OzFclass

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Regarding jackets, this was in a Berger newsletter just recently and gives a fair idea to how much trouble they go to to get jackets uniform.

We take great pride and delight in relaying the news that Berger has successfully proven a significant increase in the amount of match grade quality bullets we can produce. After implementing the solution to our jacket making process in March of 2016, we are averaging nearly two times our record jacket output. The best news is that these jackets meet and beat our industry leading .0003 TIR wall uniformity tolerance. Additionally, as an unexpected side benefit, they are also exceeding our expectations in bullet forming performance.

We've been working very hard on a key challenge at Berger. The challenge is in reducing the excessive time it takes to set up the jacket making press to achieve the .0003 or better TIR wall thickness uniformity that is required. A set up that should take between 3 to 5 days frequently stretched into several weeks. And far too frequently, set ups that took weeks ran into months.

This reality had a tremendous negative impact on our ability to make enough bullets. It also made it impossible for us to establish a dependable production schedule. We recognize that many who enjoy the higher quality Berger provides are willing to wait but they can't wait forever especially lacking a reasonably accurate notion of how long. Our shooters are understandably compelled to create loads with other brands since it is better to shoot anything than it is to not shoot at all regardless of which brand is being used.

The good news is that those who have been frustrated by the lack of availability of Berger Bullets will see that we've solved this problem in a big way. I am thrilled to relay that we are two months into a jacket production output rate that is nearly two times our highest output rate to date and, of course, the jacket quality is the same (and in some ways better). It is clear now that we've identified and resolved the bottleneck in our ability to consistently produce .0003 TIR jackets.

This is not to suggest that many things were going poorly, but as a result of us being empowered with these impactful tools, we see now how we can use them to explore important things in new and enhanced ways. Getting stronger with using these tools means nothing but good things for our shooters, their results and the rifle shooting experience.

I regard these and other soon to be announced changes to Berger as being as impactful to the rifle shooting experience as the day Walt turned his first jacket to achieve .0003 TIR over half a century ago. Shooters will see for themselves that our bullets are more readily available and will continue to be in far greater numbers. This marks the dawning of a new age for Berger and for those who shoot our bullets. We didn't change everything; we are making what was already great even better, genuinely.

Very appropriate Ray. It would be great to have a supply of Bergers.

On reading the various posts on weighing primers I decided to find out for myself what sort of differences I came up with. I use Fed.210 and C.C.I.BR2. I weighed 20 of each and found the following differences in 1/10 grains. The Fed 210 were on average 2-1/2 heavier than C.C.I. The Fed 210 varied 1-1/2 and the C.C.I. 1/2. So it appears as if the C.C.I. are the more uniform of the two. When I get the time I shall have to check out the M/V. variations. I have found that my .284W 1000yd B/R rifle shoots better with the C.C.I. The last testing I did with it gave E.S 10 &S.D 4.using 175 gr M/K Sierras, using C.C.I.
With my 6.5x55 Rogue with 139 Lapua Skenar Proj.& unsorted Fed 210 primers E/S was 6 and S.D 3. The testing was 2shots through clean barrels and 10 over chrony. Hopefully one day I can plot velocities and shot positions at 1000yds.
Cheers,
Trevor.

Graham, your topic and the secrecy within it has sparked my interest . I'm loading 200 rounds and for the first time ever I've weight sorted primers. I was pretty interested to see the variation and from that, I can easily imagine how it might be able to uniform MV a little more.

I've devised a fairly scientific test to see if it works. If I win the lead up and Nat's, it works, if I don't, it doesn't. Bahahahahaha.. No seriously, it was pretty interesting to see the variation and then to compare that to the weight of spent primers.

DenisA wrote:Graham, your topic and the secrecy within it has sparked my interest . I'm loading 200 rounds and for the first time ever I've weight sorted primers. I was pretty interested to see the variation and from that, I can easily imagine how it might be able to uniform MV a little more.

