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Aging sized brass

rduckwor

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Minuteman
Oct 13, 2011
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AL, USA
A discussion on another forum leads me to ask, do you "age" your sized brass before loading and seating bullets? I'm shooting shorter ranges, so doubtful I would see much difference, but the long distance guys seem to follow this practice.

Thoughts?
 
Is this aging like they do with brass for artwork? Where you get a patina on the brass? What's the benefit of doing such a thing?
 
I think he might mean "anneal"

Ahh, possible. Yea, you might not notice any accuracy differences at short range with annealing, but you'll likely increase your brass life. Assuming the rest of the brass holds up. If your primer pockets get loose after 3 or 4 firings, annealing your case necks isn't going to be of much benefit.
 
Annealing will yield more consistent neck tension, thus leading to better long range accuracy, I have heard of BR guys doing it every firing but I don't.

Not sure what you mean by "aging" brass though.
 
Annealing will yield more consistent neck tension, thus leading to better long range accuracy, I have heard of BR guys doing it every firing but I don't.

Not sure what you mean by "aging" brass though.

I anneal after every firing because that's how I dry my brass.... :D

I've heard "aging" to describe patina as well as in precipitation hardening. Precipitation hardening (age hardening) involves heating the brass and maintaining that temperature until certain phases precipitate out of solution. I believe the T6 designation in aluminum alloys (ie. 7075-T6) specifies a specific age hardening process. I highly doubt this is what you want. Not even sure if it's possible in brass.

Come to think of it, I've heard some guys refer to work hardening (strain hardening) as age hardening. This is a very, very different process. Work hardening occurs when the brass is...well...worked. This is generally considered undesirable (except in the case head area) and the reason we have to anneal in the first place.
 
Just back to aged brass for a second. I found re-sized brass left for a long period had reduced neck tension than immediately after I re-sized. I did a search an found an article that researched this topic and it concluded re-sized brass can lose neck tension over time. In my case it was 18-mths.
 
No not annealing. Aging. i.e. size the brass, wait a couple of weeks and then load and seat. Some of the BR guys claim neck tension INCREASES over this period. Something to do with the brass metallurgy changing over time. Sounds crazy, but then some of those guys are certifiable. At the least, they assert you should size all your brass at the same time (for a match) and give it some time to "relax".

Neck Tension, Bullet Seating, and the TIME FACTOR « Daily Bulletin
 
Never heard of it but I basically do it. I prep all my brass well before loading and have it bagged up and primed and ready to go. Not for any other reason than ease of loading. I just find it easier to get all the brass prep done well before loading so when I get to loading I am basically dumping powder and seating bullets and I am done.
 
A discussion on another forum leads me to ask, do you "age" your sized brass before loading and seating bullets? I'm shooting shorter ranges, so doubtful I would see much difference, but the long distance guys seem to follow this practice.

Thoughts?

Considering how such innocent questions become urban legend; I vote that whoever started "this practice" be taken out and shot. BB
 
Considering how such innocent questions become urban legend; I vote that whoever started "this practice" be taken out and shot. BB

Well, I agree, but would like to hear what someone in the know has to say about it.

I thought the matrix structure of metals was a fixed item, impacted only by external forces, but then what the hell do I know.
 
It is true that aged brass----as in LC Match 1967, is harder than brand new brass. But, the only difference that might exist on brass that has been resized and then left a couple weeks is that metal has a memory. When you size it, you are usually are "squeezing" it past the targeted dimension, and then it springs back a little. How much it springs back is partly dependent on the hardness of the brass to start with. What the BR guys might be talking about, and TCJ mentioned, is that over time the brass has gone back to its memory and the neck has grown very slightly, changing neck tension over long periods of time. This would be more pronounced in some brass than others, depending partly on its state of annealment or lack thereof. If you were to anneal it just before sizing, you should find very little difference in size/neck tension over time.

I know this example I am going to give here relates to steel in particular, but some of the basic principles are the same, and this example will give you an idea about metal "memory." I pulled a trailer for about 3 years, the trailer was about 12 years old at the end of that time. It was a heavy equipment trailer with a rating of 75 ton load bearing. It was built with an arch in the deck, to help carry the weight without sagging. We used it to carry loads heavy on the left side for about 5 years before this story took place. At the end of the third year I pulled it, the left side was noticeably less arched than the right side----by a good 4" in the center of a 34' arch. I requested that the trailer be re-arched and strapped to cure this ailment. It sat idle for 4 months before the welding shop got to it. When they measured it out, the difference in arch between the left and right sides was only 1/2". In the four months of resting, the left beam relaxed into the "memory" it had of the original arch, making it almost even with the right beam once more. Thus, the weld shop only had to strap the beam to keep it in its proper arch.

Metal that has been deformed by stress will return nearly to its original pre-stress position when left unstressed for a period of time, as long as the stress deformation is not past certain limits. In a sizing die, you are trying to stress the casing past the point of memory return, to create a new memory point. If the brass is soft enough, it should stay that way, or much closer to that way, than if it is a certain hardness. If it is too hard, it will crack. Thus, "aging" brass as the OP is asking, may or may not change in neck tension/size. It really comes down to the exact hardness of the brass to determine the effects of this "aging."
 
"..if aging makes whiskey better, why not brass?"

Liquids like whiskey, wine, etc. aren't static chemical mixtures, the molecules are free to drift around and combine in new ways. That's not true of solids. I rather suspect if LC 67 brass is now harder than others it was that way on the day it was made. Metal 'spring back' is a whole different thing.
 
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I believe the OP and the cited BR shooters are talking about metal "spring-back," not hardness from aging. Brass does change in hardness with aging, but not in a couple of weeks, nor very measurably in a few months. We are talking years to appreciably change the hardness of brass.
 
No not annealing. Aging. i.e. size the brass, wait a couple of weeks and then load and seat. Some of the BR guys claim neck tension INCREASES over this period. Something to do with the brass metallurgy changing over time. Sounds crazy, but then some of those guys are certifiable. At the least, they assert you should size all your brass at the same time (for a match) and give it some time to "relax".

Neck Tension, Bullet Seating, and the TIME FACTOR « Daily Bulletin

You should do all sizing operations on our brass at the same time. I.e. do all neck sizing, or shoulder bump, etc. then you can quit for the night if you are breaking up your reloading into sessions. I do not think you will see any difference with aging your brass though. They are looking for and extra .020 in group size reduction. Unless you are benchrest shooting I don't think you can tell the difference in a reduction of your group size of that magnitude.

Keep it real for what you are using it for.
 
Whisky (notice the PROPER spelling) only ages in the barrel. Once bottled, no more aging occurs.

This is because the aging is actually the whisky moving in and out of the pores in the wood.
 
Keep it real for what you are using it for.

I have to agree with this concept. For me 0.020 difference isn't going to happen if I dance naked around my brass under a full moon.

So I'm going to keep on keeping on.

Thanks. I'm off for some whisky.
 
I am reminded, after reading about arched trailers....and the possibility that an incorrect alloy was used, that some things actually do require aging. Take a slab of black granite suitable for measuring precision instruments. Also, cast iron meant for such things as a Bridgeport mill; they say these things are left out in the boneyard for a couple years before they make any attempt at grinding a perfectly flat surface.

But, I agree with "keeping it real". Aging brass for accuracy sounds like just another MOJO concept, you probably couldn't prove an advantage, one way or the other. BB
 
Brass and steel are two entirely different metals that act differently when heat is applied and worked, so what I am relating is simply academic. When making a knife from automobile spring, whether coil or leaf, it is often difficult to convince the steel it is in fact a knife and not still a spring. The hammer and anvil usually win in the argument.