Cracked Necks?????
 

I am having a problem with cracked necks in my .25 WSSM cases. I had two testloads of 18 cartridges each and when I was finished I ended upwith six cases with cracked necks. Some hadsingle cracks and others had two cracks. One had three cracks. At this rateI will be going throughquite afew cases. Oh I forgot to say the cases were all new Winchester cases and one once fired win case.

I reload for my .300 WSM and have not experienced this problem with those cases. Is this something unique with the smaller cases?

I have been loading since thelate fifties and have not had this problem with any otherreloads. I have hadsplit military cases thatwere old (.30 Carbine ammo),butnever commereical or reloads.

What the hell is going on or am I doing something wrong withthese WSSM cases? Help!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

I have not experienced this ever until I get to around 5-8 firings. Have you taken out you expander ball and measureing your sized case and then put the expander back in and then measured? It sounds like your sizer is overworking the neck. But it would have be alot. Have you tried any collet or bushing sizers?

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

I would take the rifle to a gunsmith and have your chamber measured. Good luck.

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

You wouldn't have to do that. Any reloader should be able to measure a fireformed case shouldnt' they? Every reloader should have a set of head and shoulders gage along with calibers and even a set of mics.

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

Some people have more money than others.

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

state cases bullets dies loadsrifle air temp were cartridges in the sun please let me know about new case preparation we once had a bad batch....dan

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

Man, its like 25 dollars. I have seen people go thru hours of playing around and troubleshooting when I came over with a tool and showed them in 5 min. Some people have more time I guess than others.

How much do you think a gunsmith with charge? Gas getting there? etc?

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

Holy cow, is that a sentence?:D

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

My canuckeese (grins, so don't get mad)is kinda rusty but let me try to translate.....

Can you tell me what cases, bullets, dies, loads, and rifle you are using?

What was the air temp?

Were the cartridges in the sun?

Can you tell me how to prepare new cases because we screwed some up one time.

I'd guess his name is Dan.

Just trying to help.........lol

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

Most factory chambers are cut with .006-.008 per side--safety isssue I guess...that's alot of room around the neck..that's also alot of room that will be filled when the shot goes off and also alot of stretch..poor quality brass sometime will crack and especially after 2-4 firings... size some brass just enough to hold the bullet and see what happens..an 1/8 of an inch will do, I'll bet the brass doesn't crack.. I shoot all my factory varmint rifles like that, accuracy is outstanding, haven't had a case stick and haven't had any problems.

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

Thanks wilds. I thought it was a wild turkey night for the fella.

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

Can you tell me what cases, bullets, dies, loads, and rifle you are using?

CASE: Winchester
BULLET:Sierra SP, 87 gr.
DIES: RCBS
LOAD: 41.0 grs. IMR 4895
VEL: 3372 fps. (average)
RIFLE: Win. Model 70

What was the air temp?

Mid Eighties

Were the cartridges in the sun?

No, benches are under an overhang at the range.

Can you tell me how to prepare new cases because we screwed some up one time.

Checked OAL, ran cases through resize die, trimmed inside neck for bullet.

__________________________________________________ __________________________________________________ _____

Hope this helps, Dan. All my WSSM and WSM cases have been Winchester brand. I guess I willtry some other brands. I just thought they would be the best, nostly because I haave never had any problems in the past with this brand of cases.

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

Do you mean deburred inside neck? Or did you thin inside neck with a reamer?

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

Hmmm, didn't think I had to explain that one! :eek:

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

Never heard it put that way of "trim the inside of the neck". Sorry if I offended. Just trying to offer advise. If you got it figured out, I understand.

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

If you ran an inside neck reammer in the brass you actually could have made the problem worse!! If you took .001 - .003 more and made theneck wall thinner,then when it squezzes it down it will make more of a gap between the outside and the neck area of the barrel..for that matter don't even take any off the out either..it'll just make more of a gap also...just partially size the neck and see what happens...

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

I don't think he realizes what inside neck reaming is. Or maybe thats what he is going?

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

.............Interesting....I used to do some inside neck REAMING.....USED to...

