Annealing 22 Hornet Brass?

[KySilverado]

I'm loosing a lot of 22 Hornet brass. Cracked necks. Not so many reloads on them. I know the Hornet brass is considered fragile, really thin neck and shoulder. I'm considering annealing a new batch I have coming. Wondering if anyone has tried annealing this particular cartridge and if so were there any improvements in its life?

[birdshot]

i get quite a few cracked necks on my hornet cases during the resizing process. i have not considered anealing, but have been considering a less steep angle on the expander ball. i resize a wildcat 5 hundreds in one step, with good results, and that die has a longer bevel. i was thinking the hornet would do better with a similiar setup.

[KySilverado]

Thanks for the reply.

I don't loose them during resizing/loading. I lose the during firing. I know chamber sizes play a role. I loose most in my Ruger, some in my Contender and virtually none in my CZ's.

[gearheadpyro]

Just out of curiousity, have you checked the headspace on those rifles lately? Too much headspace will cause a case to split really quickly. Loosing more cases in one rifle than another makes me question the rifle, not the case.

Annealing may help as it does soften the brass. It would be tough to do such a small case with propane and not heat the case body though.

I've been working for a while on annealing with an induction heater, it will work well for this. I've even got a .22 Hornet in the latest video I made. Check it out here

[KySilverado]

No I haven't checked the headspace in any of them. May invest in a couple gauges. I do suspect the Ruger may have problems. They, from what I've read, do suffer from headspace problems. However I wouldn't suspect a headspace problem in a Contender.

The brass is a few years old but not loaded many times. 3 at the most.

Nice annealing setup you've made there.

[thallub]

I loose most in my Ruger, some in my Contender and virtually none in my CZ's.

There is a very good reason for that. The SAAMI spec chamber for the .22 Hornet is too big. I've be reloading the .22 Hornet for nearly 50 years. Many years ago i had my own minimum spec .22 Hornet chamber reamer ground.


http://www.gunsandammo.com/content/the-22-hornet

I discovered a few years ago what the Europeans have known for a long time. The standard American chambers for Hornet rifles are much too loose for good accuracy. The European guns in .22 Hornet (5.6x35R) have much tighter chambers and as a group, shoot far better. This chamber-dimension discrepancy goes a long way toward explaining why Hornets have such a spotty accuracy history. Some guns shoot great, and some are worse than ho-hum.

The Lee dies I have do size down the cases to the nominal factory-ammo dimensions so they will properly fit the European guns. In 1997 I had a custom reamer made by JGS in Coos Bay, Oregon, which is even smaller than the SAAMI minimum chamber dimensions. The Hornet pressure barrel I'm using was made by Bo Clerke and incorporates this tight chamber. As you can see from the target, it shoots just great. The downside is that you certainly have to full-length resize any case that's been fired in an American chamber.

That's not a big problem either, and it's a small price to pay for better accuracy. After all, if a light varmint rifle isn't accurate, it isn't worth keeping around.