sizing too much after annealing

[sandwarrior]

So, went to a shoot yesterday and found I had 24 of 91 cases that I had just annealed, that I had sized too much. The necks were shorter and the shoulders seemed to be at more of a 50 deg. angle than a 40 deg. angle. I full length sized them and that saved one. I then took and ran them through a .22-250 die and that savd seven more.

Any ideas how to bring the rest of this brass back to life?

 

[Clancy]

How did you anneal? Sounds like they got way too soft and collapsed. I’d trash the whole batch.

 

[jepp2]

Any ideas how to bring the rest of this brass back to life?

Treat them as a fireform and proceed. UNLESS you annealed too far down toward the case head.

I've read often about how brass can go dead soft by being over-annealed. That said, I have annealed at 750 degees F, and over 1000 degrees F (dull red in a darkened room). The brass annealed at the higher temperature should have achieved the criteria of being over annealed. It performed exactly the same as the 750 brass.

Watch this video, compare the heat marks on the brass with what yours looks like. And see how it made no difference per the tests performed on it. Make your own judgement.

But some of your description without additional explanation or pictures is only telling a very small portion of the entire story.

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[Webster]

Treat them as a fireform and proceed. UNLESS you annealed too far down toward the case head.

I've read often about how brass can go dead soft by being over-annealed. That said, I have annealed at 750 degees F, and over 1000 degrees F (dull red in a darkened room). The brass annealed at the higher temperature should have achieved the criteria of being over annealed. It performed exactly the same as the 750 brass.

Watch this video, compare the heat marks on the brass with what yours looks like. And see how it made no difference per the tests performed on it. Make your own judgement.

But some of your description without additional explanation or pictures is only telling a very small portion of the entire story.

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For more detailed information, see our cookies page.

Accept third party cookies

Very good video. No matter how much good info is put on this website everyone believes what they want to believe. I know a lot about annealing and always anneal till I see orange. A large amount of good info is on this website about time at various temperatures and what hardness you get. 750F is a garbage number. TempLac is not supposed to be used with a flame on it. Impossible to anneal the case head. You would probably have to melt the neck and shoulder area to get enough heat at the head area to soften it. I wish AMPS would anneal some cases orange for about five seconds and publish the change if any in the case head area. No-one would probably believe the results.

 

[drop_point]

I don't know much about annealing. I'm no scientist. I do anneal my brass every time I fire it.

I have a Bench Source that I purchased because it was said to be the best when I was ready to purchase.

I use the swirl-tip torch heads. Its faster than the pencil tips. About two to four seconds in the flame depending on what the brass is. I adjust time to where it glows a dull orange color with the lights off. I get consistent shoulder bump, I get lots of firings on my brass, and I get consistent ES/SD. I don't have a means to measure seating force, but on my press, an Area 419 Zero, I can hardly feel the seating of a bullet.

My loads are more capable than I am at reading the wind. I thought long and hard about dropping the money for an AMP but I don't think it will enhance my experience at this point.

 

[Webster]

I don't know much about annealing. I'm no scientist. I do anneal my brass every time I fire it.

I have a Bench Source that I purchased because it was said to be the best when I was ready to purchase.

I use the swirl-tip torch heads. Its faster than the pencil tips. About two to four seconds in the flame depending on what the brass is. I adjust time to where it glows a dull orange color with the lights off. I get consistent shoulder bump, I get lots of firings on my brass, and I get consistent ES/SD. I don't have a means to measure seating force, but on my press, an Area 419 Zero, I can hardly feel the seating of a bullet.

My loads are more capable than I am at reading the wind. I thought long and hard about dropping the money for an AMP but I don't think it will enhance my experience at this point.

I think I am lucky I got a good barrel. Most of my improvements were bench manners. I may not shoot real small groups but pretty consistant around .350".with good bullets. Used for GH hunting. I anneal about every other load. If 1 neck cracks I anneal all my cases.

 

[Andy Work]

750F is a garbage number.

Agreed. I got split necks annealing @ 750F.

 

[rijndael]

TempLac is not supposed to be used with a flame on it.

You can put it in the inside of the neck, the flame won’t touch it.

 

[Orr89rocz]

You can put it in the inside of the neck, the flame won’t touch it.

Thats how i did mine and there is a couple seconds difference between that time to hit 750 vs the slight glow the last time i did it. So far no issues for me either way but its only my first time annealing this brass. I did one batch of each way

They make 850 deg stuff i may try that too

 

[Coyotefurharvester]

How would sizing again after "sizing too much" reverse the sizing too much? How does the die change the shoulder angle, it is designed to match the chamber? You could have potentially function, safety issues. At very least some sort of fire form load to return brass to a memory state.

 

[47WillysGuy]

Any ideas how to bring the rest of this brass back to life? Fire forming of the brass. Case head touching the bolt and the bullet touching the rifle lands.

So, went to a shoot yesterday and found I had 24 of 91 cases that I had just annealed, Using templac is messy and its hard to tell when the templac changes and you've reached 750 degree. Bring the case necks to a dark red color in a darken room and your good to go, that's about 7-8 seconds for me.

that I had sized too much. Use a comparator or the rifle chamber to just fit the case back into the gun. I like the comparator. Go slow take many readings. Each piece of brass has different sizing qualities to each. Some will resist full sizing and other will not.

