Home Forums Reloading Big Game Rifles Weigh and Anneal

Who does either of these?

I noticed that my fliers went away when I started weighing brass.
Still on the fence about annealing.

I eliminated individually weighing each charge and just started throwing it. So, I considerate it a push as far as time -especially since I only weight the first use.

I don't weigh brass, but I do sort by headstamp.

Annealing should get you longer brass life and more uniform neck tension. I anneal unknown brass, and again after several firings.

For practically all applications, individually weighing charges is a complete waste of time. I can post about the math behind that if anyone is interested.

I stopped weighing when I switched to Lapua brass. If Lapua doesn't make brass for a specific caliber then I default to Nosler (280 Ackley and 300 Win Mag).

I do anneal after 3 or 4 firings.

I do both...find that cases with the same head stamp can vary a lot...from different lots. Just try to eliminate variables. Also anneal after two reloads. Again, for consistency.
But I like to tinker. Do I get better results, depends on your out look. It has a positive effect on me, and as a hand loader, I started doing this to make better ammo than I could buy. I believe I`m still succeeding. So for me, it`s worth the effort.

In more than 45 yrs. reloading I have done neither.

I just did 1K IMI match cases.

All the 180.xx in one box 179.xx in another. Had about 15 that were below 179 and about 80 that were above 180. I'll look at the heavies and see if a trimming or demurring will get them range. Since I have two rifles I'll probably keep the bulk separate, but I would have no problem mixing it back. After looking at 1000 measurements, I would say 180 is the average.

Out of the whole box, only one bad neck. Not too bad.

I’m in the same camp except I anneal after every three firings. I’ve also encountered considerable weight variations between lots with the same headstamp. Federal brass is the worst offender for this. I’ve seen as much as a 15 gr. difference between lots. I’ve found Remington to be quite consistent. I have 3 different lots of PPU 7x57 that average exactly the same. Can’t beat that.👍 Can’t speak for Winchester - quit using that stuff years ago.

I have used Winchester brass for the entire 45 yrs. that I have been reloading and have never had any issues. I haven't bought any Winchester brass in the last say 5 yrs. so I can't speak to the issues some cite with recently manufactured stuff.

Some handload and shoot more often and in greater quantity than others.

I was once given about 180 pieces of 6mm Remington brass. All was headstamped "R-P." When I began to evaluate it I could see that it all came from at least three different eras, based on subtle differences in the font or style of the headstamp. As it turned out, there was variation of about 20 grains between the average weight of each type. I'd call that considerable.

I do all the "nit-picky" brass prep stuff, including weight sorting and annealing. I thoroughly believe the tests that Mr. Barsness and others have done to show that "match prepping" brass is just noise level time-wasting for hunting ammo. But like a previous poster mentioned, I'm kind of a tinkerer and enjoy it. To my wife, I call it "knitting." I'll sit down at our dining table in view of the TV and listen to the evening news while I run 50 rounds or so of new brass through all the nit-picking (after running the necks over the expander ball at my reloading table).
- Uniform primer pocket depth (any time in the sequence)
- Trim to trim-to length if greater than trim to length; trim to just square up the mouth on the shortest case if less than.
- Chamfer mouths (OK, this actually is necessary as I think everyone agrees).
- De-burr flash holes (only after trimming to uniform length and chamfering since the tool registers on the case mouth).
- Weight sort the cases (only after all the "cutting" on the brass is done).
I can anneal there too since I just use an alcohol lamp.
I think the annealing may be the only thing really important besides chamfering, and it's probably not until a few firings on the brass. I also don't think any of the above hurts. Anybody disagree (assuming I enjoy doing it and am happy to spend my time doing so)? I have heard one person say that using the tool to flatten/uniform the bottom of the primer pockets might inadvertently remove a little from the sides of the pockets and lead to premature loosening of the pockets. I should mention I typically use "working class" brass. The one run of Lapua I have used was so perfect I just omitted most all of the above, except trimming and chamfering.
Regarding weighing each powder charge - with stick powders, is there an assertion that weighing each charge actually is worse than not?
Same question for ball powders.

Cheers,
Rex

I do both also. I've done quite a bit checking accuracy and velocity. Every round I fire at the range is over an Oehler. I've even got some records on the effects on velocity, which increases on the heavier brass. One comparison I remember well was on 338WM brass. The European brass was 17g heavier than the American brass and that was enough difference to equal one grain of the same propellant. Plus or minus 1 grain of variance in brass has little effect, but it does have effect. On smaller brass that much difference will be more pronounced.

