Long range for beginners

[87Ford]

I used to anneal with a drill going super slow and a bit I made to hold the cases and then drop them in water to stop the heat from going down too far on the case.  Now I anneal by hand. Holding the brass by the head and turning it by hand. Then I set it on a tin plate to cool. No water mess or waiting for brass to dry, heat dosent go past the shoulders but maybe .1-.15"  still getting the same results but faster and less fuss. Typically when I finish the last peace I'm able to just start picking them up and place them in my loading block. They cool quickly.

jasnt, could you elaborate just a little on how you "anneal by hand"?  I started reloading a couple years ago and have not yet tried any kind od annealing.  I'm familiar with using a drill to turn the brass in a flame?  Wondering how you do it by hand?   

[yorketransport]

I used to anneal with a drill going super slow and a bit I made to hold the cases and then drop them in water to stop the heat from going down too far on the case.  Now I anneal by hand. Holding the brass by the head and turning it by hand. Then I set it on a tin plate to cool. No water mess or waiting for brass to dry, heat dosent go past the shoulders but maybe .1-.15"  still getting the same results but faster and less fuss. Typically when I finish the last peace I'm able to just start picking them up and place them in my loading block. They cool quickly.

jasnt, could you elaborate just a little on how you "anneal by hand"?  I started reloading a couple years ago and have not yet tried any kind od annealing.  I'm familiar with using a drill to turn the brass in a flame?  Wondering how you do it by hand?   

You do it very carefully and not on a 223 case. I started off doing it this way and it's fine for longer cases. It's hard to get the right temp or a consistent temp unless you know what you're doing. Tempilaq is your friend until you have a good feel for timing when annealing.

[jasnt]

I simply turn the brass with my fingers holding it at the case head.  While holding the case neck in the flame. It's done before the head gets too hot to hold. 223 is a bit tougher

[Magnum_Willys]

After hearing the steps some of you guys take in brass prep I'm amazed that I ever hit anything!

I don't sort cases, I rarely trim them, I don't really like bushing dies, I anneal brass whenever I have time, I've never even considered owning a concentricity gauge, and every once in a while I might tumble my brass.

For optics I don't have a preference between MOA or MIL; I have both and like both. Heck, I even mix MOA turrets with MIL reticles on some scopes just to bug people. Depending on the type of shooting I'm doing, I like both FFP and SFP. SFP is better for shooting groups and dialing because of the ability to have a finer reticle. FFP is more fun when just playing "bet you can't hit that" and constantly making corrections at unknown ranges without having to worry about what magnification I'm on. I rarely shoot any of my scopes on max power, so having to make the correction to adjust the reticle scale to selected magnification on a SFP scope gets annoying.

That brings a good bit of advise for new LR shooters: You don't need a 32x scope to hit stuff at 1000 yards! Focus on optical quality and adjustment repeat-ability first. I'd take a 10x scope with good adjustments and clear glass over a 24x scope with OK adjustments and decent glass. I've spent a lot of time shooting at 1 MOA targets at 1500+ yards with 10-12x scopes and I've never felt like my magnification was holding me back.

   Alert for Beginners - Yorke shoots Cheytac pistols as his long range plinkers so take his advise in context  He could probably ring steel at a 1000 with your grandpa's 30-30. 

[87Ford]

I simply turn the brass with my fingers holding it at the case head.  While holding the case neck in the flame. It's done before the head gets too hot to hold. 223 is a bit tougher

Makes sense.. I had never even heard of tempilaq until york mentioned it.  Lots to learn.

[jasnt]

I personally feel temp is not that critical.  After reading this article on brass I figured who could possibly tell you what temp is correct. I've annealed with a cutting torch when I used a home made bit for my drill which shielded the case walls below the shoulder. I got the mouths so hot they glowed bright and melted the mouth slightly so it was thicker at the mouth almost like lips. Resized and shot fine. Needed a good trim on the next reloading so I would not recommend doing it this hot but I don't think you need to control temp that much. If your seeing the oxidizing colors run your annealing.



This is what I learned working with cartridge brass ( 70 Cu- 30 Zn).

