. If small rifle primers were magnificent then they would make brass for everything.
I had an extremely very accurate 6.8spc once upon a time and brass was easily available with either primer. I couldn't tell by group size in that rifle which primers I was shooting. I suspect you will probably see the same thing in a 260. That said, the PPC and the Remington BR line of cartridges all use small primers to the best of my knowledge and they are known for accuracy.
I think I read where the smaller flash hole is supposed to make ignition more consistent and admittedly things can improve considerably when you correct ignition problems. That said, I wouldn't look for small primers to correct things like poor, inconsistent striker hits, the striker spring binding in the bolt, etc.
I am in the Alex Wheeler school of thought that it all starts with ignition and that proper consistent ignition is always a positive thing. One of the biggest reasons guys like to buy expensive aftermarket brass is the fact that, for the most part, it has good consistent sized flash holes. I personally shoot a lot of Lake City brass and it is not bad, but my biggest complaint and the reason I would probably not try to compete with it is the sometimes very poor quality of the flash holes. Many are way over sized and if I sort my brass for flash hole size and consistency I end up not using more than half.

Thanks for that, I understand that Fullbore shooters to use small rifle primer cartridges for .308 but like you I would be sceptical as to benefits in general shooting/learning. I am fairly new to Fclass and intricacies of it all (previously shot mostly fullbore) that I have enough other factors to improve without going to the expense of additional brass for marginal improvement.
Thanh’s for your perspective.

 

[Scott Harris]

longer brass life, much longer. i found no difference in the accuracy of LRP and SRP Lapua 308 brass

 

[mikeinct]

Thanks Guys, I've been looking for new 260 Brass...Last batch of Lapua stuff did not impress me by loading # 7 the primer pockets were softening up.. A couple leaked.....I use it in a 260 Rem AI....Mike in Ct

 

[loud_noise]

longer brass life, much longer. i found no difference in the accuracy of LRP and SRP Lapua 308 brass

Thanks Scott
That is a sensible reason to get SRP over LRP in any caliber. I have also heard you can get more consistent velocities but that again seems difficult to substantiate.

In your experience, how many more firings did you get?

 

[Scott Harris]

Thanks Scott
That is a sensible reason to get SRP over LRP in any caliber. I have also heard you can get more consistent velocities but that again seems difficult to substantiate.

In your experience, how many more firings did you get?

I didnt see any difference in accuracy or SDs. Usually get 30+ firings with small primer brass vs 10 - 15 with large primer brass.

 

[Scotts556]

I switch from Lapua LRP 260 in my 260AI to Alpha munitions SRP 260 brass. I like the Alpha brass way better, Friends use Peterson brass and they love it as well. Ive noticed a Drop in my SD/ES going to SRP brass. I went from a SD of 11 and ES of 19 to a SD of 5 and ES of 11 Switching over to Alpha munitions. Not Sure the route cause but I'm very happy with my SRP brass and dont plant on going back to LRP brass anytime soon.

Scott

 

[AJC]

I switch from Lapua LRP 260 in my 260AI to Alpha munitions SRP 260 brass. I like the Alpha brass way better, Friends use Peterson brass and they love it as well. Ive noticed a Drop in my SD/ES going to SRP brass. I went from a SD of 11 and ES of 19 to a SD of 5 and ES of 11 Switching over to Alpha munitions. Not Sure the route cause but I'm very happy with my SRP brass and dont plant on going back to LRP brass anytime soon.

Scott

Did you do any case testing or measuring. Trying to figure out if alpha or petersons is as consistent as lapua or better???

 

[1shot]

Here is an evaluation I did this spring.

http://forum.accurateshooter.com/threads/alpha-munitions-brass-evaluation.3949997/

 

[mikeeg02]

Here is an evaluation I did this spring.

http://forum.accurateshooter.com/threads/alpha-munitions-brass-evaluation.3949997/

His results mimic what my 260 srp alpha brass is. I weighed all 200 pieces I ordered and 199 were within .9 grains the last piece took it to 1 grain. Measured with an fx120. I checked over all length for about ten or so pieces, laughed and quit when every piece I had measure 2.027" IIRC. I just turned the necks down some on 100 and that all felt very consistent. Maybe 2-3 pieces out of 100 may have been slightly different. Very nice stuff.

