Annealing brass

[greenheadcaller]

I loaded some of my freshly annealed brass last night and while resizing them I couldn't help but notice that they seemed to be harder to resize and the expander ball seemed to be tighter in the case necks on extraction from the die. The necks also seemed to be tighter when seating the bullets. Is this normal for freshly annealed brass? :?

Not normal imo .... If I notice anything at all, it's that they actually resize easier (because the brass is more pliable)

Second, regarding your expander ball .... it's probably one of three things assuming they were annealed correctly (which may not be the case if you aren't using tempilaq - no offence intended).

a) Because the brass is more pliable, your expander is dragging back through a slightly smaller inside diameter neck than you are used to feeling. Stress using sufficient case lube inside neck.

or

b) Dirty inside brass ...If your brass wasn't super clean inside the neck, whatever residue was there was burned when you annealed and is making it difficult to drag through. Stress getting cases clean inside prior to annealing. (I wet tumble prior, ymmv)

or

c) The inside of the neck was super clean (result of wet tumbling), and may require more lube inside neck.

If it were me I'd check the headspace of the sized brass for variances and use that to determine if my expander is dragging too much....you will see variances in headspace if it is.

I'd also check the inside neck diameter for consistency.

My experience with correctly annealed brass is you end up with very consistent headspace and very consistent inside neck diameter's (and neck tension for that matter)

(and lastly...if the brass is overannealed.....there will be no spring back as the neck leaves the die....and it's possible the expander will have more material to drag back through and feel funny as well.)