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

FACTORY cut chambers already have to much slop in the the neck area and for the most part the rifles aren't accurate enought to make cleaning up the necks worth your time... I get a chance to see everything in the world shoot at our long range groundhog match, 200-300-500 yards, being the range master I get real nosey sometimes...and believe me for the most part there's not much you can do when the chambers are cut so sloppy..my custom Borden built rifle has .261 and about a quarter on a .262 cutting...the cases last forever because they don't move very much..I have over 2500 rounds on 40 cases and they shoot the same today as they did when the are new..YES, inside and outside neck reamming can help rifles become more accurate but if the chamber has that much clearance, it's not worth the time and effort...and if you straighten out the necks you'll be actually making more of a gap and causingmore movement...good luck, try partial neck sizing, they'll look funny becuase you'll actually see swelling but I'll bet they'll shoot better and last alot longer..

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

When we ream out the inside of the neck, we are talking about a process to put a slight bevel to the inside neck lip and removes any burrs and thenaids the bullet during seating. This is done because we don't bell our necks for rifle cases like we do for handgun cases.

I don't knowof anyonethat reams out the neck area during the reload process. Maybe this was misunderstood. ;)

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

I've occasionally found a split case neck on an unfired piece of brass right out of the bag, and occasionally after the first firing.[:@]
That's the unfortunate thing about a lot of the remchester-short-whatever magnums- most of the time you are stuck using brass of inconsistant domestic manufacture since you can't get a lot of them from Lapua or Norma.

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

That might be a point of confusion as people usually describe that process as chamferring.

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

Thats the reason I asked, there is a thing called inside neck reaming, kinda like outside neck turning. It wasn't to attack you. Reloaders call what you are talking about "Chamfering" or neck deburr.

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

I didn't think you were giving me a hard time, just busting my chops. I have heard of turning the outside of a neck but never the inside. But anyway can we get back to the subject at hand. :)

I went to the Winchester site and they make it pretty difficult to contact them. I had to send a snail mail letter. I know it will take sometime before a response, if they want to give one. We shall see.

Now has anyone else experienced this problem? A fewhave told me to anneal the necks, but I don't thinkweshould have to do this at our level. But again, if that is what it willtake then it may be cheaper then buying new brass repeatedly. It will also get a lot expensive too!

Gotta go. I got another doctor appoint. This old body is breaking down by the numbers. ;)

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

I don't think anyone is belittling anyone here intentionally...back to the topic... Two of the three procedures being discussed here are advanced tactics for reloading and one, chamferring is pretty basic. TO be honest, with a factory chambered rifle, inside/outside neck reamming are not needed and will produce very little of anything other than if you take to much off, you'll cause greater space between the neck of the cartridge and chamber, usually resulting, if the stretch is to much-- a cracked neck.. I believe you may have a chamber that may be too big, if your cracking cases on first firings..it all depends how many chambers were cut with that reamer at the factory, the first ones seem to have the problem more so than the later ones... WHAT is the measurement of a fired case neck..check the reloading manuels and see what a sized case should be.. subtract the difference and see how much yours are expanding.. I'll bet it's more than .012, if it's much more than that I'd say that your problem, not the cases but the expansion...

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

Annealing properly is difficult. Most procedures like from John Barsness only stress relieves. He tells people to just heat the necks until you fingers get hot holding the brass. I totally disagree. You need to buy a temp sensitive crayon (welders use) and a propane torch.

Annealing can help with your problem, but should have never happened in the first place if they annealed correctly.

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

The fundamental part of annealing brass is the cold water quench after a uniformheating of the neck and shoulder. Some folks throw them onto a cold wet towelbut I think a dunk in a pail of water is a more complete annealing action. Brass is the opposite of carbonized steel in that a heating and an immediatecold quench makes it softer.

Heating the brass until it just starts to turn color is plenty of heat to accomplish this, and consequently too hot to hold onto without gloves. A smooth jawed set of plyers works the best as you can hold thecase neck over the end of the torch flame, shooting the heat into the case mouth, giving a nice even heat...and not roast your digets in the process.

Annealing brass that should have been anneal2 or3 loadings prior isn't going to gain you much back.............

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

The annealing method we used to use was to stand the brass in a pan of water so that they are submerged to just below shoulder height. Then heat each with a torch and when it is hot, use the torch to tip it over. Properly annealed brass will go a long time unless you are really working the neck/shoulder area hard.

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

Annealing is a pretty simple process that most people don't understand.

You don't need water- The oft-quoted way of annealing is to place cases in a pan and heat the necks until they are cherry red, then tip them over. All this does is protect the case body from annealing while over-annealing the neck. If you heat the necks this hot, they will be annealed, but won't have enough tension to hold a bullet. BC's idea of using a temp stick is a good one- it will keep the necks from being overannealed.

