Brass Work Hardening analysis by Alpha Munitions

[Ccrider]

For SR Benchrest, shooting 6ppc, her are my thoughts on this subject.
First, what is considered as Brass Failure in the charts above?
Other than loose primer pockets, I don’t know why I switch out my brass. I don’t observe performance changes. Example, at last year’s IBS group Nationals, I believe I finished 8th in the UNL 200 yards event using brass that had been loaded 20-25 times. I would have a hard time proving to myself that I would have won shooting newer brass.

Thanks Lee. Do you anneal? Do you keep your brass in the same cycle?

Charles

 

[akajun]

Kajun, no.
What we commonly make cartridges out of is 70/30 brass and it is all one phase (alpha phase to be more specific) and that single phase brass does not precipitation harden the way other materials do.

If there were split necks on very old brass, most of the time it was due to contamination exposure to things that attacked the grain boundaries.

Didn’t know that
I was always told all brass age hardened

 

[Leeinmichigan]

Thanks Lee. Do you anneal? Do you keep your brass in the same cycle?

Charles

No, I do not anneal. As to same cycle (I assume you mean same lot), normally yes. However, when I shot my Railgun, I used brass from three different rifles (75 pcs). I did this because most ranges don’t give you enough time to clean, resize and load for ten-shot matches, i.e., Unlimited events.

 

[Rick300]

Seems to me that if you have an annealer, why not just anneal after every firing? One of the least time consuming part of reloading and evens everything out.