Copper head gaskets come up on this group, so I figured I'd reply here
as well as directly to the fella.
Ferrous and non-ferrous metals react inversely to heat tempering.
Rapidly cool a hot piece of steel and you get it hard and brittle.
Rapidly cool a bit of copper and you'll make it very soft and ductile.
Since ammo costs quit a bit for some of my guns, I do my own reloading,
as do many gun nuts. This means we are constantly work hardening our
brass. Both from reforming it as we reload, and deforming it when we
shoot. Eventually, it gets pretty darn hard.
Re-softening the cases is done by almost all of us. Line them up
standing in a tray of water. Run a torch over the mouths of the cases
(the part we make hard in use) until they are red hot, tip them over
into the water to quench them. Now we have soft cases and can start all
over again.
The same for your copper head gasket.
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