Hard primer or light strike?

[The_Eric]

Hi guys, I went shooting today and among the guns I took was my Sig P365. I wanted to run some of my plinking ammo to further validate some additions that I performed a while ago (X slide and Holosun RMR). All was well with the few Blazer brass 115grn that I had and the 100 rounds of Magtech 115grn. When I got to my usual Winchester 9mm NATO (not the actual milspec loading, but p/n W9NATOVP, I got several fail to fires. When compared to the other empty casings I picked up (including my Federal HST ammo) the primers all looked solidly struck. Even the Win NATO that went bang looked good, but the duds looked significantly less indented.

I'm reasonably sure that they're hard primers, but the more sets of eyes, the better - especially since I don't generally have issues that I can learn from.

 

[The_Eric]

Edit - I seem to be having problems posting the pics.. I've gotta run and make dinner with the fairer half, so I'll look into pics later.. sorry guys.

 

[Rand]

How are those loaded compared to regular?
if they are these

Winchester Target & Training 9mm NATO Ammo 124 Grain Full Metal Jacket 1200fps.​

I'd just chalk it up to Winchester white box.

and avoid.

 

[ArrestMeRedZ]

FWIW, a shooting buddy had a similar problem with a striker fired Taurus .45 he brought to the range the first time. The gun simply would not fire the bulk reloads we had (we had gone through many 1000s of them with only a rare malfunction with multiple 1911s). His gun would fire the commercial rounds we had, but would not cycle.

I would guess your problem is the striker hit is substandard. Your observation that the Win NATO primers are hard is probably correct, but the gun should still set them off.

 

[burbguy82]

Not really enough info to make a real informed opinion, but so far it seems that the ammo would be the issue. That seems to be the only thing that changed in your session.

Question:

After you discovered that the WWB had several failure to fire, did you switch back to the other ammo and shoot more with success or did you quit?

If you went back to the other brands and all was good, I would say ammo 100%, but if not, and you quit shooting that gun for the session, it could be that something happened like a part failed, coincidentally when you fired your last salvo of the previous ammo.

To rule out parts breakage, disassemble, inspect and clean ( good idea anyway) and good back to the other working brand of ammo to put the gun back into commission.

That all i got, good luck

 

[oldcodger]

Really not enough info to make a real judgement but could be a screw up at Winchester such as rifle primers instead of pistol primers.

 

[dubber09]

That's a pretty hot load with 124gr bullet at 1200fps, would explain harder primers.

 

[ripcord]

Not an expert, but I've read repeatedly that NATO spec 9mm has harder primers to prevent problems in sub machine guns.

 

[Lyman]

I quit buying Winchester ammo many years ago. I have nothing good to say about it.

 

[The_Eric]

Well I finally got some pics uploaded..

To answer a couple of the questions - this is the first trouble of this kind that I've ever had with this line of ammo - and I've shot thousands of rounds (albeit through another gun) and hundreds, maybe a thousand through this Sig. Though to be fair, This specific box is newer than the other ammo and a different p/n (all the other stuff that I've shot is USA9NATO to my knowledge). Also, to be clear, the actual milspec NATO loading is p/n Q4318

Not really enough info to make a real informed opinion, but so far it seems that the ammo would be the issue. That seems to be the only thing that changed in your session.

Question:

After you discovered that the WWB had several failure to fire, did you switch back to the other ammo and shoot more with success or did you quit?

If you went back to the other brands and all was good, I would say ammo 100%, but if not, and you quit shooting that gun for the session, it could be that something happened like a part failed, coincidentally when you fired your last salvo of the previous ammo.

To rule out parts breakage, disassemble, inspect and clean ( good idea anyway) and good back to the other working brand of ammo to put the gun back into commission.

That all i got, good luck

I didn't really get a chance to compare other ammo and I only brought the Sig (I have other 9mm pistols that I can try) - I shot the Blazer and Magtech out first, then switched to the Win NATO, though after having problems with it, I did elect to use my HST carry ammo and it worked fine but it was only 13 rounds so maybe not definitive.

 

[The_Eric]

BTW, this is still the old design striker - Sig has an updated version that helps with the dragging on the primers that I plan on buying soon.

 

[burbguy82]

@The_Eric

These primer strikes are not proper, as you noted and explained in you previous post. I would lean toward the combination of the deformation of the striker and its striking pattern, and primer. "Straw that broke the camels back" situation.

Ill bet if you addressed the striker, the issue would disappear. The parts in the picture look pretty nasty, there is that.

How this can be an issue with such a premier gun maker is beyond me, especially such that an updated version is needed. I have shot quite a bit of WWB and 9mm Nato, and never had an issue, nor have I have such a strike pattern.

Good luck with the issue.

 

[The_Eric]

Aside from the drag, are the strikes of satisfactory depth? Specifically on the Winchester primers. It looks like the Blazer and Federal primers have been struck deeper (or at least were slightly softer) than the Winchester and the Magtech

 

[KneeGrinder]

Nato primers are going to be harder than non Nato. Winchesters Nato 9mm and 5.56 brass is the most horrible brass I have ever encountered, and I have bought about 40 tons of brass just from military installations let alone all the other brass I have bought from a friend that collects all the brass from the largest outdoor range in CA.

Federals are the softest primers that I know of. I like them a lot! You can see how the primer has flattened out against the pistols slide breech face. The +P of the HST helped also, but the WW's & Blazer if were as soft as the Federals would have flattened out too. You can see the WW's & Blazer primers both still have round cup edges and were not flattened out by the breech face of the slide. "Your firing pin and spring is in need of some help" But may, or may not be the root cause.

For my interest, if you have a set of calipers handy, please measure all the cases (4) you have pictured, the FC, WW's, and the Blazer and post the overall length, please do not place the caliper jaw over the primer, put it just off to the side of it to measure, and move the case around a bit to get a fair reading, the cases have some burrs that may cause irregular measurements.

9mm's headspace on the neck, or actually called the mouth in a straight wall case. If the Blazer and the WW's are shorter than the FC, your striker would not have the ability to strike the primer as hard or deep. "Food for thought"

On an end note for now, a lot of competitive shooters use small rifle primers only in all small primer pistol applications. This avoids the need to stock small pistol, just small rifle primers, none of them have any issues with harder small rifle primers even in hammer fired pistols. I use them in my Glocks, but not my revolvers.

P.S. didn't notice 1 case was CBC, Magtech.

 

[D1sc]

Been there

 

[D1sc]

Too sad

 

[I<3oil]

How are those loaded compared to regular?
if they are these

Winchester Target & Training 9mm NATO Ammo 124 Grain Full Metal Jacket 1200fps.​

I'd just chalk it up to Winchester white box.

and avoid.

Unless things have drastically changed in the last decade, WWB was the gold standard for plinking ammo in the 2000s and 2010s.

 

[Rand]

Unless things have drastically changed in the last decade, WWB was the gold standard for plinking ammo in the 2000s and 2010

I prefer CCI mini-mag.

 

[I<3oil]

I prefer CCI mini-mag.

I prefer Winchester NATO 9mm but that’s neither here nor there to what I said.

 

[Rand]

I prefer Winchester NATO 9mm but that’s neither here nor there to what I said.

its also not the 2000's or 2010's if you want to get technical.