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Posted: 6/18/2011 4:28:23 PM EDT
| About how long do yall usually tumble your brass? |
| About 2 hours for cleaning and enough polishing for me. Using corn cob media and occasionally adding a little Dillon's Rapid Polish 290. I then size my brass and after wiping the case with a rag to remove some lube, they go back into the vibratory tumbler for 1/2 to 1 hour to remove case lube. Then checking every case for media in the flash hole they get primed and loaded. For a total of 2 1/2- 3 hours in the tumbler. |
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Brass cleaning
I like my brass clean and shiny. Here’s what I do. I have a one hour timer with two vibrating tumblers. 1.Put dirty brass in media separator, spin to remove dirt, grass un-burnt powder etc… 2.Place brass in walnut, polish, fabric sheet and mineral spirits for one hour. 3.Remove from walnut and place in Corn cob, fabric sheet and polish for one hour. It’s that simple. My brass is clean and shiny. |
| It depends on how dirty they are when I put them in the tumbler. When I have brass that has been used with a suppressor through my AR it is far dirtier by comparison to brass not fired with a suppressor. So it's all relative to what the brass looks like when I put it in. I just usually leave it running overnight and shut it off the next morning. |
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About how long do yall usually tumble your brass? Dillon CV-500, mostly walnut, but corn at times, a little brass polish like Flitz liquid, or Dillon beige/orange scent (lovely) in the past, but now the lavender stuff. 90 minutes tops. They come out looking nice, although not in the same condition that wet/SS tumbling yields. I don't tumble lube off, preferring to wipe either the RCBS CaseLube II off with a wet rag, or the Redding Imperial Sizing Wax off with a dry cotton t-shirt. Life's too short to go 'anal' on brass cleanliness. Chris |
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I used the Lee Case lube for a while it took forever to tumble it clean afterwards. I changed to the homebrew lanolin. I need to tumble less. That being said I usually tumble while I am at work. Turn it on before I walk out the door in the morning and off when I get home. It works for me.
MAHA |
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I used to often plug the tumbler in, go to bed, then unplug it when I woke up in the morning. I'd still do this if I didn't live in a condo with my reloading stuff 2 floors below me. I have a timer now, that is set to only turn off. Usually I set it for 4-6 hrs min. I gave up on using walnut. I found that it didn't clean any better than corncob, but was 10x more dusty. No amount of dryer sheets would get rid of it either. A couple years ago, the pet store brand reduced its size, and isn't as good as it used to be. |
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Quoted:
About 2 hours for cleaning and enough polishing for me. Using corn cob media and occasionally adding a little Dillon's Rapid Polish 290. I then size my brass and after wiping the case with a rag to remove some lube, they go back into the vibratory tumbler for 1/2 to 1 hour to remove case lube. Then checking every case for media in the flash hole they get primed and loaded. For a total of 2 1/2- 3 hours in the tumbler. Question –– I have been simply wiping resizing lube with a terry cloth after resizing. I know that many people tumble to remove lube. Should I be tumbling, or is wiping them down sufficient?? Thanks |
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I only use corn cob and ISSO
1 hour to rough clean before sorting and inspecting. after the 1st inspection they get tumbled for 2 more hours and inspected again. The brass is then processed (.223) and tumbled for 1 to 2 more hours. depending on desired finish. It is then inspected once more before loading. Pistol brass gets loaded after the 2nd tumble and 2nd inspection. The loaded ammo is then tumbled for about 20 minuets to remove case lube. Then gauged and final inspection. I have found that the ISSO cuts down on the amount of time the brass needs to be in the tumbler. I also use two different grades of corn cob. 4 hours in the tumbler total for this finish. On some LC. Another hour and all the anneling would be polished off. 
I also polish lots of brass.  This is rough polished sorted and 1 st inspection done. Both are full.
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About 2 hours for cleaning and enough polishing for me. Using corn cob media and occasionally adding a little Dillon's Rapid Polish 290. I then size my brass and after wiping the case with a rag to remove some lube, they go back into the vibratory tumbler for 1/2 to 1 hour to remove case lube. Then checking every case for media in the flash hole they get primed and loaded. For a total of 2 1/2- 3 hours in the tumbler. Question –– I have been simply wiping resizing lube with a terry cloth after resizing. I know that many people tumble to remove lube. Should I be tumbling, or is wiping them down sufficient?? Thanks What you are doing is the old school way of removing lube. Nothing wrong with this method. These were the pre tumbler days. I remember getting my first set of carbide dies in 357, no more wiping cases!! A tumbler is a time saver and a bling maker, but is not necessary. Just nice to have. |
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About 2 hours for cleaning and enough polishing for me. Using corn cob media and occasionally adding a little Dillon's Rapid Polish 290. I then size my brass and after wiping the case with a rag to remove some lube, they go back into the vibratory tumbler for 1/2 to 1 hour to remove case lube. Then checking every case for media in the flash hole they get primed and loaded. For a total of 2 1/2- 3 hours in the tumbler. Question –– I have been simply wiping resizing lube with a terry cloth after resizing. I know that many people tumble to remove lube. Should I be tumbling, or is wiping them down sufficient?? Thanks What you are doing is the old school way of removing lube. Nothing wrong with this method. These were the pre tumbler days. I remember getting my first set of carbide dies in 357, no more wiping cases!! A tumbler is a time saver and a bling maker, but is not necessary. Just nice to have. Thanks for the info. I have a tumbler that I use for the initial cleaning. I think that, at least for now, I will continue to remove lube with terry cloth rather than tumbling again. I like being able to give the brass a close and thorough inspection as I wipe it with the cloth. That is just the style I am developing though. |
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Usually put mine in when I get home from a shoot, the volume will determine time but say 150 pieces or less from an IDPA match will get about 30 minutes to clean, then corncob and polish for a few hours and I'm good.
If it's a practice day or something and there is a lot of brass, it will take longer naturally. |
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A related question –– how do you know when your dry tumbling media is worn out? How long will it usually last? That would depend on how dirty your brass gets. Down here we get lots of sand on the brass. So sandy brass get tumbled with the dirtiest media I have on hand 1st. My media gets handed down. The media I use for the final tumble that gets lube on it ends up being used to rough tumble dirty brass the 1 st time. The dirtier the media gets the longer it takes to clean the brass. I only use corn cob media so. In general though I can do about 20,000 cases before the media ends up in the trash. I buy media 120LBs at a time and that last about 1 year on the average. YMMV |
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A related question –– how do you know when your dry tumbling media is worn out? How long will it usually last? When it quits cleaning, it's time to throw out. So If you normally tumble for 2 hours and your brass is not as clean as it normally is.....it's done. |
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I only use corn cob and ISSO 1 hour to rough clean before sorting and inspecting. after the 1st inspection they get tumbled for 2 more hours and inspected again. The brass is then processed (.223) and tumbled for 1 to 2 more hours. depending on desired finish. It is then inspected once more before loading. Pistol brass gets loaded after the 2nd tumble and 2nd inspection. The loaded ammo is then tumbled for about 20 minuets to remove case lube. Then gauged and final inspection. I have found that the ISSO cuts down on the amount of time the brass needs to be in the tumbler. I also use two different grades of corn cob. 4 hours in the tumbler total for this finish. On some LC. Another hour and all the anneling would be polished off. http://img534.imageshack.us/img534/9932/picture015s.jpg I also polish lots of brass. This is rough polished sorted and 1 st inspection done. Both are full.
http://img843.imageshack.us/img843/9097/picture028hc.jpg I didn't know GM made brass?!?!
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