![]() ![]() Currently, there are a number of annealing machines on the market. There are a few different ways to anneal cases. Short pistol cases aren’t really suitable using this method because they get too hot to hold before the neck is hot enough to anneal. Obviously, this makes it tricky to anneal the case without heating the case head excessively. The other tricky part is that because the casing is by nature really thin, heat travels really quickly through it. You just want to get the neck and shoulder of the case. You can’t heat the whole casing, because if you anneal the case head the case is ruined. This is obviously different than steel, where heating and quenching are done to harden it. You heat the brass up to critical temperature, 650-700 degrees, and quench it. The annealing process itself is fairly straightforward and simple. With even common components hard to get now, this can be really useful to reloaders. I’ve had old casings split the first time I’ve tried to reload them. Even if these cases are unfired, their age alone can be problematic. 223, some of those older calibers have only had very small amounts of components (or none at all) for decades. 223 ammunition has been around for 60 years. If you have firearms in older, odd-ball calibers you probably have some of these. At this point in time, there are lots of “old casings” floating around, as centerfire brass cased ammunition has been around since the late 1800s. I hold the case with my bare hand into the flame, rolling the case with my fingers to heat around it. Annealing these cases will reduce the stress in the cases from working them during the conversion process, making it possible to get decent life out of them. If you put very much work into converting them, you really don’t want to have to toss your cases after the first time you use them. Sometimes this is significant enough to cause cracks in the case within the first or second firing. With reloading components in general rather hard to get right now, it makes sense to try to get as much life out of your brass as you can.Īlso, case conversions can work brass significantly in the conversion process. Annealing these cases will prolong their useable life significantly. Cases loaded several times will get brittle and crack eventually. Obviously, reloading is in part the resizing of the cases back to the proper size for reuse. As I mentioned earlier, brass gets hard and brittle through it being worked and also with age. For the reloader, annealing your cases has a number of benefits. Military cases are typically required to have evidence of annealing (hence why they have the visible coloring). This is done to prevent the case from cracking or otherwise failing. ![]() All bottlenecked cases are annealed during production. Annealing is the stress reduction of the brass to prevent it’s becoming brittle and cracking or breaking. ![]()
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