I anneal every 4 reloads. I also did quite a bit of checking its effect. My second reloads after annealing were always the most accurate after which accuracy would start diminishing.

Yikes! That’s a lot. I’ve only had one occasion where a lot of Remington ‘06 brass varied drastically (~10 gr. heavier) from the norm. I’ve used Remington brass in 243 Win., 257 Roberts, 270 Win., 308 Win. & 35 Whelen and found them all to be nicely consistent. Naturally, average weight would occasionally vary by 3 or 4 grains between lots but that’s no big deal.

So those that sort, what do you consider acceptable, or what lots do you sort by? +-1 grain? 2?

I have ZERO data to support that the following is better than some other target value, it's just what I have kind of fallen into.
On magnum brass I tend to go +/- 1 grain. On .308 and smaller, +/- 0.5 grains. In between on .25-06 through 9.3x62 - no more than 1 grain, a half grain if the brass permits.
That doesn't mean I throw the other stuff out, just sort it into lots.
As I said, +/- 2 grains (or even more) might be just fine; no comparative data of mine supports the above. I just kind of fell into it when I started paying attention to brass weight and usually don't end up with too many culls within a lot using those values.

Cheers,
Rex

On 223, ±1g. In the 338 size cases, ±3g. I "cheat" sometimes and allow maybe .5g more on small cases, 1g on larger. I don't worry about head stamps. The outside will be the same. The only differences are internal, usually the thickness of the head, or aberrations in the walls in the main chamber.

Bob: I'm guessing you meant grain (gr) not gram (g)? There is a substantial difference.

I usually weigh 15 rounds and take an average of that. Once an average is determined, my parameters are +/- 1.5 grains. Anything outside of that is set aside for plinking, fouling shots, etc.
Whether or not this makes much, if any, difference in the field is probably debatable. However, it satisfies my (semi) anal tendencies.🙄🙂

Comments on the process of weighing cases. Have been doing this for a while. Am retired, so I do this because I can.

What I have learned/observed so far:

There is a huge difference in the weights of sized TTL cases, IME. Was weighing 30-06 cases for my son's rifle. A large batch of mixed brands. The most common weight was about 187 grains. The lightest was 180 grain... and the heaviest 204 grains. So there for a large difference in internal volume.

In my experience cases grouped by weights were a little more consistent at the range... in 223, 7 x 57, and 30-06.

Since I don't always know what the case weights will be, I don't decide beforehand any +/- . I group by results.
After I weigh a few of the cases to get an idea of what my weight range will be.... I get/make a long piece of lined notebook paper.
tape it to my work surface. Draw a new heavy line on that skinny blue line. then I number each blue line with the sequence of grain weights thru the range I expect to measure. Then I weigh cases on my digital scale and stand each case up on the line labeled with its weight, such as 187.6 grain.

This 'physical histogram' ends up with uneven piles.... a distribution of the case weights in the lot I have weighed.

Now I can decide how to group the cases in groups that have similar weights. The outliers you can use however you want.

Once you have done this a few times its not complicated. Save the pages you use for next time....

If you don't tape the page down... or you bump the table... some of the cases will fall over and have to be reweighed.
Doing this in the presence of your conjugal partner is sure to generate snarky comments defaming your character and intelligence.

Yup, that will work - including the wife’s derisive comments.😄

Well done!! If you have enough of them on the bench, you will end up with the "bell shaped curve."

Continual Process Improvement..that`s how I look at my handloading.

Of course! Thanks for pointing it out.

2 boxes of 264 win mag, Nosler brand brass. One box is 20 grains heavier than the other. Equates to about 1 grain of powder difference in velocity.

I have done the same for weighing cases for precision rifle loads. Once enough cases are on the table, they'll show a bell curve of some sort (often with a long tail to one side but not the other); I take the largest chunk of cases in the middle and discard the outliers. Of course that is only done after cleaning, trimming, etc.

Doing that has shown some surprising results in how much difference it makes to accuracy; sometimes the difference is quite a lot. It also shows which brands are pretty consistent and which are not, and those results can be surprising as well, with more expensive brass sometimes being less consistent.

I’d like to hear more about the weighing the powder charges. I probably won’t understand the math, but I’m interested in the effects.
I find with my powder measure that the charges can vary as much as .3 gr with the powders I use (H4350, Varget, H4831, RL 16). Right now I load for 6.5CM, 6Dasher and 22BR.

