Very few of us have the combination of equipment and ability to test something like this. Thank you for the investment of your time and sharing of the data/ results.
Interesting comparison and I like your methodology...and from what I'm seeing so far it looks like I should be happy with my choice to buy (with a buddy--1/2 each) an AMP annealler. BTW, I am just TOTALLY jealous of your ability to shoot those kind of groups at that distance. Now I know why I've seen you multiple times at the BSW event standing in front of the crowd accepting a trophy while I sat in the audience!! I just can't do that any more now that I'm in my mid 70s, but I still have fun shooting and hear from younger shooters all the time saying "I sure hope that I can still do it like you do it at your age." I THINK that is a compliment, but I'm not too sure!
take those brass initially annealed with the flame method and anneal them with the AMP; and vice versa, ie., AMP annealed brass and now flame anneal them. Crossover study; In addition, while a picture tells a story, please publish your Vertical and Horizontal spreads from each batch of brass and methodology. Thank you for your videos, great stuff!
Hey Erik Interesting test looking forward to the final result , the AMP should give you a better result from what I have read I guess it’s wait and see . Steve from Australia .
@@ErikCortina I wonder if the flame annealed cartridge with the weird seating pressure was one of the "flyers"? Another question to be raised are about the consistency of the press itself. I don't understand why you get the steps on the raising part of the graph... Good technical video. Keep them coming👍
Look at the group pattern they look similar One is at 10&5 The other is 12&6 Maybe different twist pattern because of the heat differences Just a thought Maybe have to pick on and stick with it
Erik, it is well known that ambient temperature affects the burn rate of powder or at least the velocity achieved with it. One thing that has always bugged me is when a cartridge is loaded into a barrel that is heating up from shooting, does the barrel temperature and the time the cartridge is exposed to it before setting it off not affect the burn rate or velocity? If so how much does it affect it and if it has a drastic effect is there any practical way to mitigate it?
It definitely does, and I was taught to keep the bolt open until I find the target for prs type stuff. It's for safety too, but I figured I'd throw my $.02.
My only curiosity is your graphs compared to some others I have watched testing the press and annealer is your graphs through the whole sequence seemed to be way more sporadic than other I have seen. Just a curiosity. Not trying insult. Just something I noticed. Thanks for the video.
With all due respect Erik, I think this test is inconclusive. The annealing should be your last step before you prime and Load. By sizing after annealing, you reworked the brass and in turn hardened it again. I Love your videos and I watch a lot of them. I just thought as an observer that your inconsistency came from re-hardening the brass necks. I've seen you shoot and you're a benchmark for target shooters, so it's not your shooting. Thank you for going through all the hard work to educate shooters around the world.
AMP machines are excellent machines, the problem is, that when they fail, you MUST send it to New Zealand to be repaired.., Really?? with all the units sold in the US and Canada, there is no repair facility in North America?
Now you know how us Kiwis feel when we have to send our stuff back to the US for service. You are right though, I imagine there are more units sold over there than the rest of the world combined.
It was an ES of 9 for the AMP vs 12 for the flame FWIW. Not enough for me to justify 1400.00 but I just ordered the Elfster's Flame Annealer! for 259.00!
Yes PLEASE POST THE CRONO RESULTS! The AMP was really good on the verticle except for the #10 shot. Horizontal can b wind. Flame had 2 high and the #5 low. Thanks so much for your efforts! This is Exactly the test i was wanting to do. I would also b interested in knowing how 10 pieces of brass that had been shot, say 3-4 times and never having been annealed would perform in the test.
If i can make a suggestion. Keep the cases in order from the loading block to the ammo tin to the shooting sequence so that you can correlate the individual AMP trace with the recorded shots. Also use your Lab Radar to record the velocity of each shot so you can add a further data point. Would be interesting to see what effect AMP Vs Flame has on ES and SD's and how that transfers to the target.
@@rungun3982 I think he was and just didn't add in that data in video. Key part there is the _"I think"_... I only say that because the first shot, Eric does mention the speed _"2796 was the speed"_ and to the best of my knowledge, the Silver Mountain E-Target system does not measure velocity so I am only concluding that he did have the lab radar setup and running.
I love this kind of shooting science. I also know this is very time consuming so many thanks for taking the time to share this with us. With this small amount of difference in seating force I was not expecting this much difference in POI/elevation. It would have been very interesting to keep a record of each round, shoot at a target over chronograph like labradar or magnetospeed . Compere seating force, velocity and poi to see if this science can be applied to real world shooing results.
