I Got Primers!

[jag312]

Well, I don't know if I should post this to this section or to the reloading section. However, the god of reloading smiled upon me last night. I was given a few boxes of primers last night by an elderly lady who lives up the street from me. Her husband passed away years ago and she disposed of his guns and reloading equipment at that time. She has now sold her house and is packing to move. She found some primers that her husband had put away, and she wanted to know if I could dispose of them for her. I assured her that I could dispose of them properly, and I will dispose of them properly (one at a time).

What I got is this:

CCI Small Pistol Magnum - 1 box
CCI Small Pistol - 1 box
Herter's Small Pistol - 5 boxes (blue and yellow box)
Herter's Small Pistol - 3 boxes (made by Teikoku Kakohin in blue and orange box)
CCI Large Pistol - 2 boxes
CCI Large Pistol Magnum - 4 boxes
CCI Large Rifle - 5 boxes
Herter's Large Rifle - 5 boxes (blue and yellow box)
CCI Small Rifle - 2 boxes

The primers are old, and I'm going to test them to see if they are still good. I'm fairly sure they are. If they are not good, then the god of reloading has played a very cruel joke on me.

I have never heard of Herter's primers or primers made by Teikoku Kakohin in Japan for Herter's. Does anyone have any information on these?

 

[Jack Flash]

When you say "box", do you mean box of 100 or of 1,000?

Either way, that's quite a windfall.

 

[jag312]

Box of 100. I wish it were more, but I'm not complaining. And free is the right price. I just hope they work.

 

[29aholic]

Herter's was a Big sporting goods dealer for several years until they went out of business in the 70's (?). They marketed a lot of products under their own, similar to Bas Pro etc. of course the stuff was made by somone else.

 

[Bat Guano]

A couple of years ago I found some OLD CCI primers left over from when a friend and I started reloading. In 1962.

They had been properly stored and worked just fine.

 

[jag312]

Here is a picture of the Herter's boxes.

 

[SWID]

When I moved I found some CCI primers (1000s) that I had bought in the early seventies. I emailed CCI with the lot numbers and asked if they were OK to use. She emails me back and says their new primers are much better. I said thanks for not answering my question and made ups some loads and they cronoed just like the new ones. I wonder what's better about those new improved expensive primers. I haven't shot them all but it's not velocity or ignition so far.

 

[lcdrdanr]

15 years ago my boss gave me three boxes of reloading stuff that his brother had given him and had been sitting in his barn for at least 20 years. Among the goodies was an ammo box full of primers. Alcan, large rifle, I have no idea how old but the address has no zip code on it and some other stuff in the box had telephone numbers like MAyfair 2467 and LIberty 2233. I'm guessing late 50's, early 60's.

I've been using those primers pretty steady for years, down to my last couple of thousand but still have never had one fail to fire.

Dan R