It's a never ending discussion about weighing charges and dropping them. Typically benchrest shooters measure only and it's difficult to argue with their results. I bought a Harrell measure and used it for a while but whether it was the compulsion for perfection or what, I went to weighing every charge. I truly didn't see much difference either way. There are arguments for both methods. For me, if I had a shot go out on an otherwise solid load, I just wanted to know it wasn't powder quantity. Years ago on this board, one poster used to say "Build it like you were building for NASA." That poster may still be here.

I am not a benchrest shooter.

I quit weighing every charge some time ago. I really don't think it is the biggest factor - seems like I've seen a list somewhere of biggest factors for accuracy. Sizing a straight, consistent piece of brass is where all the concentricity starts. My guess is that if a piece of brass weighs different from the mean, perhaps it is thicker on one side than the other and out of round.

I

The math isn't very painful.

The basic concept is that variation does not simply add. If you're shooting 6" groups offhand at 50 yards with a perfect rifle, switching to one that does 2" groups at 50 yards (an SKS!!) will NOT make your groups 8". It will make them more like 6.3". If there is one large source of variation in the chain, it will almost completely determine the total variation. That is why fiddling with small sources of variation is pointless. You have to find the big sources if you want to make any progress.

One good measure of variation is standard deviation. The higher your standard deviation, the more spread out your data are (and the higher your "extreme spread" generally will be). Standard deviations add by the square root of the sum of the squares. It sounds forbidding, but it's really not so bad if you work through it step by step.

Take the case of the 5.56/223. In a small case like that, small changes in the powder charge are more important than they are in a large case like the 30-06. So this small cartridge is sort of an "acid test". The changes in larger cartridges will be less important.

With a stick powder like Varget, my powder measure throws charges with a standard deviation of .11 grains. In the 223, near normal loads, a grain of powder is about 100 FPS in MV. So a standard deviation of .11 grains in charge produces .11 x 100 = 11 FPS standard deviation in muzzle velocity.

It's not too hard to get the standard deviation of 5.56/223 handloads down into single digits, but commercial ammunition tends to run at about 30 FPS standard deviation of muzzle velocity.

So for purposes of illustration, assume that a handloader is making 5.56/223 ammunition with a standard deviation of 30 FPS in muzzle velocity. As part of the process, the handloader is using a lab grade scale, and is creating powder charges down to the last 1/10 of a granule of powder, essentially perfect loads.

OK... starting from perfectly measured loads, and a 30 FPS standard deviation in MV, what would be the effect of switching to my Lee Perfect Powder Measure that has a standard deviation of .11 grains?

First, we square the two standard deviations involved:

30^2 = 900

11^2 = 121

Now we add the two squared numbers: 900 + 121 = 1021.

Now we take the square root of the sum of the two squared numbers: square root 1021 = 31.95.

So going from a perfect measurement of powder to my $27 powder measure increases the standard deviation of muzzle velocity from 30 FPS to 31.95 FPS.

QED

I hope you're not sorry you asked!

Anal brass prep should pay dividends. Sorted once fired, reamed/turned, trimmed brass from 400 down to 100 closest in weight and halved group size with a Ruger 1V in 22-250. Anything that helps deliver a consistent product most certainly can't hurt.

I was right,,,,,it’s complicated

Thanks for the breakdown. Looks like this is a step I could probably skip and just drop charges from my powder measure. And a good excuse to get a new powder measure. I’ve had mine for 20 years and I have no idea how long the old guy I bought it from had it, but it was well used. Thanks again.

That wasn't complicated.

denton's explanation is a great example of getting too wrapped up in theory to see the reality. He claims that "for practically all applications" weighing charges doesn't matter, while attempting to prove it with a very limited set of information. NOPE. Sure, there are some examples where that is true, but that does not make it universally true, or even most of the time.

It's easy to find plenty of examples where weighing charges does show a significant difference on target. Take a 223 & Varget load that has an accuracy node about 0.3gr wide, which is fairly common. Now load that with a powder measure that varies +/- 0.4gr with Varget (meaning dropped charges span a range of 0.8gr), which is also fairly common. If you don't weigh those charges, you get a fair number that are way outside the accuracy node and the difference can be significant when shooting at extended ranges on small targets like ground squirrels. Good for denton if his powder measure is more consistent than that, but there's a big gap between saying it works for that one powder measure, and saying "practically all applications".