You don't need to quench brass to anneal it. Once the brasss is heated hot enough, its already anealed. Dropping it in a bucket of water or tipping it over in a pan is useful if you don't want to deal with hot brass lying around. I just toss them in a coffee can (the old kind, made of real metal) to cool.

Annealing by holding on to the rim is the easiest way to do it. You turn the brass in the flame to heat it as evenly as possible. You'll see 2 color changes- the first is where the brass gets shiny as the water is boiled out of the surface of the brass, followed by the brass turning a blueish-purple color as its annealed. You keep the brass in the flame until the blue color hits the case body. I've never tried this on WSSM cases and don't know if it would work because of the short casemight conduct heat to your fingers too quickly, but I use this method for knecking up .284 brass to make 7.5x55 brass, and anneal cases .308 and larger ever 3-4 firings to extend their life. (Note, I don't anneal .308 brass per sebecause its very easy to replace but save my annealing time for european cartridgescases that are much more difficult and costly to replacebut I have tried it with .308)

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

And that would be pretty much the point of using water......

As you air cool the brass in your coffee can,the heat migrates to any part of the case that is cooler than the neck/shoulder area and this would be the case body, head and primer pocket.

It'd be much prefered that that part of the case doesn't get softened any more than it is, as it doesn't sufferthe degree of work hardening that the neck/shoulder does. Gaining loose primer pockets or premature case head seperation isn't on the plus side.

You will also gain a more consistantamount of anneal by quenching in water, as brasscan be made several degrees ofsofter by addinga varying amount ofheat or by slowing down the cooling process. It's agreed that the slightblueish hue is the point where we want to be per color change and an imediate quench at that point will stop the anneal process dead in it's tracks giving you a much more consistant neck tension than by air cooling.

Building up hot brass in a metal container slows the cooling process down and lends to inconsistancy and over annealed case bodies, case heads and primer pockets.

In my experience not a better idea.........

I don't use the pan method because I might anneal2 or 300 cases at a time. 'Tis much easier to just fill a 5 gallon bucket and get to it.

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

You probably have a good idea about dumping htem into water to prevent over annealing or at least getting hot brass out of the work area, but brass isn't a very good heat conductor. Once you get your neck/shoulder annealed, the annealed portion isn't going to spread after removing the heat- the brass needs to be heated to a certain threshold before it anneals, the heat migrating through to the cooler brass will bring the temp well below that threshold.

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

I heard brass is an excellent conductor. Better than iron or aluminum. Its part copper right? I don't know for sure.

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

A couple of my guys run a time saver stroke sander which puts a grained finish on the doors and frames we build/sell....

We build out of Bronze, Brass, Stainless, ect.....

A #6 Satin finish requires a final hit with 180 grit.

We always have to be more careful with the brass, and the bronze, than with anything else because it heats up quickly and hold the heat longer. Sanding too much too fast will burn the finish and cause cause warpage.

Pretty hard to BS me on most thingsmetal.............

