Primers - Not a history lesson

[hdwhit]

According to the Abilene Reporter-News, most Gibson's Discount Center stores went out of business around 1982 following a government victory in a lawsuit filed by the FTC.

That suggests the boxes of CCI small rifle primers with a Gibson's price sticker bought in Jonesboro, Arkansas, were probably purchased no later than 1982 - possibly earlier - making them at least 34 years old.

Those primers were stored - in their original tray - in a garage in Northern Arkansas until they were moved to North Texas and continued to be stored in a garage that was neither heated nor air conditioned.

Last week, I loaded 35 of those primers into some .223 Remington rounds (50 grain Hornady Soft Point over 19.5 grains IMR-4198) for use in a Savage Axis rifle. I took them to the family farm over Columbus Day and shot them with no problems or failures of any kind.

This has given me some confidence that the thousands of nearly four decade-old primers that I still have are probably okay to use.

 

[X-Rap]

Primers are very stable and I really have no idea as to a shelf life.
I think most of us reloaders have used some decades old primers without negative effects. Personally I'd be inclined to use them toward practice or varmint type loads if I had just a few hundred but if I had a sleeve I'd shoot a couple hundred and if they were good I'd use the as if they were new.

Sent from my XT1254 using Tapatalk

 

[ultralightbackpacker]

I live in the great state of **********. I store my product in the garage. It easily gets 30 degrees in winter and over 100 in summer IN the garage. I have only seen 2 primer failures in my life of reloading, and I blame them on weak springs, not on storage, as the second pull they fired. I'm still using primers that I have from ~25 years ago that just sit in my garage until I need them.

Load em up, and shoot em.

 

[Robert101]

So now your confidence in primers of say 30 years old aligns with mine.

 

[Blue68f100]

Primers normally do not have a shelf life expectancy, unlike powder. The compound is sealed which makes them harder to kill. Now the newer NT Primers do from what I have read, 10yrs ? Which means I probably want be buying any since I'm still working on primers from the 60's. I still have some powder from Gibson, Herco, and a few others. If I recall the price tag on it says $2.87 for the metal push button top 1 lb can.

 

[Bart B.]

Primers do have a shelf life, but most folks won't see a difference.

I've used Federal and RWS 15 year old primers then new ones with new powder and seen elevation shot stringing at longer ranges of about 1 MOA or more. Both were shot alternately at the same time. Others have noticed this happening.

Tulammo (formerly PMC then Wolf) Russian primers are the most stable over time. And are very uniform.

 

[mdi]

Primers aren't as delicate as a lot of folks say. I can honestly say that in my entire reloading history I have had fewer "bad" primers than I have fingers on my left hand (in fact I can't remember any misfires that weren't my fault). I've only used CCI, Winchester, Remington and Wolf (all sizes) and 90% of my reloads have been handgun ammo. I think a lot of the "facts" about rimers being "killed" by a bit of case lube, or oily fingers are old wive's tales repeated until they become "true". I've squirted some primers with WD40 and they would still pop after about a full day, but I didn't take that experiment very far, just 6 or 7 primers, cause I'd rather put a primer in a case! And I, like many folds do, just keep my primers in a tub, in the original sleeves and bricks, in a shed or shop with no A/C and little heat, near the ocean (from 900 yards to 1 mile)....

 

[alexcue]

My oldest primers are probably about 34yrs old. I'm finishing up some of the small pistol ones, but still have some in the Magnum version both SP and LP. They weren't treated all that well in storage. Like you they've seen garages from the 30's to over 110* in the summer. This was before I got smarter about storage and brought them in. To date, none have had issues relating to that storage as far as I could tell. The ones I've had failure to fire are IMO due to seating depth, and usually a second strike has gotten them to fire. Like I said, these weren't babied in any way. They are CCI BTW, Some slightly younger Win primers (two decades old but treated better in storage) have been all used up and have had no issues.

... and yeah, I've had some that I've tried to kill with a drop or two of oil, and after reading that they didn't necessarily get killed by it, tried to fire them through my gun... they did go off. (these are usually crooked or primer pockets that weren't letting them seat right).

 

[Swampman]

Tulammo (formerly PMC then Wolf) Russian primers are the most stable over time. And are very uniform.

Do you have a source for the stability of the Murom Apparatus Works primers?