All brass of the same grade is not the same when specifying annealing temperature
Most yellow brass is manufactured from recycled brass, aka scrap
The use of recycled brass introduces impurities of iron, lead, tin, phosphorus . and others
Whne brass is annealed , it recrystallizes to an initial grain size that is dependent on the cold work in the brass along with prior in process hot anneals ( grain size) and purity.
Although brass with low imputities and sufficient cold work will recrystallize ( anneal) at 370 C. , it was common to anneal cartridge brass at 500C or higher to meet unique grain size requirments for shellcase.
To adjust for impuity levels in the brass, the brass was reclassified after melting and casting into sub categories ( about 5 ) for t purpsoe of specifying annealing parameters
The annealing temperature required to achieve uniform grain size varied by nearly 100 degrees C dependent on the impurity level
In the special case of a phosphorus impuity of greater than 0.001% in the presence of iron, we would bnot use this grade for shellcase as the annealing repsonse was very unpreditcable for the shellcase grain size specifications
There are other things we learned and applied that iI dont need to reveal - need some secrets.
I suspect brass is stil mostly manufactured from recycled brass with impurites , so I can see the annealing temperature requirement can vary from lot to lot and the degree of the anneal as measured by grain size will vary by prior cold working… from 370 C. for high purity heavily cold worked brass to 600 C, for recycled brass loaded with iron up to 0.1% and phosphorous over 0.001%.

[jasnt]

Another benefit of anealing every loading is less work hardening between loading means less stress on the brass and if you believe the artical less heat needed to achieve full aneal. Jmo.  I figure it's in the can't hurt might help catagory

[Magnum_Willys]

I just stick a deep wall socket in the cordless drill, spin brass over a wide flame propane torch for 5 seconds.  ( metronome app on phone to count) You can see the brass color turn a little shine to it and done.   Test in full dark to when you see any dull red in the brass and make sure you are not going that long.  Lapua brass can take a lot more heat than other but extra time not needed imo. 

[yorketransport]

Alert for Beginners - Yorke shoots Cheytac pistols as his long range plinkers so take his advise in context  He could probably ring steel at a 1000 with your grandpa's 30-30. 

You've got it backwards, I need all the help I can get to hit anything beyond 25 yards. I'd be lucky to shoot my own foot with a 30-30. 

For the record, I did try and hit a 24" gong at 1000 yards with a 14" 30-30 Contender years ago and the results were something I've tried hard to forget about.

[jay.sharkbait]

Alert for Beginners - Yorke shoots Cheytac pistols as his long range plinkers so take his advise in context  He could probably ring steel at a 1000 with your grandpa's 30-30. 

You've got it backwards, I need all the help I can get to hit anything beyond 25 yards. I'd be lucky to shoot my own foot with a 30-30. 

For the record, I did try and hit a 24" gong at 1000 yards with a 14" 30-30 Contender years ago and the results were something I've tried hard to forget about.

Don't give up... it just hasn't gotten there yet.

[Alchase]

After hearing the steps some of you guys take in brass prep I'm amazed that I ever hit anything!

I don't sort cases, I rarely trim them, I don't really like bushing dies, I anneal brass whenever I have time, I've never even considered owning a concentricity gauge, and every once in a while I might tumble my brass.

For optics I don't have a preference between MOA or MIL; I have both and like both. Heck, I even mix MOA turrets with MIL reticles on some scopes just to bug people. Depending on the type of shooting I'm doing, I like both FFP and SFP. SFP is better for shooting groups and dialing because of the ability to have a finer reticle. FFP is more fun when just playing "bet you can't hit that" and constantly making corrections at unknown ranges without having to worry about what magnification I'm on. I rarely shoot any of my scopes on max power, so having to make the correction to adjust the reticle scale to selected magnification on a SFP scope gets annoying.

That brings a good bit of advise for new LR shooters: You don't need a 32x scope to hit stuff at 1000 yards! Focus on optical quality and adjustment repeat-ability first. I'd take a 10x scope with good adjustments and clear glass over a 24x scope with OK adjustments and decent glass. I've spent a lot of time shooting at 1 MOA targets at 1500+ yards with 10-12x scopes and I've never felt like my magnification was holding me back.

So Kentucky windage is out of the question?
Can you tell it has been awhile since I have shot over 1000 yards?
 

Nice post, it reminds us sometimes just shooting is more fun then the engineering and the science behind it.

[jasnt]

I've been thinking about getting a phone scope to record my shots threw my spotting scope. What are you guys doing to help spot when shooting solo?  Plus it would be nice to have some proof of my shots for all the haters to mope over lol. 

[Jonathan_S]

  Tough to hear rock hits in the wind

[jasnt]

  Tough to hear rock hits in the wind

its not too bad if the wind is blowing at you. I normally see my hits in the scope but if I miss I may not see impact in the vegetation. Would be great to record it.  Atleast be able to see the trace.

[Karl Blanchard]

Phone scope on my spotter set up as close to the guns level and angle as I can get.