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

Rabsob, before the Internet, Roy Dunlap, gunsmith, said annealing took skill, brass has not changed, some of the brass I use was around when he published the information in his book on gunsmithing, 1950 + or - a few years.[/align][/align]If I thought the cases were brittle, lacked elasticity, had the wrong percentage of copper to zinc ratio, etc., I would neck-up 5 of the cases as in 280 Remington to 35 Whelen or 270 Winchester to 30/06, brittle brass that does not have elasticity will result in a high percentage of failure as in necking up nickel cases, when necking up nickel280 Remington to 35 Whelen, as many as 33% will split.[/align][/align]Split necks: something that is lost when reloading, the # ONE thing we are dealing with is a 'hot high pressure metal cutting gas', that can cut the bolt face if primers are unseating due to excessive head space, cut the throat and muzzle under normal useor cut the receiver like a cutting torch when there is a catastrophic failure of the case.Point being, how well does the case handle the heat and escaping gas? Would the results have been different had you loaded 10 cases with one different component likea slower burning powder like H4831 or H4350,if usingthe slower powder resulted in fewer or'no splits' it could be said the case had the ability to expand with the slower burning powder but couldnot tolerate the fast expansion caused by the faster powder, or, if you have multiple splits and cracks, did the escaping metal cutting gascut the necks?[/align][/align]To an extreme: I offered to form 25/06cases to be used in a 22/6MM Remington Improved chamber, seems the failure rate was 80 out of 100 when they tried 6MM Remington cases, there was nothing about their techniques or methods I agreed with but the influence of the Internet is overwhelming, they are using OatMeal, Cream of Wheat, Cheerios? Wheaties? and pistol powder, I believe the burningpistolpowder expandsfaster than the casesability toabsorb the expansion, and the unknown, 'meets and or exceeds' the receiver'meets' the requirement to absorb the shock, how closedid the pistol powder come to 'exceed' the ability of the receivers abilityto absorb the shock? I formed the cases with a +.020 shoulder to case head, this would allow die adjustment for head space and extra long necks, they choose not to use the cases because of the 25/06 head stamp, I had hoped they would size the cases so they would just chamberand trim, this would allow me to form cases that could be chambered and fire formed, I am waiting to see if they have reamers and dies.[/align][/align]The short fat case (WSM, WSSM)was to be the best way to shorten the action to make it more rigid (stronger) and sell more rifles, dies and ammo, it would appear nothing changed, case, bullet, primer and powder, the difference is in appearance, the cases are shorter and larger in diameter, this could require different thinking. The column of powder is larger in diameter, powders that have been around for years havebeen designed to work in cases long columns and small diameters, it would appear little thought has been given tothe change in column diameter and length of powder in the case.[/align][/align]Annealing: forget the Internet, but in real life I have talked with people about annealing with interesting results, two reloaders with a total of 60 years experience building rifles and reloading said they gave up after trying everything they read on the Internet, some of the advise cost one individual $200.00, long story, the other said he tried the 1" of water deal, My question was why stop at 1", why not run the water deep enough to come up to the shoulder, his reply, " Because the water boils at the point the heat comes in contact with the water" I explained to him that is called 'spheroid', meaning the case at that point was 212 degree F and the only way he could get the water to stay close to the case was to pressurise the air around the case, each increase ofl Lb. ofpressure increases the boiling point 3 degree (not an easy thing to do) or increase the boiling point of the coolant (water), both came to visit, I put together a project, I am not ambitious, convincing two people it can be done correctly is more than I started out to accomplish.[/align][/align]F. Guffey[/align][/align]

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

Ever smoke a case neck & shoulder for setting dies? It can get pretty warm on the digits. And that is just from the heat of a candle or match. Gotta agree it is a pretty good heat conductor.

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

Ok, so bascially, your saying everyone is dumb besides you. Am I correct? So what temperature do you think the neck is getting too with the water around it with direct flame to it? What temperature do you think it takes to anneal brass? Since we are all forgetting the internet besides what you say?

Your correct on the water statement. Bernoulli's principle has been around for a long time. But the water is acting as a heat sink. Why do you want the water to get up in temperature? Your want to only anneal the neck, why do you want to worry about the case body or the shoulders?

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

This is the method i've always used too...

Brass is made up of copper and tin, and annealing it after several fireings makes it last a lot longer. There's probably several ways to do it, but this way that's been workingfor me for the last 40+ years, so i'll stick with it.

DM

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

DM, again, Roy Dunlap said annealing took skill, he was a master gunsmith, I agree with him and yes, the old method works but RAFSOB does not need to be confused with methods and techniques that leave out so much information. The onlymethod missing is the one where a candle is used as a heat source, the candle is hot enough butthe time factor would render that method useless, we do have the 'hold ityour hand until it gets too hot to hold' method: 'heat them and throw them in a bucket' method: 'stand them in a pan of waterand tip themover' method. With thousands ofquestions and responses, it would seem someone would mentionthe advantage of working indim lite when annealing, it would seem the water boiling at the surface would have been observed and mentioned (unless the case was not getting hot enough), when annealing, time is never mentioned, RIFLE LOONEY's point is overlooked when he questions 'air cooling', heat travels to cold, annealing is about heat and controlling travel.

F. Guffey

http://www.6mmbr.com/annealing.html

"Before starting,to anneal,choose adarkened place to see the true color, not in bright light"

[hr]

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

Why not just use a propane torch and tempilac paint, get it to the right temp, and call it a day? Make a jig to stick in you cordless screwdriver and rotate nice and even.


Why does everyone have to make it so complicated. The temps to anneal arewell known.

RE: Cracked Necks?????
 

So far I have gotten a lot of good info on this subject. I never thought I would have to go this farin reloading, but as with so manythings in life there are manydifferent facets to consider. I have learneda lot andthank the many responses tomy problem.

I can see that the WSSM and WSM cases are going to need a little more tender loving care in my reloading process.


[hr]

fguffey,
I went to the link you provided and liked the article. I liked Ken Light's machine, but thought it was alittle beyond my modests means.

bigcountry,
I like your idea and can see itwill fit in my budget, thanks.