This was a first...

[The German]

First time I had this happen in 20+ years of reloading.

I started reloading some .44 mag today and realized that on some shells, the decaping pin simply pushed off the top of the primer and the rest got stuck - this happened to about 20 out of 300 shells. No idea why, they all were reloaded with the same load/bullet in a medium range, so there should have been no over-pressure causing this. I had them all wet tumbled with steel pins and let them air dry, but that was the same process for all of them as well...

Thoughts?

 

[DShortt]

Looks to me like the primers were on the verge of failure and the decapping process was just a little too much.

 

[Riesel]

Were you able to get the primer carcass out?

 

[Bojo]

Flip top model of primer.
They are refillable!

 

[Bojo]

Serious question though ?
Do you seal them in at all with anything like nail polish ?

 

[DShortt]

What's the load data on those? I'd suspect it's either pretty hot, or you got a batch of primers that just barely got the job done.

 

[Doom]

I have had this happen on a few pistol cartridges and what I credited it to was getting into a groove when using a decaying die and hitting them pretty hard. Slowed down and no more issues. I don't remember if was 9mm or 45 ACP.

 

[The German]

I tossed them all, assuming that if it was a too heavy load, it might have cause more invisible damage and I had plenty of new brass.

Edit: grabbed a few out of the trash and was able to remove the remaining ring with "some" force and a knife - looked rather clean, but was definitely "well seated"...

Were you able to get the primer carcass out?

 

[The German]

Serious question though ?
Do you seal them in at all with anything like nail polish ?

Nope, it was standard loads with Winchester LR primers, NOS JHP, 43 grain H110, no flat primers and bullet seated with competition die to 1.600 COL.

Edit: Yes, I mistyped - that recipe is with 23 grains of H110 ....and LP primers, not LR...

 

[joshb]

Primer weld. I’ve seen a few. Maybe 10-15 times in my lifetime.

 

[The German]

I have had this happen on a few pistol cartridges and what I credited it to was getting into a groove when using a decaying die and hitting them pretty hard. Slowed down and no more issues. I don't remember if was 9mm or 45 ACP.

I was initially decapping with RCBS die set and switched to a LEE Universal one with the same results.

 

[Tommie]

Reloadable primers!

 

[Coyotefurharvester]

There was still some moisture in some of them, hydraulic pressure the weak spot in the primer let lose and pin pushed the material to the side????

 

[The German]

There was still some moisture in some of them, hydraulic pressure the weak spot in the primer let lose and pin pushed the material to the side????

Nope, they have been sitting in the dry basement for half a year.

 

[Homerange]

Primer weld. I’ve seen a few. Maybe 10-15 times in my lifetime.

Good point although never seen it.
But if you consider we can push sealed and swaged primers outta military cases without issue it might seem the OP has another issue, maybe seating primers too firmly as Doom has mentioned.

 

[hpshooter]

Nope, it was standard loads with Winchester LR primers, NOS JHP, 43 grain H110, no flat primers and bullet seated with competition die to 1.600 COL.

I had 20 incidents on 300 cases of this on factory loaded Winchester .45ACP in a lot of bulk brass from the South Carolina law enforcement training facility a couple years ago.

It appeared as though the cases that retained the primer skirt had been in the weather since there was some light corrosion visible between the skirt and case.

 

[bozo699]

Nope, it was standard loads with Winchester LR primers, NOS JHP, 43 grain H110, no flat primers and bullet seated with competition die to 1.600 COL.

43 grains of H110?…..you better check the frame on your revolver….. that’s about 19 or 20 grains over max load on a 240 jhp
Wayne

 

[Janeau]

Wet tumbled with primer on..primer rusted to case. Decap before wet tumbling.

 

[kiwijohn]

I have had this happen in a 1050 on 9mm brass, next crank on the lever results in a bang that is quite exciting.

 

[RegionRat]

I suspect one of two possible scenarios.

One is the primer cup reacted with the wet tumble solution and that chemical attack tends to go to the "high energy" places first, so the bend at the bottom of the cup radius is the hardest place and likely to react first. Depending on the time lag of shooting, to cleaning, to decapping, the wet tumble opens to the door for ionic reactions.

Another scenario is a primer cup radius that is slightly too hard, and subsequent to firing becomes just weak enough that there is no margin when something like wet tumble makes an addition bond between the case and the primer. So, not so hard that it leaks during firing, but just hard enough that there is little or no margin for anything else.

How long was it between wet tumble and decapping?

What brand of primers? What did you use to wet tumble?