Not to dash any cold water on anyone, but the cruel truth of the matter is that primers are about the most consistently reliable device known to man. When there's misfires involved, it's almost always traceable back to a gun problem, or something the handloader did in assembling the ammunition. By actual count, I have run across exactly three (3) bad primers over the past 25+ years, out of upwards of two million rounds I've loaded during that period.
Three, out of over two million.
Two of these didn't even make it into the case, as I spotted them during the priming process. The third was actually loaded by a friend of mine, and likely cost him a win at a 600 yard BR match in St. Louis a few years back. Exactly the same problem in all three; no compound. In the two that I ran across, I plainly saw the bright metallic shine of the inside of the cup, right where the compound should have been, beneath the anvil. My friend tried to fire his round, the last in a five round string of a registered BR match, and got a resounding "click" when the striker fell. Time ran out, that was his last round, and he wound up with only four hits (but a beautiful group) on paper. He brought the round down to the range the next day for an autopsy, assuming he'd forgotten to charge the case with powder. Pulled the bullet, and found a fully charged case with the appropriate load of powder. Carefully decapping the "fired" primer, we immediately saw the same thing as I had with the other two; no compound at all, just a cup, a foil and an anvil. Hey, it happens.
These were spread out over several years, but as I mentioned, entailed something in excess of two million primers. Pretty good odds, but you've still got to pay attention to the actual loading, as well as the condition of the firearm.
