Winchester’s New Primer Pockets

Winchester’s new oval primer pockets will set the shooting world on fire. :lol:

NOT what a joke. Since switching their bags from the blue and white to this red and black , it has been nothing but junk. I loved the old brass, but now it is so disappointing.

RL338":31xulajz said:

Winchester’s new oval primer pockets will set the shooting world on fire. :lol:

NOT what a joke. Since switching their bags from the blue and white to this red and black , it has been nothing but junk. I loved the old brass, but now it is so disappointing.

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Wow that’s some poor quality control. Pretty hard to get a consistent velocity I’d think.


If the wind doesn’t blow, take to the oars.

Are you referring to the flash holes? I've seen several like that myself which I removed from use before ever firing once. Ended up with 85 out of 100 pieces of 7mm Rem Mag brass. I need to buy another bag of 50 just to get an even 100. Lame...

I'm assuming you're talking about the oval flash holes. I have the old blue/white bags of 348 Winchester and 7mm-08, not bad brass. I got a red/black bag of 22-250 and like you experienced pure frustration to get them prepped to be decent. I wont buy it again.

Yes I was referring to the flash hole. I was trying to make lite of a bad situation with title. It looks like they punched them with a cold chisel from the chunk hanging inside the case.

RL338":2ny65rkb said:

Yes I was referring to the flash hole. I was trying to make lite of a bad situation with title. It looks like they punched them with a cold chisel from the chunk hanging inside the case.

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Yep. Look inside some of those cases and they'd make a bat cave jealous. The amount of work it took and the amount of brass shavings I got from prepping both the primer pockets and flash holes to make them useable was ridiculous. Wont happen again with me.

Mass production with old tooling.

I buy Norma.

It costs more per piece, but I don’t toss 15% on defects I can see... and wondering what I can’t see in the other 85%.

I full transparency, I have bought Winchester brass for my plinking guns and WSM.

The Norma is for the guns I really want to perform.


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Or a contractor with bad tooling...


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I haven't bought any Winchester brass in 25 yrs due to the poor quality of the last batch I had back then.

I just loaded up Winchester 6mm Remington brass, 100 rounds. Out of two bags of the red/black stuff I had 18 (EIGHTEEN) that were defective! At the neck shoulder junction it looked like not enough brass flowed into the mold and left a vacant teardrop shaped flaw. I just shipped them back to Winchester. We'll see. I hope they send me 100 new ones and not 18 replacements. It really sucked!

High quality brass is well worth the money if you are shooting an accurate rifle.

A few days ago I was shooting my Creedmoor (which is a production rifle) with a tailored handload in Lapua brass with the small primer pocket. It was the 7th reload on that brass with no annealing. I shot a 1.14" group followed by a .77" group at 400yds. It takes pulling everything together to get groups like that but the brass is no small part of it. The fact that I just reloaded it for the 8th time makes the Lapua brass a bargain.

Now when will Lapua start producing some 6.5 PRC brass? Hmmmmmm

Charlie-NY":345j2ljx said:

High quality brass is well worth the money if you are shooting an accurate rifle.

A few days ago I was shooting my Creedmoor (which is a production rifle) with a tailored handload in Lapua brass with the small primer pocket. It was the 7th reload on that brass with no annealing. I shot a 1.14" group followed by a .77" group at 400yds. It takes pulling everything together to get groups like that but the brass is no small part of it. The fact that I just reloaded it for the 8th time makes the Lapua brass a bargain.

Now when will Lapua start producing some 6.5 PRC brass? Hmmmmmm

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Great testimonial.

Guy

Charlie-NY":1mlujlw1 said:

High quality brass is well worth the money if you are shooting an accurate rifle.

A few days ago I was shooting my Creedmoor (which is a production rifle) with a tailored handload in Lapua brass with the small primer pocket. It was the 7th reload on that brass with no annealing. I shot a 1.14" group followed by a .77" group at 400yds. It takes pulling everything together to get groups like that but the brass is no small part of it. The fact that I just reloaded it for the 8th time makes the Lapua brass a bargain.

