Bullet Annealing

barnesuser28

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Hi, i read a post saying that sometimes the 300 grain Berger OTM wont leave a very large exit and i was wondering if annealing the front 1/4 of the bullet would help with low velocity expansion but not make it so soft that it blows up on impact. Any thoughts?
 
I don't know much about annealing but suspect by the time you achieve the temperature required to anneal the jacket-you'll exceed the melting point of the core. I suspect the monometal bullets might tolerate this better. Mostly just chiming in to follow along and see where the question goes,
 
i google search said lead melts at 621 degreas faranheight and copper at 1,984 degrees faranheight. So i think a copper bullet will defiantly be able to be annealed and maybe a lead core bullet if care is taken to keep the temp low enough.
 
This is interesting, i think if they are kept tip up like in the video then the lead will kinda bond itself to the jacket. i wonder how that would affect terminal performance.
 
My thoughts are you need to shoot something with some before screwing with them!!!!

Pretty good advice! Occasionally though taking thing apart to better understand them is worthwhile. In this particular instance a couple of guys that don't fool with tools or mettalurgy much may learn a thing or 2. Chucking a bullet up to see what it takes to turn , drill or cross section, or heating and cooling metal just to add to a persons knowledge base may pop up down the road somewhere.
 
Haha ya i figured someone would say that. To tell you the truth i dont really trust any of his results and i think he is full of himself. I sent him a couple emails and it seems he really thinks he knows everything about anything. :rolleyes:

I also had another crazy thought. Taking a small nail and inserting it into the meplat and giving it a couple light taps with a hammer to make the meplat a little wider to improve expansion rather than trimming the meplat down. It would be much cheaper to do than trimming.

Rhian, do you think a Barnes bullet will benefit from annealing?
 

That is just crap. I am a bullet maker and annealing makes the jacket softer and tougher so it is " less " likely to fragment .
If a bullet has a lead core even if you only melt a fraction of the top edge of the core you have upset the balance of the bullet . The affect on accuracy could range from slight to catastrophic .
At a temp that does any useful annealing of gilding metal jackets some lead would surely melt.
You could anneal a solid mono metal bullet OK but there is no guarantee it's diameter would not change slightly . I am not sure I have not tested it.
A softer bullet means more fouling so why the hell do it anyway.
 
That is just crap. I am a bullet maker and annealing makes the jacket softer and tougher so it is " less " likely to fragment .
If a bullet has a lead core even if you only melt a fraction of the top edge of the core you have upset the balance of the bullet . The affect on accuracy could range from slight to catastrophic .
At a temp that does any useful annealing of gilding metal jackets some lead would surely melt.
You could anneal a solid mono metal bullet OK but there is no guarantee it's diameter would not change slightly . I am not sure I have not tested it.
A softer bullet means more fouling so why the hell do it anyway.
I really think this guy is a joke, i just figured i would post the video anyway. Also he "anneals" Hornadys interbond and sst.

Im thinking annealing the bullet in front of the bearing surface so a slight diameter change wouldnt make much of a difference, except maybe in BC.

Now just to make it clear i am not claiming to know anything about this kinda stuff im just throwing some ideas out there.gun)
 
Bullet bumper, in terms of bullet jacket, or composition of monometal bullets is there a way to measure hardness? If so is there a level of "hardness" you prefer? The Barnes X bullets were "soft" and fouled badly at times like you said. After that some got "harder" and did not expand well. We thought at one time giving them a bit more hollow point might give more reliable expansion. So we chucked them in a lathe and drilled them out a bit. From the same box came those that the copper just peeled easily from, and those we could not cut at all. One of the younger members of the group shot a few deer with them, the "soft" ones had large wound channels the "hard" ones had pass throughs. These were 338 bullets. We "inferred" hardness was the bigger issue than the hollow point. From some of the younger guys Tikkamike, and Riley Barnes may have fixed this issue. The question is if Riley was to experiment with hardness/annealing is there a way to measure it vs backtracking from the results? Thanks for your experience!
 
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