First off Wow, and thanks for this. I greatly appreciate the time, resources and money that you have dedicated to this! With that said, Im gonna say the flame annealer had better results... bc I dont want to buy an AMP annealer and if I decide otherwise my wife is gonna be pissed lol. But seriously if you take that flyer away it looked like the flame group was a little tighter.
When in doubt, Trust the target. For me personally, it seems like a lot of extra money spent for such a little gain. But I don’t compete so what do I know.
Very interesting! Did you shoot them in the same order as loading - i.e. is there a correlation between loading pressures "outliers" and "fliers" on target?
I would like to see how some of the NRA high power folks are loading...know any of the champs? (comparative analysis) Maybe Elsenboss has some pointers : )
As a mediocre short-range amateur, the lesson I took away from this is that the two methods are comparable in the field, and it takes the best of the best on a good day to tell them apart. Ideally this should be done indoors, on a clamped pressure barrel, with an instrumented range - but who has such a thing that reaches out to 1000+ yards?
Hi Erik - Love your videos - If you shot the cartridges in the same order as your checked the pressures - then you will find #5 and #6 of the flame broiled did plot 'weird' - Otherwise - Yes - Will have to re-visit - Appreciate you work -
I agree that’s why I suggested he laser engrave his brass to keep track of it and also he needs to keep track of the order he fires them in with his Labradar to get the velocity On each specific number of brass.
HUM the flame had 3 outlyers but the amp had 4 outlyers so it seemed the flame was better ??? I also suggest you always keep the data in accending order of 1-10 to see how the load data compared to the shoot data . If the load data show a flyer do es the shoot data confirm that as well ?? (;-) TP
2, 5, 7 are flyers for the Amp, Flame Annealed had similar flyer location. The Flame annealed result look more tight overall. I think in order to really figure it out. You have to control anneal time to the millisecond on both. Ensure both groups are annealed as perfectly as possible. Probably do 5 shot groups. First letting barrel cool between shots. Then back to back like you did.
I'm glad that there was nothing dramatic between the two annealers. However, in your world any tiny increase in accuracy and consistency you have to take. Plus everything you do seems geared to accuracy and speed. So the ampmate is in the future. And what a strange contraption it seems just from pictures I've seen. Last night I annealed 75 pieces of Alpha brass in my Burstfire. Good enough for my world. Thank you for the video.
First let me say I went from never annealing..Just bought new brass after 3 firings.Then I bought a flame annealer..Then the Amp Annealer. I dont think it made much difference between the 3 in my groups or consistency.In the journey I have learned alot more,especially about reloading techniques.That improved alot.And my mechanics improved by shooting with better shooters. This test didnt prove anything either way in my opinion.It did not either prove it when I did the same test..The first test was Minus the Amp Pressand it went to the Amp Annealed ..The 2nd test I had the Amp Press & that test went to the flame annealed. Ive purchased abouteverything you and F-Class John has showcasedexcept the Promethus ..I wasnt dropping $4K.. .If I didnt like reloading and shooting so much Id probably put a Bounty on yalls head for me spoending so much money..LOL ..Just kidding..I have really enjoyed the journey and continue to learn and progress.I appreciate Your videos & F-Class John's videos.Thanks.
The work flow is nicer with the flame unit... results are very similar... both seem to work fine. Basis for choice ought to come down to just preference and price then.
Statistically there is nothing here to call a significant difference because the test assumes the barrel, case, powder, bullet and shooter are totally consistent. And we know that is not the case, bad pun intended.
Look at column 4 and 10 psi where the lines bundle together and compare the difference between Flame and Amp. What is happening at that point that the two differ so much?
Your Flame graphs had 3 low outlier plots. Maybe those are your fliers. Maybe sort the 10 rounds based on how they group on the press and see if the press outliers become target outliers.
Yep, I think you need to pull the press force traces for each of your fliers and compare them to the non-fliers to see if there's a pattern, and not just in the max PSI either.
The other thing to consider is that maybe curves that have major deflections (which suggest the bullet is sticking for a moment, releasing, sticking again, releasing, etc)is indicative of an out of spec case, out of spec bullet, both, and that maybe some damage/deformation is occurring. You could sort the “too wavy” curves by eye or you could fit them to a linear equation and sort the the “R-squared” of the curve fit.
