Reloading Question - or Overcooked brass

[SwampRatt]

I'm playing with all my new SS media cleaning stuff, and learning as I go. My question of the day is how long, and at what temp can I dry my cleaned brass in the oven without annealing it? I had it in the oven for about an hour at 300 and it looks like I ruined the batch.

Thanks in advance!

[jjrothWA]

Yep, over done.

No greater than 200 Defgree Farenheit, brass is single layer and put timer fro 20 minutes. let cool and continued reloading.

[RED]

No way 300 degrees is going to do much of anything to your brass. For example, one recommended way to anneal brass is to dip it into molten lead. Lead melts at something like 620 degrees...

The most common annealing process is to heat the brass until it starts to change color (in a darkened room) then tip or drop into water. 300 degrees ain't about to do much...

Hello, water boils at 212 degrees and is not going to change any basic characteristics of brass cartridges. If that were enough, why couldn't you pour boiling water over the brass to anneal it?

JMHO

[tmark]

I bake my brass at about 150 to dry them for about a half hour. I suggest using the lowest heat that gets the job done of drying.

[PhillipM]

You didn't hurt the brass, however it will tarnish in the oven. Been there, done that.

Jerry Mickulek has a video where he says to prop the door open a bit for air circulation, and I think that is a key part of the process.

I have floor vents in my home and central air. In the winter, the cases are in a mesh bag on a vent and in the summer, outside on the condenser.

A friend swears by acetone. He rinses the cases in a pan of acetone and they dry at room temperature quickly. He pours the acetone back in the gallon can and reuses it till it becomes so saturated it doesn't dry well.

Another thing I discovered when wet tumbling with ss pins is hot water will tarnish the brass too.

[bruce]

Re: OP. Agree with advice that brass is not damaged. However, would strongly recommend you not use lots of heat. Keeping the temperature down to say 200 degrees or less will dry the brass without any potential of messing up. JMHO. Sincerely. bruce.

[joem]

That's why I choose to dry tumble all my brass. Cleans up well and I didn't note any difference in shooting when I ran them through a sonic cleaner. Just a extra step that didn't improve accuracy IMHO at least.

[Sunray]

Brass in the oven for about an hour at 300 will do nothing but make it hot. Annealing requires 650 to 700 F.
Dry wet cleaned brass in a 'warm' or whatever the lowest setting is for 15 minutes. You still will not be able to handle it for at least another 15 minutes of cooling time.

[Former Cav]

I just use a dillon tumbler and walnut shells and dillon number 290 polish.
works great for me.

[XLF30]

Swamp Rat: Late response. I have a Rebel 17 and they sell a food dehydrator type dryer, not adjustable. I already had one with variable temp, So I called them and asked what temp I should set it on. They said 140F. That's what I do, it dries 4# in about an hour. If you're planning to use an oven, it might take longer, because the oven does not circulate hot air thru like the food dehydrator.