As to the weighing vs measuring argument - powder energy is a function of the mass of the powder, not the volume dispensed, and most powder measures dispense by volume. Dispensing without weighing can sometimes be as accurate, but weighing is never less accurate. If someone claims it is, their test was flawed or the sample size was too small.

Same goes for weighing cases. For example I've got a 357 Sig load, and a batch of brass with weights in two distinct groups. Velocity from the heavier group of brass is approximately 100 fps faster than the lighter group (about 1750 fps vs 1650 fps). That makes a noticeable difference, so I choose to sort that brass.

Often this stuff doesn't matter, but sometimes it does.

About the OP's annealing question - yes I anneal as needed. It can help accuracy by making neck tension more consistent, but even more than that it helps cases live longer without cracking in the neck or shoulder.

This is an oversimplification. Unless treated with a waterproof coating, modern smokeless powder is hygroscopic so its energy density and its mass density are both functions of its exposure to humidity. Its macroscopic volume, however, is not dependent on exposure to humidity.

Yes, but from the same batch, reloaded at the same time, their volume would still be uniform charge to charge. That would only vary the weight of the charge very slightly, especially in the lighter loads.

Wow. If your powder measure is really that bad, we ought to chip in and treat you to a new one that is at least mediocre.

With Varget, my Lee powder measure has a standard deviation of .11 grains, measured. So 95% of charges will fall between plus and minus .22 grains, and the math works out as shown.

As stated, stick powder is a worst case condition, and so is a small case. The laws of physics being what they are, ball powders and larger cases will turn in more favorable results.

But just for grins.....

Assume that you are measuring powder down to 1/10th of a granule, and that variation in bullet weight, neck tension, case capacity, etc. are giving you a standard deviation of 30 FPS. So you switch from measuring down to 1/10th of a granule to using my powder measure. Here are the actual numbers:

223/5.56, Varget. The standard deviation of 30 FPS becomes 31.95 FPS as previously shown.

223/5.56, ball powder. SD of the powder measure is .041 grains. The standard deviation of 30 FPS becomes 30.28 FPS.

308, Varget. The standard deviation of 30 FPS becomes 30.67 FPS.

308, ball powder. The standard deviation of 30 FPS becomes 30.04 FPS.

I've given you all the necessary steps, so you can make the same calculation for other cartridges if you like.

Slightly interesting. One thing is for certain, we dont all do it the same way. Some struggle more than others and some just seem to get it done regardless.

Meh. Do you really think everybody else gets similar results, with every powder out there? You're going to pretend that a guy dispensing 3031 with a Uniflow will get the same results?
Seriously, you miss the forest because of all the trees.

Exactly, thank you.

True, but I'm not much into re-tweaking the load with every new batch to account for mass density differences. Volumetric charging doesn't inherently have this batch-to-batch variation. Of course I'm being a little facetious, but the claim that energy density is more consistently correlated with mass than volume may be fundamentally flawed due to the chemical nature of smokeless powder.

I have several 308s that shoot very well using thrown charges of 3031 whatever the statistics may be.

I got a pretty good powder measure, some kind of RCBS .Using stick type powder I never trust it. Nothing to do with the powder measure but rather the way the kernals fall into the powder hopper. You can fill the hopper and then bump it a couple time and make the weight change. Not for me, I weight every load with stick powder. Ball powder measure's much better and once I get the thing set I throw 10 loads and weight them. They need to come out real close to ten time's one charge or I don't just throw them. Flake powder is in it's own world. Only reason to weight it is to set the measure! I don't weight handgun loads other than to set the powder measure.

Run the math on your own setup, and argue with that.

Fill your hopper, throw about 50 charges, weigh each, and take the standard deviation. Excel or a calculator will do the math. If your SD is greater than about .1 grain for old style 4831, stop and get yourself a decent measure.

Go to a credible web site like Hodgdon, and find the increase in MV per grain of powder. The formula is (max charge MV - start charge MV)/(max charge weight - min charge weight).

Multiply that result times the SD of your powder measure.

Then add that to your background variation by the sum of squares method shown.

If your background variation is about as assumed, your answer will surely be similar. If you're otherwise getting very small MV SDs, then your answer will be different.

Come back and give us your test results.

Just to simplify this for me, I’m assuming you’re saying that the things that are in bold and underlined in your post, will have a far greater effect on the velocity ES/SD than throwing charges through a powder measure will.

That's very close to what I'm trying to say.

