Did I anneal my brass?

[frame12]

I put some brass in the toaster oven on 150 degrees for 30 min to dry them, let them cool for 30 min.
When I pulled them out they had a purple tint to them. Thinking the toaster over gave them full heat for 30 min. Possibly somewhere above 400 degrees.

Are they toast?

 

[ShtrRdy]

I don't think so. I think you have to get the temp up to something like 900 degrees F. Try pinching the neck together slightly with a pliers to see if it springs back.

 

[TheOfficeT-Rex]

What did you wash your brass in, and how well did you rinse it before you chucked them in a toaster?

 

[Fig]

If I'm in a hurry I put them on a cookie sheet in the oven on 200 convection. Dries them out pretty quick. That said, you are nowhere near hot enough to anneal them. Handload them with confidence.

 

[B y r o n]

No.

 

[straightshooter1]

I put some brass in the toaster oven on 150 degrees for 30 min to dry them, let them cool for 30 min.
When I pulled them out they had a purple tint to them. Thinking the toaster over gave them full heat for 30 min. Possibly somewhere above 400 degrees.

Are they toast?

How much annealing occurs is a function of amount of heat + amount of time. 150°F for 30 min. isn't going to do much, if anything. You're good to go. 400ºF for 30 min. will make some change, but not likely enough to be of concern. . . though I'd recommend not doing that.

The color you observed has nothing to do with the annealing. It has to do with the brass not be totally clean, like residual sizing lube and/or whatever cleaning fluid might have been used. You can test this by taking a piece of brass and cleaning it thoroughly by hand with some steel wool and you'll see it won't turn color when heated. Here's an example of a case that I did that with and heated more than twice as long as I normally do for my flame annealing (like the neck was bright red glow for a few seconds):

 

[supercorndogs]

How hot they possibly got coukd depend on whether you preheated or put them while coils were red and heating the oven. In a 150 degree oven nothing should happen. I don't know how much heat the brass could have picked up if the coils were preheating the oven at the time.

 

[diggler1833]

The tint is from whatever you used to clean them, and is not "annealing".

I've done that before, and know others who have as well when we were experimenting with the 'best' cleaning solution combinations.

 

[secondofangle2]

Dunning-Krueger is real, folks.

 

[Taylorbok]

He's worried the toaster oven may have malfunctioned and gave them max heat and annealed them. Which might be possible. (500+ Degrees)
Post a picture of the brass

Maybe all you guys ragging on him should learn to read.

 

[FimRire RongLifle]

Do you have a thermometer that you could check the oven at the same settings for actual temps like a candy or BBQ setup for more data?

 

[308pirate]

Dunning-Krueger is real, folks.

+1000

I love threads like this

 

[secondofangle2]

He's worried the toaster oven may have malfunctioned and gave them max heat and annealed them. Which might be possible. (500+ Degrees)
Post a picture of the brass

Maybe all you guys ragging on him should learn to read.

Yeah I misread it

However I don’t think I’d ever put my brass in the oven under any circumstances