A Definitive study of Annealing

[hounddawg]

Something fast, economical and precise is the goal. If the makers of AMP work out an automatic feed system, they will have addressed a big limitation of their equipment for volume shooters.

looks like they are addressing the auto feeder issue. The auto feeder will be a separate standalone component and you will be able to upgrade your older units for around $300 give or take and have the option of either buying a unit with or without a autofeed depending on your budget and needs

https://www.facebook.com/AMPannealing

also according to the AMP people they can not only vary the time but the power. The machine can either use less power and more time or more power and less time depending on the case

https://www.facebook.com/AMPannealin...type=3&theater

I found using the Annealeeze that I prefer the common unregulated pencil flame torch over the "swirl" flame regulated torches simply because I can pinpoint the cone of the flame right at the junction of the neck and shoulder. Using the inner point of the flame to "aim" at the case seems to give me a much better heat flow.

I am still looking for a regulated pencil flame torch so I can have the best of both worlds

[F. Guffey]

someone mentioned annealing with a candle earlier in this thread, well they tried it and tested it. Conclusion was you would not change the brass but you would burn the heck out of fingers

One annealer posted a u-Tube video using the 'hold the case in the hand' method, about half way through the video the hand disappeared. That video reminded me of the reloader and black smith in the shade of 'A' tree. The horse shoe was hot for the black smith and it did not take the reloader long to look at it.

F. Guffey

[mete]

In the metallurgy business we sometimes picked up warm stuff. If we weren't careful we dropped it and said "wow that got hot fast "
I will go through the article but in all the comments about annealing much of it is done without the reloader's understanding of metallurgy or ways of measuring important things. For most of you I still think that the Norma method I have previously quoted is fine for the great majority of reloaders the rest is word games and wishful thinking ! Have fun !

[RC20]

Sorry if I am boring some or most here, I realize that this is a subject that is only of interest to a few. For 99% of the shooters/reloaders here any annealing machine would be about as worthless as teats on a boar hog as we say down here. Spending that money on powder, bullets etc would do them a whole lot more good in my opinion. Bench rest, and long range people are the only one who really need to care about neck tensions. Well not to forget the exotic cartridge guys who pay $$$$ for their cases. Other than those groups no one needs to spend money on this or any other annealing machine.

My take on boring people is you can read the thread tittle, if not interested you don't have to read. Pretty simple.

If you read and make snarky comments my response is the same, not interested in snarky, contribute something, (good or bad or even funny) to the discussion or keep quiet

[RC20]

Lets see, the candle thing works, wear leather gloves, problem solved. At no cost to you either!

Well its slow and ........

[RC20]

Supercub99 pointed out that you get a low cost food dryer and your wet case problem is solved at low cost and totally effective.

[hounddawg]

For most of you I still think that the Norma method I have previously quoted is fine for the great majority of reloaders the rest is word games and wishful thinking !

By Norma method do you mean put the cases in a tray of water up to the shoulder then heat with a torch tilll the neck glows and tip over ?

I would have to agree. I have some .308 Lapua Palma which is damn near geriatric in dog years. I always used the drill and socket routine on them every 5th loading, never had a neck split issue but loose primer pockets have taken a toll

Even perfect annealing alone will not work miracles on accuracy it is just one step in the recipe. If you need or want a perfect case it is worth pursuing, if not then it is of dubious value and a waste of time and money.

Just my opinion as always

[RC20]

Ok, funny. I know grinding makes things hot, been there and done that.

So my wife has an aluminum lid she wants a knob off, rivet type thing on the back side.

I grid off the plume and garb the knob and third degree burns alarms. Ok, hand into the water dish on the porch , cold water from faucet.

Hmm, aluminum, fast heat transmission, grinding, who knew?

[mete]

Yes that's the method !

[F. Guffey]

Lets see, the candle thing works, wear leather gloves, problem solved. At no cost to you either!

You failed to understand the fable of the black smith and the rleoader.

