doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Hard Primers?

Was shooting my late model 20 gauge Fox (2 3/4" chambers) today with some off the shelf Rio 7/8 ounce loads. Had several mis-fires in the right barrel (none in the left). Looking at the shells they seems to be hit pretty good with the firing pin, but apparently not good enough. Was wondering whether Rio's have harder primers then others. FWIW, I've never had this problem with Federals or Remington's and of course RST's (which are my favorites).

Wondering thoughts and if folks have had problems with either Rio's or other ammo brands when it comes to having apparently hard primers.

I haven't had a single misfire with Rio shells, tut. I've gone through 20+ flats in the last couple years in several different doubles.

SRH

Don't know about the primers specifically, but out of the last few boxes of Rio's I have purchased there have been two shells I didn't fire because of obvious external defects. Any chance it was a bad box?

If it was hard primers you should have had misfires in the left barrel as well. Sounds more like a spring problem with the right firing pin or perhaps some crude in the firing pin channel that is preventing the firing pin from going all of the way forward.

Fastest way to check for bad primers would have been to stop the shell which would not fire into the left barrel. If it then fired you know the problem is in the gun not the primer. Right barrel gets a lot more use and I've seen more problems with firing pin wear, mushroomed firing pin ends. The left side I see more crude in the works type problems.

Thanks. What I did do was move the shell that didn't fire into the left barrel and it fired there. However, I then used Federal's in the right barrel and had zero problems. Been using Federals all year with no problems, so I guess my assumption now is that perhaps there is a lighter strike on the right barrel then the left barrel and that lighter strike will still work with Federal ammo, but not the RIO's. Accordingly, I'm guessing that RIO primers are harder then Federal primers.

FWIW, I don't normally shoot RIO shells. I just happened to have box in the garage that I grabbed when I left the house yesterday.

OR, you have a deeper chamber rim cut in the right side
Mike

So don't use Rio primers or spend time and figure out your problem. If your firing pin strikes are less on the right side than the left it will cause this problem. If your rim cut is slightly deeper it will do the same. But unless you just have to use Rio primers I would just use other brands and not worry about it very much.

When they went off in the left barrel that should have told you the problem was in your gun not the primers. You never had a left side failure to fire just right side. so your problem is right side only. If you moved the "bad" shell to the left side it was instantly good. If you measure your firing pin striking depth the right side is most likely less than the left. The right side does get more use. If it bother you that much you can get it corrected but just changing brands of shells will correct it as well.

I have reoccurring failures to fire when shooting my old guns. I've found many times that the primer is seated too deep. But these are reloads. In any case, the misfires are often on one side.

Years ago I had an old J Stevens double 12 with a weak hammer spring on the right side. It would virtually always fire a WW shell but was apt to misfire with a R/P shells. It never missed in the left barrel. I fixed it by replacing the hammer spring. It is noted that when it did snap I could break the gun open & re cock & try again & it would fire on the 2nd try. I do not believe that moving the same shell from one side to the other tells you much of anything because the primer has already been dented to some extent & is thus now more sensitive. If with the same lot of shells it habitually doesn't fire in the right barrel but never misses in the left barrel, using a fresh shell for each try, then you can say the problem is with the gun, not the shells.