Annealing

[ecomeat]

Keen to see your follow up, Matt. How long till you get to shoot 900 or 1000 yds ?
I should add here that I also found better consistency again with seating, when I reverted to using a coarse nylon brush inside of the case necks prior to seating. The AMP unit certainly burns the carbon off, but trialling both with/without a quick brushing, it's certainly worth the little bit of effort.

[6.5x55ai]

Blah, I am weeping. I have a 12 month old Bench Source which I would drop a load of bucks on if I tried to sell it.
AMP is located 20 minutes drive from where I live, I have been past their office/workshop. I don't dare go in.....

[Brad Y]

Well I shot last week and chronographed annealed and un-annealed cases and numbers were a bit better (ES was 11 vs 15 and SD was 3.8 vs 5), I couldn't see it in the groups but it was at 300M.
Seating pressure was definitely more consistent, as with a lot of these things I don't think you'll see a improvement until after 600.
Matt P

Matt did you have to change bump and bushing size for the annealed brass? Also was there any velocity change in the annealed loads due to a change in neck tension?

[Matt P]

Well I shot last week and chronographed annealed and un-annealed cases and numbers were a bit better (ES was 11 vs 15 and SD was 3.8 vs 5), I couldn't see it in the groups but it was at 300M.
Seating pressure was definitely more consistent, as with a lot of these things I don't think you'll see a improvement until after 600.
Matt P

Matt did you have to change bump and bushing size for the annealed brass? Also was there any velocity change in the annealed loads due to a change in neck tension?

Hi Brad
Yes had to change the bush size and reset the "bump length", in 6mm I have bushes in 0.0005" increments. I only went 0.0005" up in bush size.
No velocity change.
Regards
Matt

[Brad Y]

Thanks Matt. I have one of those PMA die adjusters on the way and will reset my die then.

[formi]

Well, having read what Tony and others are saying, I placed my order at the beginning of this week. Having paid for it two days latter, I'm told it will be sent this week and delivery to Oz is better than 7days from dispatch. Is this possible?... There was another order here that took 5 months.
They appear to be on the shelves ready for picking.. Can't wait to compare notes on SDs etc and groupings for the long ranges..

[Normmatzen]

I have watched the AMP on line from when they were originally getting it set up. I knew it would be around $1000 USD so I went ahead and ordered an ANNIE. I must admit, I did a years worth of experimenting with induction annealing with all kind of kits and now have a bunch of duff MOS transistors left! I may be an Electronic Engineer, but since retiring, it isn't fun anymore to build stuff in the shed!
My Annie cost me $450 USD and I got it early in the move into "mass production" for Fluxeon. That means, I had problems. But due to the experimenting on my own and my experience in the real world getting a product into production, I was way more forgiving than a lot of their customers. I sent mine back three times after it died. I also gave them good feed-back so each time I got back an Annie with better performance and reliability. Now, my Annie is working just fine. I experimented with different core spacing as well as making some work coils of my own. I am very happy now. Annie is not as sophisticated as the AMP, it does not have power level control, just on time control. The power level is based on the mains voltage. I did test the different cases I use to find the correct time to anneal. My seating force is very controlled now and I'm pleased with Annie. I think it is a suitable alternative to the AMP on a lower price point. I of course cannot claim the accuracy AMP has, but I am sure it is way more consistent than a propane burner. I have found the physical placement within the core gap not to be critical so I figure the flux density is pretty constant thru the gap. I can anneal 100 cases in less than a half hour, like some one said about as fast as one can load one of the "automatic" gas annealers, about as quick as the AMP.

So, don't ignore the Annie if the AMP is too rich for your blood!

[DaveMc]

Testing annealed vs not annealed will be a challenge. To get any sort of meaningful result you will need a very accurate rifle to start with and have your loading techniques down such that you already have very low velocity sd. You will also need very accurate velocity measurements and a large sample size.

Remember the velocity variation (or impact variation) we see is the overlapping of many small variables. These are not directly accumulative but rather overlap in such way that if the annealing brass contributed a sd of 2 fps to your loading - you would not see it as a reduction of 2fps off your current overall sd. The total sd is the square root of the sum of the squares of all the minor components.