Note: You can limit (set) the amount squeeze your press puts on a case. Example- if raise the ram all the way up and run the die down to the ram, you can not squeeze that case any more than that.

The necks were shorter and the shoulders seemed to be at more of a 50 deg. angle than a 40 deg. angle. Seemed is a subjective word. If the proper die was used, the cases would have the correct degree of angle.

I full length sized them and that saved one. I then took and ran them through a .22-250 die and that saved seven more. So you saved 8 cases total and the rest were discarded?

Hope this helps! Good luck!

 

[Straightshooter1]

So, went to a shoot yesterday and found I had 24 of 91 cases that I had just annealed, that I had sized too much. The necks were shorter and the shoulders seemed to be at more of a 50 deg. angle than a 40 deg. angle. I full length sized them and that saved one. I then took and ran them through a .22-250 die and that savd seven more.

Any ideas how to bring the rest of this brass back to life?

From your description, it sounds like somehow the die is set up where it's grabbing and pushing the neck and shoulder down. . .??? If you're using the expander ball in the die and is not quite set up properly, I can do this kind of thing. And you might check the OD at the body-shoulder junction to see if there's a little bulge goin on there too. If so, that would certainly confirm my suspicion.

 

[Webster]

So, went to a shoot yesterday and found I had 24 of 91 cases that I had just annealed, that I had sized too much. The necks were shorter and the shoulders seemed to be at more of a 50 deg. angle than a 40 deg. angle. I full length sized them and that saved one. I then took and ran them through a .22-250 die and that savd seven more.

Any ideas how to bring the rest of this brass back to life?

Brass cost too much. Load them and shoot, you probabily get new dimension. Cannot believe there is anything to change a 40 deg to almost 50. The case forms to the chamber, a constant dimension.

 

[sandwarrior]

Brass cost too much. Load them a shoot, you probabily get new dimension. Cannot believe there is anything to change a 40 deg to almost 50. The case forms to the chamber, a constant dimension.

So, an update as to what I did to try and square things away. Found my bump necksizer with a loose lockring. That's probably where the necks got pushed down, and the shoulders pushed out. As I mentioned I pulled down a big part of the lot that would not chamnber and attempted to resize them in various ways. Most would not fit, but I managed to save 8 of those cases. The cool thing was I had not even touched the first relay's 13 that would not fit. I pulled the primer pin on a 30-06 die I have (suspected the other dies of leaving a bulge, down the case, as I did not fully size them) and voila! All 13 were saved! Still trying to figure out how to save the rest of 'em.

 

[boltfluter]

So, an update as to what I did to try and square things away. Found my bump necksizer with a loose lockring. That's probably where the necks got pushed down, and the shoulders pushed out. As I mentioned I pulled down a big part of the lot that would not chamnber and attempted to resize them in various ways. Most would not fit, but I managed to save 8 of those cases. The cool thing was I had not even touched the first relay's 13 that would not fit. I pulled the primer pin on a 30-06 die I have (suspected the other dies of leaving a bulge, down the case, as I did not fully size them) and voila! All 13 were saved! Still trying to figure out how to save the rest of 'em.

Wait what? You should probably stop annealing as you are doing more harm than good. For cases to do what you are describing they are way, way over annealed. Personally I would trash the cases and move on, especially if you are competing.
Paul

 

[sandwarrior]

Wait what? You should probably stop annealing as you are doing more harm than good. For cases to do what you are describing they are way, way over annealed. Personally I would trash the cases and move on, especially if you are competing.
Paul

The annealing wasn't so much the problem as oversizing added: after annealing.

 

[Webster]

Wait what? You should probably stop annealing as you are doing more harm than good. For cases to do what you are describing they are way, way over annealed. Personally I would trash the cases and move on, especially if you are competing.
Paul

It's very difficult if not impossible to over anneal anything below the shoulder area. You would have to be at high temp for maybe 2 minutes based on annealing charts made by the University of ILL metallurgy dept.

 

[Clancy]

Seems insane to me to risk maiming yourself over some brass….

Carry on.

 

[Webster]

Seems insane to me to risk maiming yourself over some brass….

Carry on.

Your assuming it's over annealed. You don't really know. If it's very soft you could tell the difference between a normal case and very soft one in by sqeezing the case body with pliers just above the .200" line where the wall thickness is thinner. Try it at mid length of the body to. I don't think you can get the lower case body up around 1000F for sseveral minutes to soften it. 800F for a few seconds you couldn't measure the small hardness difference.

I annealed case necks in a lab quality furnace for 15 seconds at 800F. I cross sectioned the necks and made polished metallograhic specimens. Just like AMPS did on their wbsite. The hardness dropped about 2 Hardness Rockwell B scale units.

 

[sandwarrior]

Sorry guys, a big key I left out here is they were initally 'bump neck-sized'. It's a neck die that sizes all the way down the neck and is set to 'bump' the top of the shoulder down .002" It also has a bit of a rounded corner at the shoulder. So it takes the neck/shoulder junction down and, is supposed to, keep the shoulder/body from blowing out. It was this die's lock ring that I found loose and did not reset correctly. The brass was then sized down too much. All of the rim/lower cases remained hardened.

Added: FTR I would love to just fireform them. But, the cases that were bad, would not chamber.