Based on these photos is there any real evidence of over pressure? I think there might be very slight flattening, but but i have seen much, much, much worse. Thoughts?

Primers condition look fine.

Post another of the case mouth condition. Presence or lack of carbon will show case mouth expansion to seal the chamber.

How was the recoil compared to other/factory loads?

Looks like the slightest of flow back, but that could be quality of pics.. they seem to be blurred.

I'm with LJ on that one...

Looks fine, what's tha load/oal?

They have an OAL of 1.125, but the load was supposed to be 4.5grains of ETR7. I checked the powder throw on my scale it was good an consistet +/- .1 grains so my throw should have been 4.4 to 4.6.. I loaded 3k of rounds checking periodically and it was good to go.. I went back to load some more and noticed they were weighing higher; recalibrated the scale and then they were measuring low.. long story short, I bought a new digital scale and got a balance beam scale and the powder measure was more of a 4.6 so the range is 4.5 to 4.8, the weights of 30 throws combined in batches of 10 all came out to 46.8grains per 10 throws, so an average of 4.68grains per throw... I shot a box and they felt fine firing, recoil was fine. I just don't want to have to disassemble the 3k rounds if there aren't any warning signs.

Just an opinion, but I don't think primers are useful for determining anything. I use Federal primers, and they flatten with .38 +P loads. Trying to determine if a high pressure cartridge like 9mm, .357, etc is overpressure that way seems pointless, as a below max pressure load will have classic symptoms like flattening, flow back, etc.

There are probably other brands that are much less likely to flatten, flow, etc. So if I used those, it would be pointless to tell if something like a .38 load was safe, if they don't start showing signs until say 40k psi or something.

I also find that with the same primers, shooting the same ammo in a pistol vs a carbine will change how bad they look, probably as the pressure effect is cumulative and not just due to the peak. So then, if something looks "fine" in a pistol, but looks like hell coming out of the carbine, does that mean the pressure is ok for one but not the other? Or is it just that primer reading is a specious tool for evaluating load safety?

Anyway, just an opinion.

It is not the end all tell all way to determine pressure but is a useful indicator of a safe or too hot load.

There is a relationship to primer flattening and chamber pressure. Small Pistol, Small Pistol Magnum and in the following example (Small pistol vs Small Rifle) not only uses different chemistry but also different type and thickness and hardness of the primer cup.


Take the following:

http://www.k8nd.com/documents/hl38sup.pdf