I purchased a bunch of the PMC .217" Large Rifle Berdan primers back when PMC was liquidating their stock for @ $60 per 5000, so better than average stability would be great news for me.

I just wonder how anyone could reliably test the long term stability of Murom's non-corrosive primers.

I never heard of any Russian high power rifle ammunition that wasn't corrosive until the mid 90's.

 

[hdwhit]

Robert101 wrote:

So now your confidence in primers of say 30 years old aligns with mine.

Yep.

I took enough chemistry in college to realize that lead styphnate is a very stable compound that was only minimally soluble in water (i.e. humidity) so that it should have a very long shelf life, but I was expecting a failure rate at 30+ years of around 2% to 4% as others have reported and yet, I experienced a failure rate of zero.

Thanks to those of you that had experienced minimal failure rates on primers in long-term storage for giving me the courage to go ahead and load my old primers. It was a very good decision that I would not have made but for your encouragement.

 

[hdwhit]

alexcue wrote:

... Like I said, these weren't babied in any way. They are CCI BTW, ...

Most of my old primers are CCI, too.

I guess this is testimony to the fact that CCI really got it right in the 1980s.

 

[hdwhit]

blue68f100 wrote:

If I recall the price tag on it says $2.87 for the metal push button top 1 lb can

The oldest powder I still have is a canister of IMR-4227 marked at $6.97.

 

[hdwhit]

Xrap wrote:

Personally I'd be inclined to use them toward practice or varmint type loads

In this case, they were used for loads intended in sighting-in a new rifle.

I'll worry about varmints after I retire (somewhere between 15-21 months hence).

 

[hdwhit]

Bart B. wrote:

Tulammo (formerly PMC then Wolf) Russian primers are the most stable over time.

Do you have a source for this? I understood that PMC was based in the Philippines, while Tulammo was based in Tula, Russia.

 

[Reloadron]

Bart B. wrote:


Do you have a source for this? I understood that PMC was based in the Philippines, while Tulammo was based in Tula, Russia.

I always had PMC (Precision Made Cartridges) in South Korea?

PMC Ammo Information:

PMC ammunition is manufactured in South Korea by the Poongsan Corporation (ISO certified) which produces cartridges ranging from small arms ammunition to large howitzer rounds for the South Korean military. The Poongsan Corporation dates back to 1968 and since its founding it has grown to become on one of the world's largest manufacturers and suppliers of ammunition. The Poongsan Corporation's primary mission is to make South Korea fully self-reliant for their ammunition needs.

The above quote taken from Lucky Gunner. I have also seen many other references to South Korean manufacture for PMC ammunition. I should have some boxes of .223 Remington made by PMC around here somewhere.

Ron

 

[MADDOG]

The shelf life of primers is longer than the shelf life of the shelf they are sitting on.

 

[Reloadron]

This past summer I have loaded and shot quite a bit of .223 Remington and .308 Winchester using a wide range of CCI (and a few other primer brands) which are about 20-25 years old. I also used some powders that date the primers. Everything has shot fine.

Ron

 

[Slamfire]

The shelf life of lead styphnate primers is greater than the gunpowder in the cartridge. This DTIC document is worth looking at:

Percussion Primers design requirements

www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a114616.pdf

In it you will see that high temperature will dud out primers. The old chlorate primers would dud out as they aged, and there is a table showing this. I am surprised that the lifetime of lead styphnate primers was not specifically addressed.

Maybe the military does not care since any loaded ammunition, the gunpowder inside will go bad before the primer, and the military does not use reloads.

 

[hdwhit]

I always had PMC (Precision Made Cartridges) in South Korea?

PMC Ammo Information:



The above quote taken from Lucky Gunner. I have also seen many other references to South Korean manufacture for PMC ammunition. I should have some boxes of .223 Remington made by PMC around here somewhere.

Ron

Thank you. This, is what I had been remembering:

Eldorado Cartridge Corporation (previously Patton and Morgan Corp., and Pan Metal Corp. ) PO Box 62508, Boulder City, NV 89006. The PMC headstamped ammunition for ECC has been made in Korea, the Philippines, Mexico and the Repuclic of South Africa.

Source: http://www.cartridgecollectors.org/headstampcodes?page=headstampcodes#P