The smith said to the reloader: Hot, ain't it? And the reloader said to the to smith: "No, it just don't take me long to look at it". And then there are rules and factors, if a reloader had rules he went by he would never consider the candle.

F. Guffey

[hounddawg]

if a reloader had rules he went by he would never consider the candle

long before I ever reloaded my first round I had a firm rule about burning the tar out of my fingers - just say no to blisters

[RC20]

Ahhh well, easier said than done.

Working on a Compressor can one day and had not clue how hot the internal heater made the entry port.

3rd degree burns except some quick thinking about how cold return suction is and a nice cold place to put the hand.

If I could outthink the world I would never have an problems.

[hounddawg]

well yesterday I got my Brownells catalog in and they have a coupon for 100 bucks off with free shipping for big orders. I looked long and hard at the AMP, but have still decided to hold off awhile longer. I have decided my money is best spent on bullets, powder and cases to work on technique and wind skills than on fancier equipment at this stage. After 30 more rounds down range this morning decided what I have is good enough for right now.


I will go out on a limb and say that the better the SD and ES the tighter the groups at 600. Nothing scientific but the cases I have been shooting have had three trips through the Anealeeze and on are their 5th loading and still getting decent groups with very little vertical stringing. Only had one flyer this morning and one major outlier in my velocity data. They were on the same string so I have a feeling that the outlier caused the flyer

[Mozella]

Sometimes you gotta' take a step back, take a deep breath, and ask yourself if you're not getting too crazy about reloading. For example, I refuse to cut powder kernels. I'm just not going to do it, especially since I compete only in local matches. I don't weight sort primers either. Therefore, I don't need a scale with much more precision than .02gr because that's roughly the weight of a kernel of Varget. I can load to plus/minus one kernel using moderately priced equipment along with an investment of my time as well as some carefully honed operating techniques to make my equipment function reliably.

Likewise, my home made "Skip Design" torch based automatic annealer provides all the precision I need. I only reload two calibers. I clean and anneal them every cycle. After some experimenting and calibrating I have settled on a annealing time for each caliber which works well. Although my brass may be slightly harder or softer than some other shooter, I believe my cases come out of my machine at a consistent hardness and I also believe consistency is more important than absolute hardness. I'm not a metallurgist, but I have had significant formal training in metallurgy as part of my University education. So I have a pretty good feel for what it takes to properly anneal cartridge brass. I no longer count reloading cycles and my Lapua brass seems to last forever, or at least until the primer pockets wear out.

If I were in the commercial annealing business, then an expensive machine calibrated at the factory along with factory data allowing me to select a time/temp setting appropriate for a whole range of calibers and neck thicknesses might be worthwhile. A commercial business couldn't afford to do much experimenting and offer annealing services at a marketable price point. Being able to consult a chart and dial in a good annealing setting for some brass you've never seen before would be great. But just because a sophisticated machine makes sense for a commercial enterprise, it doesn't mean that it is required equipment for a shooter processing one or two types of brass. That's not to say that hand holding your brass in a candle flame is a good idea (It isn't).

[F. Guffey]

But just because a sophisticated machine makes sense for a commercial enterprise, it doesn't mean that it is required equipment for a shooter processing one or two types of brass. That's not to say that hand holding your brass in a candle flame is a good idea (It isn't).

Mozella. very good.

And again, I decided there were rules to annealing, I decided there were factors; and then I sat down and made some equipment that did not violate a few simple rules and agreed with factors.

F. Guffey

[hounddawg]

I agree totally with the consistency first thing I did with my machine was void any warranty by replacing the PWM with this unit

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...?ie=UTF8&psc=1

here is the modded unit. With that PWM the speed will be exactly the same each time.

I let the flame burn for about three to five minutes to stabilize then put a trash case in with the motor off and the case in position. I try and pinpoint the cone of the flame vertically and with the junction of neck and shoulder horizontally. With a half full bottle of propane once the flame stabilizes it will be consistent for 50 cases no problem.