The basic idea is that you can fiddle forever with the minor sources of variation, and not make progress. If you have sources of variation in your process that are much larger than the variation in a powder measure, then the effect of variation in the powder measure will be much smaller than most people expect because of the peculiar way that random variation adds.

Early on, I was individually hand weighing charges. Then I took the time to characterize my scale and my powder measure, and have not weighed charges ever since.

With ball powder, the variation of my powder measure is comparable with the variation of my scale (and with stick not much worse). I can trust one as well as I can trust the other. In my system, the powder measure is not the main source of variation, and not what I need to be working on if I want more consistency.

There is a lot of math being presented by folks probably better at it than me, but I have an observation/question on Don's post above that I'll throw out for thought:
If the issue is that variations (by weight) in the dispensing of powder charges is or may be a problem, I can't see how dispensing ten charges into a single batch, then weighing the whole thing, can in any way give confidence that there are not big variations by weight in each charge thrown. It would seem that this approach would actually mask that problem. If the measure was to vary by +/- two grains on every thrown (an extreme example of course) and you threw 10 charges, you could get a perfect "ten times" the desired target weight when you weighed them all due to the large sample size. If you weighed 20 charges in bulk and divided by 20 your measure would look even more perfect.
I may have misunderstood what Don meant. Maybe this is just how he checks to make sure he has his measure adjusted correctly, before he starts dispensing, in which case I would agree, that's a nice easy way to check it. But it would seem the worst way to check for variation.
Like him, I typically weigh all my stick powder charges (I have the time), but will throw spherical powders straight into the cases when loading a lot of them. I get everything dialed in and have at it. Every tenth charge, I drop it in the pan and check it on the scale, just to make sure nothing has "slipped."

Cheers,
Rex

I weigh ten throws together to get a good estimate of the mean and that's what I designate as the particular load.

I know from testing that my measure doesn't exhibit the wild swings outlined in your extreme example. There isn't going to be a safety issue. So I don't worry about what the charge to charge variation actually is. I let the targets tell me if things are consistent enough.

Which means you don't know zip about the actual variation.

Sure, you have some loads that shoot great that way. That's not what denton claimed though. "practically all applications" was his wording, and you've claimed similar in the past yourself.

You need to get out and shoot more, and forget about the math so much. Your theoretical calculations do not reflect reality for all situations.

Do you think you're informing me of anything? I know I don't know the actual variation. I said I don't worry about it and let the targets tell the tale.

Well, that settles it then.

I weigh and anneal. With lapua brass there are usually 2-6 outliers, then 2 or 3 batches of close weights , like 0.5 grain spread., this is out of 100 brass on average.

The limited (one time) Alpha brass begot 2 groups ,0.5 grain spread and 3 what I consider outliers.

For bullets I take 20 ,weigh them and then divide by 20 for an average (Berger & Lapua). I just bought some Barnes match bullets, 112 grain 6mm. These I will weigh individually as there seems to be looser quality control as concerned with weight.

A good load (OCW) will tolerate small variances in weights and measures.

A finicky load will respond to minor variances.

For shooting groups at distance (1000 yards) I look for a low ES, as one bad round ( an outlier) can double the group size. Especially if the load responds to slight variations.

I weighed twenty charges using a beam scale this afternoon. Nice reminder of how much I hate that operation. What really chafed was the powder was N135 which meters great, but I wasn't in my usual workshop.

That is a 6.499% difference. Pretty big when your looking for 1/16th of an inch in score groupings.

If you weigh, sort, segregate, etc. You have giver yourself a chance of an easy quality control measure by mass of loaded cartridge..

Once you know the average numbers its easy to check for a load that's dangerously out of spec.

I weigh and sort my brass and anneal every other or every 3rd loading for mid-range loads

For extended LR loads I anneal after every firing... the difference it makes on shot-to-shot consistency at longer ranges where minor variations will show up.

The consistency is easy to see and feel during seating step.

When done correctly annealing restores brass to it's ideal state for the most consistent loads.

The important factor is to be as consistent as possible during each step of the loading process.

I weigh at least and toss the outliers. I was wearing out 20 pieces of 7-08 Winchester brass. I thought it peculiar that I had one consistently out of the group in that 20 cases. I separated it after it threw the 1 1/4 inch out of the group and weighed it. 6 grains less than the lightest of the rest. The flier always seemed to hit at 2 o'clock.I happily tossed it.

I weight all my brass twice!