Interesting use of the word "guarantee". I would like to see the statistical evidence for the statement. What were the other variables, and how were they controlled, in support of your guarantee? Are you saying that "correlation is causation"?
Not meaning to pick nits (well, perhaps I do mean to), but the 71 page "dissertation" cited by others above contains NO objective evidence of the affect of annealing, either correctly or incorrectly (whatever that means), on the actual accuracy of cartridges. The paper DOES contain statements like this one:
As it is the cartridge that holds the bullet in place; differences in the properties of the brass can affect the exit velocity of the bullet from the cartridge. This can have serious effects on accuracy as at 1000 yards (914.4m) a change in velocity of 10ft/s (roughly 3ms-1) can cause a shot deviation of a few inches at the target[7].
Nowhere, however, does the paper provide any evidence to support the assertion emboldened above. Various people will no doubt wish to cite "common sense", but that is not scientific, is it? The paper repeatedly uses the word "may" to describe the affect of neck tension and brass microstructure, to wit:
The microstructure variability after annealing will have consequences for shooting accuracy as one round may react differently to another.
This is not science. The author's assertion "will have consequences" is not supported by "may". I could go on, but you get the point. So for anyone to say that "proper" annealing is critical to accuracy, one must first describe exactly what "proper" means (this was the subject of the OP, as you may recall). Most of you are simply saying that "proper" means "with a machine which I bought, because you guys who are doing it with a drill are doing it wrong". What is the actual, measured affect of "doing it right" versus "doing it wrong" versus" doing it not at all"?
No one here has answered, and the cited paper, if it was an actual academic dissertation, should most certainly not have resulted in a passing grade.
I get the idea you're making posts here mainly be argumentative but I wonder if you're also missing the larger point. The dissertation you so dismissively put between quotation marks is indeed just that; a dissertation. Unless it is I who is missing the point and the paper is a complete hoax ginned up by some 9 year old kid in his Mom's basement. Somehow I doubt that, but I could be wrong.
You may not like it and you may disagree with the entire paper and you may even think that it doesn't deserve a passing grade; however, that doesn't make somehow less than a genuine dissertation. Neither is the information there worthless just because you fault them for not testing the results of the annealed cases by test firing loaded cartridges. They also didn't give details on how to make a Shoo-Fly pie either. Do you fault them there as well?
The idea was simply to take a look at what happens to cartridge brass when you anneal it. I think they did a decent job doing that. True, Mr. Stevenson didn't go the rifle range, but that wasn't part of his plan even though you seem to think he somehow short changed you. After all, the title wasn't "The Grand Unified Theory".
In fact there's quite a bit of information to be gleaned from the "dissertation", as you put it. The fact that cases annealed using the drill/torch method were inconsistently annealed is only one useful observation.
Furthermore, the anecdotal account presented in this thread by a fellow forum member who noticed increased precision after he began annealing doesn't make it non-factual just because he didn't have support from NASA.
Of course, not everything you find on the Internet is the God's Honest Truth; that's for sure. Nevertheless, there is often good information to be had here and elsewhere on the Net, even though sometimes it involves trying to pick the fly s**T out of the pepper.
While it is human nature to say that a product on which someone just spent a considerable sum of money is the greatest thing since sliced bread, it is possible that the newly acquired equipment might actually be something good. Surely you aren't arguing that spending money on something makes it automatically bad, are you?
Additionally, some of us who shoot have been formally educated in the science of metallurgy and many of us anneal in a reasonably precise way. We we have also carefully measured and recorded the before-and-after effects of that annealing process as far as how it effects the precision of our rifles.
I wonder if being too quick to dismiss findings which are not full and complete scientific studies covering each and every aspect of the shooting sport isn't being a bit short sighted. Most of us are here to learn something.