Also modded the torch holder a bit by adding a couple of knobs from a hardware store and a diy delron bushing. Not really necessary since once the torch is set very little adjustment is needed. You will notice that in these pics the cases were annealed after cleaning but before resizing and depining. after reading that report from AMP I am cleaned, depined, and neck sized before annealing to see what if any effect it has on SD

[flashhole]

Good thread.

I've not seen any accuracy gains with annealing. I sort brass by runout. IMO other brass processing steps that are used to ensure concentric rounds pay higher accuracy dividends. But I have extended brass life by annealing. I find I lose more brass to enlarged primer pockets than case neck problems with brass I have annealed regularly.

[hounddawg]

I've not seen any accuracy gains with annealing.

just out of curiosity what distance/discipline do you normally shoot and what annealing method are you using? Unless you are a BR or a long range shooter I doubt you will.

Oh and why do you sort by concentricity? Ammo that is not concentric can be trued up. I have found most stuff coming out of a Lee collet is pretty concentric straight from the press out occasional a .0015 or greater will pop out. Not many but maybe 3 or 4 out of 50, but they can be tweaked back in with one of these

https://www.hornady.com/reloading/pr...entricity-tool

[flashhole]

I generally shoot at 200 yards at the range, 300 if I shoot from my property.

My method is simple, I use a Bernz-O-Matic torch, put the brass in a nut-driver, rest my hand on a support, and turn by hand and count. Works well for me.

I have Lee Collet Neck Dies for all my bottle neck cases but I discovered I get better accuracy when I FL size my brass. All my rifles have chambers on the small side of the tolerance range. In fact, I have discovered that different brand FL sizing dies make a difference in accuracy and I can tell where the round will land just by the feel of closing the bolt. For the cartridges I load I find Lyman FL dies the most aggressive when sizing cases and a close second is CH. RCBS, Redding and Hornady (when I had them) sized bigger than Lyman and CH.

I use the Forster concentricity tool.

I see your link but you could not pay me to keep a Hornady brand anything equipment on my bench. I've had multiple bad experiences with their Customer Service. With the exception of some bullets I bought in bulk, I purged my bench of all things Hornady long ago.

[hounddawg]

I don't think that at 200 to 300 any significant deviation in velocity won't affect ballistics much unless you are shooting BR and worrying about .1's

At 600 plus I can see my groups tightening though the more attention I give to case prep. I can't speak for all Hornady tools but the one I linked works pretty well

[flashhole]

I agree, small deviations in velocity won't affect ballistics all that much and a person would be hard pressed to see the difference on a target. Where I see a difference is how the round chambers in the gun. For example, if I get resistance on bolt closure with my Kimber 84M 223 Rem the round always hits left, always. If I get resistance on bolt closure with my Sauer 202 7mm RM the round always hits down and right. 221 Fireball and 25-06 exhibit similar behavior.

Another thing I discovered just from shooting in different configurations is - I get more predictable behavior when I use a bi-pod vs. my Uncle Buds Bulls Bag. And, it makes a difference how I hold the gun when using the bi-pod. I find if I use a buttstock rest with the gun nested firmly in my shoulder and hold the bi-pod leg I get better results than if I use the buttstock rest and hold the forestock.

At first I thought these random anomalies but the more I paid attention to things the more I discovered the consistent behaviors that best favor accuracy.

[Unclenick]

Flashhole,

Have you read Bugholes from a Bi-pod?


I'll restate what I said earlier: unless you know you have a truly and measurably consistent annealing method, it's very hard to know whether failure to see an accuracy improvement is because annealing doesn't help or because you've introduced variation in neck strength and hardness or because you are annealing to a sub-optimal degree. So far, only the AMP unit has a verifiable approach to producing a certain targeted hardness. Even then, you are depending on them to have determined what hardness is best for precision shooting. We know that manufacturer annealing prevents season cracking, but do we know that is also what's best for target precision? I think there is still work to be done in this arena.