To make this worse and as I started to describe in the other sampling issues thread. Just due to the random fall of shots(normal), group sizes (or velocity measurements) of 5,10 and even 30 have a significant chance of giving you type 1 and type 2 errors ie your group/velocity measurements when testing the difference can show a difference when there is none or vice versa show no correlation when there is a positive one). The larger your total variation (sd) the harder it is to pick out the smaller factors.

Individual 5 or 10 shot comparisons mean absolutely nothing. Hopefully I will get to finish some on the other thread but I did do some modelling that shows 3*10 shot groups or velocity varitions is as almost as powerful as 30 (the number often quoted by statisticians as minimum required). Even at 30 shots though ther is still a significant chance of errors if the background variation is large and individual component you are testing is small.

[jasmay]

One thing I should state on my belief on annealing is it wont necessarily result in lower SD's but more consistency of what you are achieving with other reloading steps.

[KHGS]

Annealing is one of the "many" things that accuracy reloaders do in the quest of the "ultimate" groups. It fits into the group of things that I classify as, "I can't really see much difference, but it just might help" in which case we accumulate an array of tools & gimmicks that cost a small fortune that "might help". Then after all that we get beaten by someone who doesn't have any of the "gimmicks".
The "gimmicks" all work, I am not for one moment suggesting they don't, but the amount of improvement in group size that the "gimmicks" give us is in a very low % rate & the "improvement" gets lost in all the exterior "atmospheric noise" between the muzzle & the target. I have a draw full of "gimmicks" I don't use among those is an annealer!!! Over my many years of reloading I have refined it to a pretty simple procedure by discarding those things that just "might help". Having said that there are some things in the process I will not compromise on.
At the end of the day if doing one of the "small things that might help" makes you feel better then you should do it!
Keith H.

[jasmay]

Keith, another thing I consider is, if throughout a championship shoot, one step saves 1 point it is worth doing, at the top the competition is so close and fierce resting on your laurels and a "good enough" attitude certainly wont get you over the line. Reloading techniques become almost as important as fine wind reading skills.

Quite often, dropping one point mean a placing below 1st and 2nd at 1 day shoots, if that shot goes out the top or bottom, and you cant explain it, how far would you go to avoid it happening again?

[plumbs7]

Bryan Litzs has an interesting take on it ! You'll have to read his new book on it!

[DenisA]

Here's an example of where annealing has proven to benefit one of my guns. It is my 6BR. A couple of years ago I was annealing every firing. I only neck size this cartridge and only run a 1/2 thou neck tension. 1/2 thou holds the bullet firmly enough that I can't move the bullet with my fingers once seated and don't have any issue's with dumping powder when un-chambering a loaded round that's jammed 15 thou.
I got lazy and ran through about 6 firings without annealing. I un-chambered a round on the mound and dumped powder. I checked the rest and I could move all the seated bullets.
With such a light neck tension to start with, as the necks work hardened they sprang back more than usual after re-sizing.

I still don't anneal every firing. I anneal every 3ish firings though to keep my necks predictable.

I've also found that if annealing by hand there is an obvious increase in short range grouping and bullet seating feel when the neck is worked before the subsequent firing. Eg, anneal, size, expand and re-size..
This may be a process that is not needed with an annealing machine as consistent and precise as the AMP??

[KHGS]

Keith, another thing I consider is, if throughout a championship shoot, one step saves 1 point it is worth doing, at the top the competition is so close and fierce resting on your laurels and a "good enough" attitude certainly wont get you over the line. Reloading techniques become almost as important as fine wind reading skills.

Quite often, dropping one point mean a placing below 1st and 2nd at 1 day shoots, if that shot goes out the top or bottom, and you cant explain it, how far would you go to avoid it happening again?

Jason, at NO point did I say, or even indicate that near enough is good enough . What I did empathise was that if you (or anyone else) feels good about any reloading process or "gimmick" than you should do it, or use it. Reloading is a science but like cake cooking, you can overcook the cake!! I can assure you that my perfectionist personality will no allow me to short cut anything!!!
Keith H.

[Chopper]

On the subject, How far Down the case is this annealing done , ? Are there dangers in case separation ? May be a Silly question but why are cases not cooked down to the Web ? Chop, Never heard of that done before ? Chop Ps Im Not suggesting anyone try this .