Question on Annealing

F

fx77

Member
Read T. Boyer's Book and M. Ratigan's book on accuracy and specifically the brass prep. section. There was to the best of my recollection no strong recommendation on annealing. the closest I could find was in the former's book a recommendation to use a case for 20 firings.
Did I miss something?
Thanks in advance.
 
My experience

is that Lapua 6mm BR brass, reformed to 30BR, will way outlast the necks ability to provide uniform grip on the bullet. Annealing is the only way to do that, if its important to you. Otherwise its to toss the brass when this occurs. At $1 a case, I choose not to do that.
 
glp said:
is that Lapua 6mm BR brass, reformed to 30BR, will way outlast the necks ability to provide uniform grip on the bullet. Annealing is the only way to do that, if its important to you. Otherwise its to toss the brass when this occurs. At $1 a case, I choose not to do that.
Click to expand...

This ^^^^^^^ -Al
 
Using Tempilaq takes most of the 'guesswork' out of it.

It makes getting a machine set up and working reliably far easier.
 
I have 300+ 30BR cases, and I agree with the statement that the necks start showing erratic neck tension long before the rest of the case shows signs of failure.
 
Different powders have different neck tension "preferences".(In this case I am referring to seating force, which is the only real way we have to guesstimate bullet pull.) 133 has been an important powder for the 6PPC. It is my experience that 133 does better with relatively more neck tension than some other powders require for best accuracy. Given that the current trend is toward more generous loaded round neck clearance (somewhere between .002 and .003) and that the most popular chamber neck dimension has been .262, the range of neck thicknesses runs from around .008 to around .0086 which limits the amount of neck tension that is available. Short bullets tend to have less of the full diameter portion (which I refer to as the shank) in case necks. This also limits bullet pull. If one were to anneal necks the force required to seat bullets would be noticeably reduced, which IMO would be counterproductive for shooters that use 133. Ratigan's and Boyers' books were primarily written for the short range group segment of benchrest, which is almost exclusively 6PPC dominated. I do not know of anyone that anneals 6PPC brass with the exception of one well known shooter that is experimenting with one of the new inductive annealers, but I would lay you odds that he is using LT powders, which do not share 133's neck tension preference. None of this is to say that annealing would not be a good idea when paired with a powder that does not share 133's neck tension preference. I think that it would be, but my primary powder is 133.
 
jackie schmidt said:
I have 300+ 30BR cases, and I agree with the statement that the necks start showing erratic neck tension long before the rest of the case shows signs of failure.
Click to expand...

Not all that surprising.

The necks often get the brunt of the expansion/compression cycle compared to eh case body.

I long ago started keeping the 'allowed' neck movement down to 0.002.
So 0.001 all around.

It requires complete attention to details.

So far I have not found any neck thickening but still measure it over and over to ensure clearance.

It is probbaly less shooting than BR.

I might fire a single shot in a day to produce one dead critter.

I am waiting to see if I get my usual calls about groundhogs this year.

A number of landowners call me up when growing gets started looking for some pests removal from their fields.

I have been 'stealing' BR tricks and methods for many years now.

I have even had introductions from one farmer to another that created new shooting opportunities.

Must be doing something right.
 
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