Annealing machine

[kisfish]

I have been reloading for several years now. I am thinking of getting a annealing machine. Anyone have one they recommend or care to share your experiences with it.

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[DizzyJ]

Everyone will tell you it's overkill, but I went with the AMP annealer. It was suggested to me by the Berger ballistician.

 

[Goosebrown]

AMP is absolutely the way to go.

 

[Stomper]

The amp is an induction annealer and is pretty swank, but it's also quite spendy and you have to manually handle each piece of brass.

I processed 1,500 pieces of brass through this machine that I made a video of without the slightest issue.

Here's the link to their site:

Annealeez – For a Hot Piece of Brass!

annealeez.com

It's $275 shipped in the lower 48, and I highly recommend it!

 

[Camelfilter]

Not having started reloading rifle yet, how necessary is annealing to the reloading process?

I plan on .223 & 7.62x51, all of which the brass we've saved apears allready annealed.

Later on when I figure I've learned enough to stay out of trouble (mostly), will do 7.5 Swiss. That PPU brass is not annealed, I don't think. Doesn't look it anyways.

 

[DLS]

All factory brass is annealed, most of the time they polish off the color for aesthetics and to remove any residual "stuff" that may be lurking on the finished round.

As you fire and resize your brass, the neck and upper shoulder work harden. Eventually this will lead to neck splits and inconsistent neck tension.

How soon this happens depends on the intensity of the load, chamber dimensions, how much you size the case and on top of this, each lot of brass will behave slightly differently.

For most applications annealing every four to five firings is sufficient to keep the necks soft lengthening case life drastically and increasing accuracy measurably.

A lot more detail can be posted, but should probably be another thread, and I'm thumbing my phone keyboard which is not exactly easy with the size of my digits!

 

[Stomper]

Not having started reloading rifle yet, how necessary is annealing to the reloading process?

I plan on .223 & 7.62x51, all of which the brass we've saved apears allready annealed.

Later on when I figure I've learned enough to stay out of trouble (mostly), will do 7.5 Swiss. That PPU brass is not annealed, I don't think. Doesn't look it anyways.

You'll get as many different answers as the people you ask. Some anneal EVERY time, some say every three cycles, some say every seven, others say ten....

Properly annealing every time wont hurt the brass one bit, and if you're going for maximum precision and über consistency annealing can only help.

You don't necessarily have to anneal new brass that's never been fired, but it won't hurt it either.

 

[DLS]

Agreed, but you can over-anneal and cook out components of the alloy which is damaging.

Done properly however it will only help, even if done every firing. That often the amount of improvement may not be noticeable unless you have precision gear, components and the skill to use them.

But your brass will last a long time, ultimately failing for reasons other than neck issues.

 

[Stomper]

Yep, don't overcook your brass as it's an alloy... meaning (this is for those who have no idea) it's a mixture of different metals with various "boiling points", and the component with the lowest boiling point with vaporize first, thereby changing the chemistry of the brass.

 

[Camelfilter]

So, simplistically speaking, I'd be good in the short term reloading already annealed brass. Our range pickups, as an example.

For the long term (once I figure out the what fors and how to's), I'd get much better longevity out of each individual brass by annealing as part of my batch process?

 

[No_Regerts]

Aneal-eze.......hehehe

 

[Stomper]

Aneal-eze.......hehehe

Pretty sure Seca (remember her?) invested in the company.

 

[bikemutt]

I started out with a flame thrower annealing machine, Bench-Source, great piece of equipment but, because I don't have a well-ventilated place to do this, I switched to the AMP induction machine. While the cost of the AMP is high, you may be able to put together a group of fellow shooters to go in on the buy and have everyone share it.

I have no regrets moving to the AMP, especially now they have the analyse function built-in. New brass? No problem, enter analyse mode, run it on a sacrificial specimen, record the code and use that to anneal all subsequent pieces. Rumor has it AMP will be releasing an auto-feed feature for higher volume shooters.