I got a bonus at work and my birthday is soon so I treated myself to an UGLY annealer. Found it on Scamazon yesterday for $285 and lucky for me I ordered it. Price is up to $333 today! I’ve been annealing with an adapter on a cordless drill, which works but it takes forever. This should quickly pay for itself in lost time and very consistent annealing. It should be here on Saturday.

450–give us a review once you’re up and running. Thanks in advance

Jesus....

I set up to anneal brass a long time ago...

pair of needle nose pliers.... a propane tank ( 7 gallon) that someone was discarding, a propane tree ( free also) and a plumbers torch... $6.00.
put $10 worth of propane in it about 12 years ago...still haven't had to re fill it...

pair of old needle nose pliers that were given to me...

I have $6 for the plumbers torch and the original propane I put in the tank, that is all of my investment.

I've anneal brass well over 10,000 times with that set up....

let it air cool, in a small galvanized decorative bucket from Walmart.... that cost me a Buck... $1.00.

I've got brass that has been annealed and reloaded over 50 times....so it works... and that is also range pick up brass.... so that was free also.

Cheap SOB, Ain't I?

Cheap is ok. I’m cheap too except when it comes to my time. I never use to anneal because most of my shooting was pistol. Now that I’m shooting cast bullets in my rifles, shooting a lot of them, and paying a lot for good brass, those cracked necks are getting really expensive. It will pay for itself in about 5 hours of my time and pay for itself again the first time I run all my brass through it. That and it was a birthday present I bought myself!

I certainly will!

Frugal, John...FRUGAL.

I hope so! I have a BUNCH of vintage but new .17 Rem brass that is really splitting easily, and since its hard to get,I decided to try annealing...but I went REAL cheap! Spent $3 on candles and tried JBs candle annealing that he outlined in Gun Gack. Initial results are good!

I wouldn’t say cheap but would say a negative and rude for no reason.

I got the annealer today! It’s better than I expected only because it was my first annealer and I didn’t know what to expect. It was very well packaged and needed just a little assembly. Base was drilled and tapped for the included machine screws, Needed to attach the case “slide”, the rod to hold the outside of the brass hopper, and the torch “holder”. Installed the 223 case die, changed the wheeI from the big one to the small one and was ready to go.

My auto light torch head has been broken for years so I can’t lock it on and had to hold the button. I’ll change to a different head tomorrow. This isn’t a problem with the Ugly, it’s on me and the torch head. I ran about 15 17 fireball through just to see it work and it was perfect. Tomorrow I’ll get the new torch head installed and put it to work.

The hopper is big, I’m guessing it will hold well over 100 223 sized cases giving me plenty of time to do other things.

It comes with a set of allen wrenches and extra C clips and screws. I think pretty much everything is stainless steel and very well put together. Shout out to the Aussies, you make a very nice annealer and worth every penny!

My only complaint is with Biden and this freaking inflation. See my op about the price increase… It must have been warehoused on the east coast, I ordered it Wednesday and was delivered today. No complaints there!

Not disappointed a bit the UGLY Annealer, it’s going to serve me well for a long time.

I’ve come to expect it at this “campfire”, rudest place on the internet…

pffftt…Seafire was gentle.

not in my case....


Cheap SOB in my case.... actually more Hillbilly roots than anything else...in the vein of keep it simple.
I call it hillbilly mechanics....

Well Kaleb,

maybe so... but it wasn't intentional....

as my granddad use to see.... "Just because you dress 'em up... doesn't mean you can take them anywhere respectable"..

some times I am guilty of that... won't deny it, but not slander or slam were intended...

so if anyone did get offended, please accept my apologies.

No offense taken Seafire, I grew up poor, have one kid in college and another planning to go in a year so things are a little tight. I don’t throw anything away and have realized I can’t throw time away either, it’s worth way more than the money. The annealer will save me time that I can spend with my family, and being an older parent (was 40 when daughter was born), it’s worth spending a few hundred bucks. And the way inflation is going, it’s probably a good investment.

Haven’t had time to run the annealer yet, my daughter and I have been working on a project and it’s requiring my redneck woodworking skills and lots of time…

450,

I wouldn't have paid what you did for that annealing set up...

now that being said....with your above explanation factored in...

your new annealing machine is worth every darn penny... family comes first...

on what I did as a set up, it didn't really affect anything to do with family...

my one son is 27 now and has no interest in hunting or shooting... nor does the wife...even tho both of them have a real good eye for shooting accurately...

theirs are natural, mine was acquired with practice.....

but nothing is more precious than spending time with your children and family.... they all grow up way too fast.. and before you know it they are out on their own...

wishing it serves you well my friend.. and thanks for your understanding I was intending no offense in my original post..

and thanks to Kaleb for bringing it to my attention...

I've done it more or less Seafires away for a long time. But getting older and able to spend more money on hobbies I bought myself a nice annealz sometime ago and I like it. I went through a hard life as a kid and young adult I've earned nice things never apologize for having nice things.

Yeah, I’ve done it the “harder” way too. Spun a lot of brass in a cordless drill but got tired of doing that.

On a side note… I was at a Sportsman Warehouse last week looking at reloading supplies. Basically, they had nothing I wanted but I did note some prices on a couple of items. 26 Nosler brass, $97.99 for 25 count box, Weatherby 30-378 loaded rounds, $163.99 for a 20 round box. Boy, you’d want to make that brass last, not that I’d be plinking with either one of them.

Seafire isn't cheap, he's THRIFTY.

I like to call it practical instead....

just for myself.... I don't need a $10 solution to a $2 problem.

Homebrew Annealer

Short little video there. I ended building one as all the other methods that involve hands, candles, pliers, and so on, just bothered my 'efficiency chromosome'. But here's another thought; I viewed the annealer as path to reducing the cost of reloading. Brass is a consumable of course, but annealing returns it to a near state of new. Of course it can't shrink blown out primer pockets and stuff like that, so you just keep your eyes and brain peeled. I pick up a lot of brass at my local range, and since building my annealer, I've not purchased brass. Not once. Not quite a frugal as SeaFire's setup, but it cost me less than a 100 dollars to build it, and that included a few changes I made post construction and testing.

This thread has me regretting tossing two rusted out barbecues into the appliance pile at the dump. Should have at least cannibalized one valve, right?

I built my own with directions from these DIY instructions, I have a total of $74 in the build and it works fantastic. I did make 2 turntables for small and large cases

I’ve been using the UGLY fairly hard the last week and really like it. I was able to put 262 223 brass in the hopper and could have stacked in some more but that was all I had in front of me. It takes a little time to load but it’s completely hands off after it starts.

450BM—After weeks of procrastination, my Ugly Annealer is inbound and due to be delivered on Sunday. I’m hoping that setup goes as smoothly as yours did.

I bought an Ugly Annealer a few months ago. That is one bad arse machine! Built like a tank. Very easy to set up and get going. Lots of videos on you tube if needed

I ran some 308 through mine the other day, still love it!