Now when will Lapua start producing some 6.5 PRC brass? Hmmmmmm

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And 6mm Remington brass damn it.

I seldom if ever bought Winchester (or Remington) brass during the past decade. If Norma or Lapua was available, it always got my nod. Drilled flash holes were superior in every way to punched flash holes.

I really wonder if the shape of the flash hole (oval) or location (central vs off center) really make any difference in the accuracy of a load? I also wonder just how much the difference in accuracy, if any would make a difference in a hunting load. Probably of more importance might be how many angels can dance in the point of a pin? :roll:

Might be the grounds for a project. Take brass with centrally located flash hole and brass with the offending problems and see just how much, if any difference there might be.
Paul B.

Even if they had perfect flash holes, I've still seen a 15% reject rate due to wrinkles in the shoulders. Unless you like brass prep, the time spent uniforming primer pockets and deburing flash holes makes the Lapua worth it in my opinion.

Yeah I'm cheap but honestly I can't tell the difference in groups from the cheaper priced brass.
The last Winchester brass I bought was a little disappointing and took time to prep.
I've also had to prep other name brands so for the price I can accept some throw away.

PJGunner":29pdl7nj said:

I really wonder if the shape of the flash hole (oval) or location (central vs off center) really make any difference in the accuracy of a load? I also wonder just how much the difference in accuracy, if any would make a difference in a hunting load. Probably of more importance might be how many angels can dance in the point of a pin? :roll:

Might be the grounds for a project. Take brass with centrally located flash hole and brass with the offending problems and see just how much, if any difference there might be.
Paul B.

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Yup. I saw this last night but was too tired to comment. Try shooting the offending "oval primer pockets" for group. Share your results.

IMO it's doubtful that these flash holes will be noticeable to an average shooter even with an above average rifle. I'm still using new (unfired) 30 year old brass, but have needed to get some new current production brass. When did the flash holes become smaller & why? My standard size uniforming tool (.080") doesn't fit "standard" cases anymore. The PPC size tool (.060") has become standard in the newer brass. Pin gauges from .060 to .065" fit these newer small holes, so I'm pretty sure with a little work the oval flash holes could be made round & .080" if the WW brass is also undersized. Recent production Hornady, Peterson, & PPU have all had smaller holes.

Not to be pedantic, but words do have meaning. Brass is not cast, so of course it cant fill out the mold. There is no mold. This is about all I could find quickly...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wXNXUpOozDg

Anyway... circumferential brass thickness variation in a case apparently will cause all manor of goblins to appear & would be more of a concern for those after the ultimate accuracy. Some brass of more extreme variance will show flyers & uneven sizing even in sporting rifles. Neck tuning will not fix this. The thickness variance is more pronounced down at the web. There was a series of articles on this phenomenon in Precision Shooting mag in the early 90s, back when banana shaped cases were visible, with close inspection, to the naked eye. Years ago I measured a full box of Lapua 308 with the NECO gauge & was simply amazed at the uniformity compared to domestic brands at the time.

Below are some pics I took with the bore scope (mirror removed) of inside some brass.

I picked this bag up for $20 , didn’t think of it. My 30-06 is not a precision rifle by no means. It is what I call my “rain gun” hunt in the rain with it. This brass will work fine in replacing the Remington brass I’m using now. Winchester brass has always worked well for me and it has just more capacity per given cartridge. The worst I ever seen was years back my brother gave me 2 boxes of Federal 30-30 brass to reload for him. The flash hole were off center breaking 2 depriming pins before I tossed them.

RL338":16csjfrz said:

I picked this bag up for $20 , didn’t think of it. My 30-06 is not a precision rifle by no means. It is what I call my “rain gun” hunt in the rain with it. This brass will work fine in replacing the Remington brass I’m using now. Winchester brass has always worked well for me and it has just more capacity per given cartridge. The worst I ever seen was years back my brother gave me 2 boxes of Federal 30-30 brass to reload for him. The flash hole were off center breaking 2 depriming pins before I tossed them.

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Starline Brass started making 30/06 shells last year. I would look at them for future brass at decent prices.