Help Cleaning & Polishing Brass

[Gromann]

Wet tumble with a warm water, stainless steel media, couple drops of dawn platinum, and a teaspoon of citric acid polish (lemishine or whatever) and then just tumble for 90 minutes has been my process.

Separate with a spin separator then use a cheapo magnet from HF to put the steel back in my tumbler.

 

[fresnohog]

I haven't heard of that brand. I'll give it a try. How long do you usually tumble?

2 hours minimum but I have gone 8 for really dirty stuff which is why I switched to wet. Never went more than 30 mins for wet. Now I just use dry for after sizing to remove the lube.

 

[ar15robert]

2 hours minimum but I have gone 8 for really dirty stuff which is why I switched to wet. Never went more than 30 mins for wet. Now I just use dry for after sizing to remove the lube.

I found that wet does a great job of removing the lube.I use one shot so not too hard though.When i first started i used the rcbs lube and pad you roll the cases over and even though cases looked good after dry tumble youd see it on the cases after shooting.Did make it easy to id my brass though.The one shot does leave some too but not nearly as bad nothing if i wet tumble after though.

I changed my process some though lately and i will just tumble in warm water with dawn to clean, then lube and size then i will wet tumble again with pins dawn and lemishine.

 

[eeediot]

I use wet tumbling without the pins. It cleans your brass just fine and you also don't need to worry about making sure that there are no pins stuck in your freshly cleaned brass. It does peen the necks a bit so you will need to trim any bottleneck cases. Supposedly if you don't anneal after every firing you will get uneven neck tension but I haven't been able to verify this.

I don't do dry tumbling due to it putting lead into the workspace and ultrasonic is ok but doesn't really work for anything high volume.

 

[xrMike]

Use Brass Juice and skip the stainless steel pins altogether. https://www.thereloadingstation.com/products/brass-juice-case-wash

View attachment 134721

Man, those are pretty!

 

[AR15barrels]

Thank you so much. I'll give that a try. I'm kinda discouraged with the vibratory system now. The wet tumble seems like a great idea. Thanks again.

Don't get rid of your dry tumbling stuff just yet.
If you get into wet cleaning, you will need to work out how to get the steel pins out so you don't accidentally send one down a barrel as well as how to dry the cases and then after they are dry, you will want to run them in the dry tumbler with some corn cob to get them dusty so they don't stick to dies or neck expander funnels and buttons.

Wet tumbled brass ends up too clean to work properly in carbide reloading dies without lube as well as neck expanding buttons or powder funnels that expand the neck.
These tools all rely on the dust left over from dry tumbling to keep the brass from galling.
If you wet tumble and don't lube the cases somehow, you will find out what galling is.

If it's only a media problem, you need to go to your local feed store and get a large bag of the finest ground corn cob cage litter.
Then load your tumbler with only the media and add a couple tablespoons of Nu-Finish car wax.
Let that run for 10 minutes to break up the clumps of nu-finish and then add brass.
8hrs overnight will get the brass nice and clean like you remember.

 

[Hit Factor]

Don't get rid of your dry tumbling stuff just yet.
If you get into wet cleaning, you will need to work out how to get the steel pins out so you don't accidentally send one down a barrel as well as how to dry the cases and then after they are dry, you will want to run them in the dry tumbler with some corn cob to get them dusty so they don't stick to dies or neck expander funnels and buttons.

Wet tumbled brass ends up too clean to work properly in carbide reloading dies without lube as well as neck expanding buttons or powder funnels that expand the neck.
These tools all rely on the dust left over from dry tumbling to keep the brass from galling.
If you wet tumble and don't lube the cases somehow, you will find out what galling is.

If it's only a media problem, you need to go to your local feed store and get a large bag of the finest ground corn cob cage litter.
Then load your tumbler with only the media and add a couple tablespoons of Nu-Finish car wax.
Let that run for 10 minutes to break up the clumps of nu-finish and then add brass.
8hrs overnight will get the brass nice and clean like you remember.

Brass Juice (no pins required), a cheap food dehydrator from Amazon (easy drying in 30 minutes), and Hornady One Shot (a quick spray with no wiping off after processing required) take care of all this.

 

[Gromann]

Just wet tumbled these last night using that process above. Starting to work on 220 and 230gr loads for 300 Win-Mag.

 

[BBCAP]

Don't get rid of your dry tumbling stuff just yet.
If you get into wet cleaning, you will need to work out how to get the steel pins out so you don't accidentally send one down a barrel as well as how to dry the cases and then after they are dry, you will want to run them in the dry tumbler with some corn cob to get them dusty so they don't stick to dies or neck expander funnels and buttons.

Wet tumbled brass ends up too clean to work properly in carbide reloading dies without lube as well as neck expanding buttons or powder funnels that expand the neck.
These tools all rely on the dust left over from dry tumbling to keep the brass from galling.
If you wet tumble and don't lube the cases somehow, you will find out what galling is.

If it's only a media problem, you need to go to your local feed store and get a large bag of the finest ground corn cob cage litter.
Then load your tumbler with only the media and add a couple tablespoons of Nu-Finish car wax.
Let that run for 10 minutes to break up the clumps of nu-finish and then add brass.
8hrs overnight will get the brass nice and clean like you remember.

Thank you very much for the great information. I'm going to try the Nu Finish and fine corncob and see what kind of finish it gives me. I'll post as soon as I try it. Thanks again. I really appreciate it.