[hounddawg]

Thank's for that article on Froggy. I remember reading that a couple of years ago but had lost the link and forgotten it. It's a great read and I also envy the neatness of his bench

My theory at the moment is that extreme speed anomalies are one of the causes of flyers. A 50 FPS difference will not affect the external ballistics more than a .1 inch or so at 100 yards however it could cause a major difference where the bullet exits and at which point in the barrel whip because of the harmonics which could put the shot off the group by an inch or more. This is just my theory but it would be like shooting 1 round with 44.0 grains of powder then the next with 44.3 or 43.6 to get the velocity spread. Something to think about. I don't think many here will argue that consistency in all the aspects of loading and shooting is the key to accuracy and neck tension does should affect the velocity.

Just my 2 cents worth

[Unclenick]

Hounddawg,

What you are actually describing is change in barrel time, and that does happen. The bullet experiences greatest acceleration at the pressure peak, which occurs in the first couple of inches of travel down the bore. If that peak is higher, then it starts the journey down the rest of the tube with higher initial velocity and that gets it out of the muzzle early, shortening barrel time. QuickLOAD gives barrel time in its output,

The harmonics are frequently mentioned and are an older idea that I think the late Creighton Audette started the conversation on with his ladder technique. It is, however, not exactly what goes on. The harmonics actually appear after the bullet exits. It's like the firing event plucks the "string" that is the barrel, and free ringing oscillations then occur. What happens when the bullet is still going down the bore is two things: First is that because most rifles have the bore axis above the point of support at the butt, the muzzle rises with recoil and this puts a bend in a barrel for the same reason raising the handle of a whip to crack it puts an arch in the thicker part near the handle. On a barrel that is long relative to its diameter, this bending is significant and the upper hump of the arch is complete before you get to the muzzle, which is then around the corner from the end of the main hump. The location of the corner is what barrel contact tuners in the stock control, with a longer muzzle portion just past the bend having a slower rise for longer barrel times. Secondly there is some pressure distortion that changes the barrel stiffness and rolls it forward behind the bullet. This cracks the whip by trying to straighten the bore back out again.

These are complicated interactions, but Varmint Al has a good animation done by finite element analysis on fancy government software. He also has a page showing a series of animations of the 8 different harmonic modes of a barrel after the bullet has left, which are interesting but not particularly relevant to accurate shot placement.

Both the Audette Ladder and the OCW system of load development use barrel time to tune loads, though the former is aimed at the vertical dispersion while the latter tries to take both axes into account and that pressure wave distortion of the muzzle can affect POI. In both instances it is desirable to find a flat spot wide enough that you can change the load by as much as possible without changing POI. This gives you immunity to the velocity variation you described. If we could make absolutely perfectly consistent guns and ammo that produced the same velocity with the same amount of muzzle deflection for every shot, we wouldn't need to tune the loads at all, as the shots would always then have the same angle of departure and trajectory. But since guns bend a little differently as they heat up or expand against their bedding and since ammo barrel time tends to follow the velocity around a mean value with a normal distribution, finding a wide sweet spot grants you immunity to a good deal of that variation and is why the OCW method (or a good Audette ladder, for that matter) looks for a same POI from at least three load increments in a row.

[nanuk-O-dah-Nort]

Originally Posted by F. Guffey

Mozella. very good.

And again, I decided there were rules to annealing, I decided there were factors; and then I sat down and made some equipment that did not violate a few simple rules and agreed with factors.

F. Guffey

you sure like to talk in riddles... makes you feel superior?

Originally Posted by Mozella

For example, I refuse to cut powder kernels. (It isn't).

wouldn't that alter the burning characteristics, and therefore burning rate/speed and defeat the purpose?

I remember reading an article about BRs weighing powder to the exact, so an experiment was done altering weights, and it was apparent that a difference of 2-2.5% made no difference on target.
perhaps a confidence builder?