I havent shot it yet. My two barrels for it should be here this winter. My reamer and dies just showed up.

 

[F Class John]

FWIW at the very least the small primer pockets are also supposed to last and stay tighter longer as well. At least that's the story I was told when I talked to Lapua when the 6.5 brass came out.

 

[Clark]

From my 2012 hunting report, when I wanted to run very high pressures in 260 without getting loose primer pockets.. it did not work out.

7) 308 Lapua palma brass with small primer pocket, necked down to 260, neck turned, 120 gr Nosler BT moly, and CCI 450 small rifle magnum primers will set off 40 gr of CFE, but not 42 gr.

 

[SAPenguin]

Dumb question - if a particular rifle craters primers (due to sloppy fit between firing pin and channel) would switching to small primer help at all (as the primer is smaller, less material to 'flow'?)

 

[DocDoc]

Actually makes it worse. The Rem 700 pins tend to be loose and often need to be bushed with a smaller pin to handle SR primers well without piercing.

 

[jsthntn247]

I know it’s off topic but would it be best to size these up or 308 srp brass down for 7-08?

 

[Laurie]

It's very easy to neck 308 brass down to 7mm-08. I run Norma LRP and Lapua SRP 'Palma' 308 brass in mine. In a minimum SAAMI match chamber, the Lapua cases may just need a mite of neck turning to keep chamber clearances reasonable depending on the lot. Most Lapua 'Palma' is around 0.015", but it can run at 0.0155" or even a shade more and necking down thickens it by a thou'.

Reverting to the OP's query, the primary benefit in a case of this size is strength. People run some scary pressures in Lapua SRP 308 brass irrespective of what cartridge / calibre it ends up as and the cases just go on and on providing a bit of annealing is done every few firings. There are usually ES/SD reductions too although that depends on the components combination especially powder choice. Use magnum / BR primers (for their thicker and stronger 0.025" cups).

Possible downsides in a 308 / 260 / 7-08 size case are marginal ignition with some powders especially in cold conditions. (Don't use any of these in 'hunting' or other shooting in temperatures below freezing and some powders start to see performance deterioration below around 5-deg C / 40F.) Some primer / powder combinations give hang and misfires even in warmer conditions - CFE223 didn't work in 308 'Palma' for me and I've heard on this forum of poor 243 performance with compressed H1000 charges. Finally, as DocDoc says, primer cratering / blanking is a problem in some action designs and/or individual bolts. Winchester 70s / FN SPRs don't work with high-pressure SRP cartridges for instance and some Remy 700s suffer from this problem, other examples of this model where tolerances run the other way cope fine.

You will hear people, including some on this forum, who declare that SRP brass never works well in any conditions in cartridges of this size as the primer heat / power combined with the smaller flash-hole (1.5mm v the standard 2mm) simply cannot ignite 243/260/7-08/308 size charges efficiently. My 7-08 runs fine on compressed charges of Viht N160 (nearly 48gn worth) and I have run it with very heavily compressed N165 loads of over 51gn and never had an issue, and that includes use in temperatures barely above freezing. Several thousand F-TR and Palma / Fullbore competitors worldwide manage just fine with this brass although I personally become leary about using it in temperatures much under 5C which we see in some of our (UK) winter comps.

Other 'issues'? You need small diameter decap pins as some standard size models will stick in the 1.5mm flash-hole. SRP brass based loads need higher charges to achieve those obtained in standard brass. Depending on the powder this can be as little as 0.5gn to as much as 1.5gn in a case of this size. Conversely, transferring a 'hot' SRP load to the more aggressively ignited and weaker case-head LRP version of these cartridges without dropping charges substantially and working the load back up is a potential recipe for VERY BAD things to happen.

 

[Scotts556]

Did you do any case testing or measuring. Trying to figure out if alpha or petersons is as consistent as lapua or better???

No I didn't. I just worked up a new load in the Alpha and went to town. I tried to work up a load again with the lapua to mirror the results, but could never get the lapua as consistent with the same amount of brass prep on both.

Scott

 

[AJC]

No I didn't. I just worked up a new load in the Alpha and went to town. I tried to work up a load again with the lapua to mirror the results, but could never get the lapua as consistent with the same amount of brass prep on both.
Scott

Interesting to hear you like the alpha better. Is the case volume about the same?