Primer?

[79F250]

This past saturday my dad and I broke out the rifles to get some meat in the freezer. I had shot a nice doe early in the afternoon so i continued to sit untill dark hoping to get a big axis. well at sunset a couple axis came out so i picked the one with the biggest body and got set up to shoot. waited for a broadside shot and flicked the saftey off and squeezed the trigger i expected to hear a bang and see the deer drop, but all i heard was click. i thought maybe i forgot to load another shell after i shot earlier. so i opened the bolt to find i still had a loaded shell in it. The axis ran off when i tried to load a different shell so didnt get my axis that i relly wanted so i could use the hide for seat covers in my truck. any how do yall think it was a bad primer or something wrong with the fireing pin? it was a brand new box hornady. any info would help. sorry for the long read just to ask a simple question. Thanks matt

[Jason19]

How would you rate the primer strike? Light? Hard?
If primers come into contact with oils or grease it can dud them. Thats rare for Hornady...

[79F250]

It put a decent dent in the primer but not quite as deep as the ones that actually fired. I think the firing pin didn't hit hard enough. I tried shooting the same shell again and nothing.

[mrc]

Honestly its hard to say did you try another round to see if it goes off? disassemble and clean the firing pin and bolt,or atleast spray some carb cleaner in it the reoil it.Then shot it again and see what happens.

[Artos]

It put a decent dent in the primer but not quite as deep as the ones that actually fired. I think the firing pin didn't hit hard enough. I tried shooting the same shell again and nothing.

Sounds like you just got a bad one after two strikes...in all my years of shooting, I have never had a bad primer.

Being in the mfg biz, we measure failure in PPM's or parts per million...primers are one of those products you see rarely fail. Big game hunters, LE, military, etc expect those little booger to go bang every time.

Sooner or later, failure will fall into the picture...sorry it happened on a hunt.

[79F250]

I didn't try shooting a different shell. I'll just clean it and see what happends. But as big of a dent it put in the primer I don't see how it didn't go off.

[cwill37]

I've had it happen on a hunt also.

Probably just a bad primer. With the millions of rounds Hornady loads each mounth there are bound to be one every once in a while. You can contact Hornady and they will replace the box of ammo at no cost to you.

[Dallascowboys]

ive had it happen to pistol ammo it could be the primer was seated further in i found that out the hard way while learning to reload

[RemMan700]

I had the same thing happen to me when I tried to shoot a coyote a couple weekends ago. Two strikes on the primer and it had a good dent. It was a reload so I took it back to the house and pulled the bullet and powder and put the case back in the gun and it went off. That is the first time I have ever had a centerfire rifle primer not go off on the first strike. I just chalk it up to a bad primer.

[79F250]

Thanks for the info guys.

[stang_j_99]

wasnt a superformance was it? Had a friend that had about half a box that failed to fire with a know good gun.

[79F250]

I dont think so box just says custom hornady 30-06 SPRG interlock. Doesn't say superformance anywhere on box.