I've devised a fairly scientific test to see if it works. If I win the lead up and Nat's, it works, if I don't, it doesn't. Bahahahahaha.. No seriously, it was pretty interesting to see the variation and then to compare that to the weight of spent primers.

Na it doesn't work ! Total waste of Time ! Now where's my gem pro scales !
Not want to put the Mocka on you but was looking at ur et at 1000 yds on the weekend and you have that .30 cal humming ! Good luck mate , we can both donate money to the prize pool together! Regards Graham .

The way I'm looking at the variation in these primers is that there's 0.16gns between extremes here. I don't know what the burn rate of primer compound is compared to different powders, but 0.16gns is equivalent to 8 x kernels of ar2208, 5 x kernels of ar2209 and 4 x kernels of ar2213sc. None of us would be happy with random powder variations like that.

Spent primers weigh approx. 5gns.

Good luck to you too mate. What ever happens on the mound, it'll be a great week catching up with people that we don't often get to see.

Queens is happy times

i reckon i'd get more value in weighing the wind flags.

curious to see any data come of your research etc though, in the primerrs.

I've noticed that with GM210M primers that the lacquer they use varies considerably in the amount applied.

There would be significant weight variation just from that alone. Just saying...

... and how much will you mess with the primers by tossing them into pill glasses - particularly if the Lee claim that Federal primers are dangerous when contained together in the Lee priming tool?

Longranger wrote:I've noticed that with GM210M primers that the lacquer they use varies considerably in the amount applied.

There would be significant weight variation just from that alone. Just saying...

I know what you mean. Often you'll see a primer with very little red stuff on the anvil side compared to others. Sometimes there's some green coming through too??? In this lot, there didn't seem to be a correlation between the lighter primers and those with less red stuff on them. Some of the primers with apparently less red stuff were in the heavier piles.

Send-it, I wont be doing any testing with this. I'll be treating it the same way that I treat brass. Weight sort them and then load them in order of lightest to heaviest so that there are no sudden differences and no waste.

John, they're disposable shot glasses and it has more kick than Ouzo...
They weren't stored like that, only sorted before loading. It's probably safer on the bench in a shot glass than it is in a RCBS hand primer tray sitting above your knuckles.

DenisA wrote:... it was pretty interesting to see the variation and then to compare that to the weight of spent primers...

Denis,

A key question is, how much variation was there in the spent primers?

Alan

AlanF wrote:

DenisA wrote:... it was pretty interesting to see the variation and then to compare that to the weight of spent primers...

Denis,

A key question is, how much variation was there in the spent primers?

Alan

Alan, I weighed 10 random spent primers from my press tray which is full They ranged between 4.9gns to 5.0gns.
I didn't go any further because I think for that to offer any real value each individual primer weight would have to be weighed before and after firing. Even then, theres still carbon in them.

It would be interesting to U/S clean a group of spent primers and weigh them. Trouble is the anvils would probably fall out. Have to U/S clean one at a time. I wonder if the U/S clean would get all the crud out.

Denis,

If you can be satisfied that the metallic parts of the primer vary by only e.g. 0.05gn, then most of your total weight variation of 0.18gn has to be in the primer compound, which would suggest that weighing primers could be worthwhile. So the U/S cleaning and weighing of fired primers idea might be worth pursuing.

Alan

Denis Mc has gone through this exercise for us a little while back.

CCI BR primers were remarkably consistent in anvil and cup weight after cleaning. MOST of the weight variation is in primer compound.


To test the effect on velocity variation you MUST follow Peter Smiths recommendations earlier in this thread. Testing sorted vs unsorted will likely yield no result due to the effects outlined in the ES/SD and sampling errors threads.

Try and sort and then map weight vs velocity or impact height and look for the correlation.

I did weigh 20 primers ES was .09gr
weighed 20 spent primers ES .07
will clean some and see what the ES is then