I thank you for your time and sharing with us. This test I think does show AMP is better. That being said I would think this test actually raises some more questions that are probably racing around in you're head. Thanks again for spending money for your and our education.
For me this test was inconclusive. It also tells me that his flame annealing process is effective given the experience he has had with it. If I were doing this test, the AMP might really shine given I don't flame anneal or have any experience with it. This test would not lead me to run out and get an AMP.
Did you happen to brush the inside of the necks after the annealing? I've noticed much more consistent and easier seating after doing so with the AMP annealer. It seems to produce a bit of carbon residue during thr annealing process.
Fantastic video series. The flame group seems to be outside of your normal expected group size for that rifle, based on previous videos. I assume previous load dev has been done with flame, so it would be expected to shoot tighter than that? If so what was the difference in process this time - no bullet sorting?
I would call that inconclusive, did you note which of the flame annealed had lower psi when seating ? if so where these the ones that shot low ? Keep up the vids always enjoy watching
wondering if you anneal before or after sizing when starting off with new brass, or with any brass as far as that goes. maybe do a test of brass annealed before sizing and brass annealed after sizing to see witch is more consistant. interested in seeing those kind of results.
Great video Sir. I can't wait to see the follow up video. In reality it could of been a difference between each case. Not the annealing that produced the differences on target at 1050 yds. What are your honest thoughts on it??? Give'um hell on the range Sir, I'm rooting for ya.
Flame had three shots “outside” the group, AMP only the last one. So consistently so far seems better with the AMP. Having said that, more testing to come to make sure.
IMO the groups look comparable. Different shape, similar size. As noted, more testing is needed. For most, I don't think the AMP groups are going to be $1200 better than a flame annealer. The AMP may make sense for top competitors looking to that 1% edge.
@Erik Cortina, the varying seating force is a direct result of inconsistent neck "compression" I say compression as opposed to tension in that the neck is COMPRESSING on the bullet per say! Now, back to these varying forces = at a high level discussion, just imagine the neck internal diameter has varying diameters as you travel downwards from the case mouth towards the final seating depth. yes, there is a difference. But is it match accuracy difference??? Not sure! btw, great video as always! If I, as a fastidious engineer, could invent a device this is what I would design. A bullet pulling device which measures the amount of force necessary to "unseat" a bullet = that would show any inconsistencies in the brass neck, etc...
What this demonstrates is that the more repeatable process is the better one. Same with your calipers. They may not be *accurate* to .0005, but they're *repeatable*. Accuracy can be dialed in if you're producing the same ammunition, round after round, as it goes through the reloading process.
As a control for this test shouldn't each piece of brass from the same lot be sorted, and prepped all the same way as new first. The seating pressure graph for each new unfired case should be recorded as the benchmark. After each subsequent firing and annealing process the bullet seating pressure graph of each individual case can be compared to see how close it stays to the original seating pressure across a predetermined amount of firings. Isn't the group size really irrelevant to the question does the AMP annealed brass have more consistent neck tension than the Flame annealed brass? I think measuring the group sizes can be misleading and not the way to answer the question of which annealing method is more consistent. The rabbit hole of all this stuff is a bottomless pit of despair in my opinion. Kudos to Erik for attempting it.
Thanks Erik for doing the testing on the issue of flame vs amp annealing .. I have a flame annealer and would like to purchase the Amp unit , but you make it look like the flame is just as good as the amp.., also any chance to send the flame units in to be tested ? Thanks señor will keep checking for further information on your channel..👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼
What I would be interested in knowing is a comparison between the distance from the mean of an individual cartridge among the bullet seating pressures AND the distance from the mean of an individual cartridge among the target hits. So, is there a correlation between a "weird" bullet seating graph line and a "flier" on the target? If there's no correlation between the individual graph lines and how well that cartridge shot, then the graph lines (i.e., the record of the forces involved in seating the bullet) are not important. An example, If you take five cartridges and really polish up the inside surface of the neck before seating, and another five and don't touch the neck, you should get an appearance of two distinct groups -- AND two distinct sets of seating pressures graph lines. If you don't, then those graph lines aren't really telling you anything very important. As for me, lol, I'm just a retired scientist -- and it's been almost 50 years since I reloaded a cartridge, lol. You have a RICH set of data, but you have to go about analyzing it in a sophisticated manner. You were wise to engrave the cases -- and if you shoot them in order you can directly compare a graph line (as long as you know which is which) to a target result. If the comparison shows no correlations then you have to look for another factor to measure -- eccentricity of seating, perhaps.
