reloading .223

I was told after I did a whole day of range picking for .223 shells was that some .223 cases need the primer crimped and some don't. Most if not all my cases are federal and appear to have crimps on the primers. Can someone shoot me what tool I might need to purchase to crimp .223 primers?

i've never heard of crimping primers, usually thats something done at the factory. more time then not reloaders need to REMOVE the crimp through either swaging or reaming.

Right, you don't crimp them. Some are crimped from the factory. Those you have to swage the crimp out. The best tool that I have found without breaking the bank is the RCBS Pocket Swage Die. It comes with both the large and small primer pocket swager. I belive it was like 26 bucks at midwayusa http://www.midwayusa.com/viewProduct/?productNumber=447022.

Here is a picture showing a case with a crimp and one without a crimp. This way you can see if you need to swage your primer pockets or not..



Now if you buy factory rounds like at walmart, the remington UMC, which is good for plinking, you can save that brass. They do not crimp their primers.

you can also use your deburring tool to remove the crimp. I believe Ammosmith has a video on this. swaging is faster and doesnt remove material, reaming does.

victor8881 wrote:I was told after I did a whole day of range picking for .223 shells was that some .223 cases need the primer crimped and some don't. Most if not all my cases are federal and appear to have crimps on the primers. Can someone shoot me what tool I might need to purchase to crimp .223 primers?

Some cases need the primer crimp Removed and some do not. this is a process like the above have mentioned that makes the brass friendlier when you want to seat the new primer in the brass. without removing the crimp, the primer will hang on the crimp and buggar up before you can get it to seat.

The crimping process, as done for brass usually intended for military applications, is to ensure that the primer wouldn't fall out of the brass after being fired in a fully automatic firearm, thus lodging itself in the action somewhere jamming the rifle's action and potentially costing someone their life in a firefight. that's why it's done. for you and me, it's just a pain to remove to reload the brass, but necessary if you want to reap in the benefits of reloading cheap, readily available brass.

hope this helps

To the best of my knowledge there is NO primer pocket crimping device available to the public.

Primers are crimped at the factory and those are generally intended for auto-loading firearms, AR's and such.

if you really wanted to, you could make a crimping device using a lathe and then case-hardening the metal. But as you mentioned, why bother with any of that when you don't need to. Then it'll just be a pain again when it comes time to reload the cases again.

That's what I love about autoloaders; they're constantly spitting free brass all over the ground. So many people are too lazy to pick it up.

BigAgitator wrote:if you really wanted to, you could make a crimping device using a lathe and then case-hardening the metal. But as you mentioned, why bother with any of that when you don't need to. Then it'll just be a pain again when it comes time to reload the cases again.

That's what I love about autoloaders; they're constantly spitting free brass all over the ground. So many people are too lazy to pick it up.

+1

there are sealants that you can buy to "seal" you primer but honestly I can see no benefit of it for the average person.

Reload3006 wrote:there are sealants that you can buy to "seal" you primer but honestly I can see no benefit of it for the average person.

Like you said, prob no benefit for average person, however, ON some of my handloads, what I have done was taken some clear fingernail polish that I stole from the wifes, make up kit, I "painted" a small amount around the edges of my primers as well as around the edges of my bullets where it meets the mounth of the case. Then, using one of them small handheld bag sealers, the type you get with the vaccum seal ziplog bags, I placed some rounds in those and vaccumed sealed them as well. When I go hunting or what have you, they are water proof and sealed tight. I guess you could call this a survival tip...