 

[BBCAP]

Just wet tumbled these last night using that process above. Starting to work on 220 and 230gr loads for 300 Win-Mag.View attachment 138577

Wow. That's great looking brass. That's what I'm trying to get. I just can't get it with dry media. I'm going to try the wet. Thanks for the pic.

 

[coastline55]

By far the best option is wet tumbling. You don’t need the steel pins to do it. Hot water, dawn dish soap, citric acid, and shake that up for awhile. Ultrasonic cleaning is absolutely the worst. I have the big hornady ultrasonic cleaner and it doesn’t do . Dry tumbling/vibratory works but it will not get them nearly as clean and shinny as wet tumbling.

 

[Gromann]

By far the best option is wet tumbling. You don’t need the steel pins to do it. Hot water, dawn dish soap, citric acid, and shake that up for awhile. Ultrasonic cleaning is absolutely the worst. I have the big hornady ultrasonic cleaner and it doesn’t do . Dry tumbling/vibratory works but it will not get them nearly as clean and shinny as wet tumbling.

Dry tumbling gets them clean but not pretty, and I require pretty brass.

 

[coastline55]

Dry tumbling gets them clean but not pretty, and I require pretty brass.

I agree. Stick with what you plan on achieving.

 

[Turbo4cylinder]

I use horrible freight vibratory tumbler, walnut media, and a couple caps of nufinish polish. I dont deprime until after it goes in the media to keep primer pockets clear. 2-3 hours is a scratchy semi shine, acceptable if youre in a time crunch, 4- 5 hours is very shiny. Almost new looking. I throw my oxidized hollow point in there once in a while to bring them back too. A pasta strainer with like 1/8th inch holes gets like 95% of the media if you strain it well and move the brass around.

 

[Jimi Jah]

I use ultrasonic bath. Very clean, but not shiny. Inside the case and primer pockets are very clean. I don't care about shine.

 

[yatzooa]

Like most of the folks here, I do wet tumbling for brass prep. I only reload 9mm so far, so this might be specific only to 9mm. I'm reloading with a frankford arsenal rotary tumbler.

My usual recipe is:
* 17 lbs of brass + tumbler case (so weight of brass in tumbler case with no pins). Sometimes I get lazy and I eyeball to where the tumbler case narrows
* 5 lbs of stainless steel pins
* 1 tbsp dawn
* 1 9mm cap of lemishine
* Fill with water until 1 inch below the top (should come out ~30 lbs)

I'll wet tumble that for 2 - 2.5 hours. When thats done, I'll separate the pins from the brass and rinse off any suds in a Frankford Arsenal Platinum Series Wet/Dry Rotary Media Separator. As a side note, I had the Quick n ez separator before, but it was not as helpful and easy to use as the platinum series. The platinum series had a side with a media screen at the bottom, so you rinse the brass on that side and let the water flow through, instead of having the dirty water pool up in the bin. I also use a Frankford Arsenal Media Magnet to move pins around when I need to.

Once the brass and pins are separated, I'll dump the brass on a large towel to remove the excess water. This also helps remove any pins left in. I have a cheapo food dehydrator that I use for drying my brass (also works well for drying 3d printer filament) so I'll dry it for an hour ish while I start my next batch of brass

Also, I found a website thats list the number of empty casing + primers by lb, which I found useful for trying to figure out how many casings I was processing at once:

Brass Counts By Weight | Arm or Ally

We've calculated the brass counts by weight for many calibers. Arm or Ally has bulk brass and reloading components for your pistol and rifle reloading needs

www.armorally.com

 

[GunnerV]

Use Brass Juice and skip the stainless steel pins altogether. https://www.thereloadingstation.com/products/brass-juice-case-wash

View attachment 134721

Are you using a rotary tumbler?

 

[Experimentalist]

I - like Jimi Jah above - use an ultrasonic cleaner. It does a great job of cleaning not only outside, but the insides where it matters a bit more.

I highly recommend ultrasonic cleaning for your brass. As Jimi Jah noted, it won't make things as shiny as with vibratory tumbling, but maintaining consistent internal dimensions is important to consistent ballistic performance.

 

[Tere_Hanges]

I only load 308 and 3006 blasting ammo so I dont care about the cases being super clean. Heres my case prep procedure:

1. I decap first with an RCBS universal decapping dye. I love that thing. I use it in a handpress "thigh-master" so I can decap a bunch of rounds while watching tv.

2. Then dry tumble for 30-45mins in a Lyman with walnut reptile bedding or corn cob and some car wax.

3-6. Then I size the case, swage the primer pocket if using crimped brass, chamfer the mouth and clean/scrape the primer pocket.

Im able to hit a target accurately enough at 300yds with TAC and pulled 762 projectiles (2-3" groups with a 9x optic off a bench). That will do just fine for affordable blasting ammo.

 

[BBCAP]

I - like Jimi Jah above - use an ultrasonic cleaner. It does a great job of cleaning not only outside, but the insides where it matters a bit more.

I highly recommend ultrasonic cleaning for your brass. As Jimi Jah noted, it won't make things as shiny as with vibratory tumbling, but maintaining consistent internal dimensions is important to consistent ballistic performance.

Thanks for the input. I appreciate everyone's help. It helps me make an informed decision.