Thanks for all help have been watching here and there for a few years.Just now starting to buy equipment mainly because of money and availability.I do have a Question now you have the amp Would you be willing to sell the bench mark flame anneler
No doubt a great shooter. But how much is the human factor and environmental factors playing in this test.. Still good shooting I guess we will never know
Thanks, Eric. I currently use the bench-source because it's faster (than the amp without the AMP mate) and more automated. I know you can buy the AMP mate for $449 (by that point you're $2K into annealing). Do you think it is worth $2K to upgrade to AMP?
I did notice that you adjusted the first 1-3 cases when annealing that could contribute go possible neck tension issues shots 5&6 couldn't it or not? I also think your barrel could have gotten hotter I currently run the BS annealer and I'm interested in your thoughts if it is worth the expense. I shoot PRS and ELR comps. Keep up the good vids
Hi Erik, I am a keen fan and enjoy your no-nonsense vids from a pro. I’m relatively new to reloading and was wondering when you get a spare second could you please list your reloading procedures after you have shot. IE 1) Decap, 2) Anneal, 3) Clean 4) Resize. Thanks Chris.
Definitely enjoyed video. At this point fair to say close. But to a hunter/shooter is the 1K difference in cost worth the money? If I had surplus of disposable income would be amp. But for me, flame due to $ since I’m no competitive shooter. Your videos are informative and helpful. Thanks
...and here's another thing I'd be very interested in seeing: Setting up a second electronic group measurer at 100 yards -- or maybe 200 yards. I'd LOVE to see a comparison of how a bullet is doing at 100-200 yards vs where that bullet ended up at a 1000 yards. If there was a poor correlation then the 1000 yard grouping is a result of something about the flight of the bullet past 100 yards -- which would be very interesting information, IMO.
More testing please! I didn't see a huge difference that warrants spending that amount of money on the annealer, but then again, I'm not competing at your level. I am interested in the velocity, SD and ES. What are those numbers? Also, what are the odds that, but annealing methods require custom seating depths or tunning?
It looks like splitting hairs almost. I think the AMP is marketed towards those who are earning their living competitive shooting. Flame annealer is good enough for the rest of us
I think that your hardness tester showed some cases in the flame annealer batch that should have been regulated to a different shooting lot. That is the problem with a fixed batch, no flexibility that you would have with a 50 piece box to mix and match. That maybe the flaw in your testing. You might test two batches, one of each picked from 20-50 candidates, picked for the same hardness, to see if there is a difference. Then, depending on the results, you could go +- 1 hardness, +- 2 hardness etc to see what the break point is.
Do you do anything to the inside neck surface after annealing? I find flame annealing leaves a layer of charcoal'ed carbon that I remove and wonder if the results af AMP annealing offers the same? The charcoal'ed residue in the flame annealing approach my offer inconsistent static friction, i.e.. inconsistant start pressures. Or not. Just a thought.
I'd like to see the same test with the AMP vs Little Annie. I know the AMP is going to be easier & probably a better annealing point but curious if there's any difference in consistency between them. I like the AMP & would love to have one but my budget might not forgive me for the AMP..
Just depends on your own individual goals. For a club shooter just trying to get better and have some fun along the way, you are right, probably not worth it to remove a flier or two. But consider this - I have to flame anneal in my garage away from my family. I could use an Amp on the couch while watching a movie. That alone may be worth it to a high volume shooter.
Depends on what you consider basics. Patches and ball powder down the end of the barrel while you push rod on a ball of lead? This is a major leap in technology we are only scratching the surface of what this AMP data is going to change for the field of shooting.
@@ErikCortina Like racing, the difference between a 5 horse power upgrade and a 10 horse power upgrade could be a $10.000 investment. The Amp products are not for every body. But I sure like that Amp press.😎 Heck I'm still learning to use my Hydro Press. Eric do you sort by the start of the bullet seating or the over all seating pressure???
It seems you are using light neck tension as your scale is 0 to about 50#. Some videos I have seen are with much higher seating forces as their scale is showing up to 175#, with a huge initial seating start bump that falls and then rises to levels that seem extreme. It would be interesting to see if a small increase in neck tension has an affect of the frequency of fliers, and if the seating slope is more even without all the ups and downs.
