What some people go through for cleaning 100 pices of brass!

Darn fine show ready brass…….

I’m lazy and tumble mine in corn cob or walnut media for a few hours and that’s about it.

I use distilled water in my wet pin tumbler. The tap water is so 'hard' where I live it almost clunks coming out of the faucet. I use about a tablespoon of citric acid (powder) and three squirts (spray bottle) of Simple Green concentrate. I also use an old percolator to heat the water (1 percolator full) that goes into the drum. Dump in pins first, then brass, then hot water, then chemicals. Then top it off with saved rinse from a previous batch (recycles water). Water stays hot/warm in the drum long enough to complete the tumble cycle (about an hour). Then the usual processes to separate pins and wash water. Rinse with fresh distilled, save rinse water for next tumble batch.

EDIT: This is the 'long process' for bulk range brass (or really dirty). I do deprime first.

Being new to hand loading, I have never cleaned brass so I have no basis on which to judge.

This seems like a lot of work. I thought you tossed 'em in a rock tumbler with some walnut media and call it good.

I think this guy would be well served with a couple dollar store colanders to drain them and an air compressor to dry the them.

But what do I know?

eddiememphis said:

This seems like a lot of work. I thought you tossed 'em in a rock tumbler with some walnut media and call it good.

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All depends on what you want out of your brass. If you want showroom glimmer then yea, go to the extreme. For me, I want them clean enough to reload and shoot….

Wow I feel like an underachiever, a true slacker if you will.

Lennyjoe said:

Darn fine show ready brass…….

I’m lazy and tumble mine in corn cob or walnut media for a few hours and that’s about it.

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I do mine initially in walnut media, after I later deprime and size, I run it with corn cob and Franklin polish.

From where I'm sitting, a lot of folks make handloading about as hard as they possibly can, and on occasion I have to stifle the urge to make fun. Some people (here's looking at you, @merlynski ) spend more time on brass cleaning than I do on the whole process! But in the big picture, it's a hobby and folks are free to do it however they like.

For myself, though, I'm just going to keep running the empties through corncob for an hour or two and calling it done...

.38 Special said:

From where I'm sitting, a lot of folks make handloading about as hard as they possibly can, and on occasion I have to stifle the urge to make fun. Some people (here's looking at you, @merlynski ) spend more time on brass cleaning than I do on the whole process! But in the big picture, it's a hobby and folks are free to do it however they like.

For myself, though, I'm just going to keep running the empties through corncob for an hour or two and calling it done...

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When I get a batch of 500 or 1000 lot of once fired range brass I like it to be nice and clean so I can do a good job sorting out the culls, and then not damage my reloading equipment in the processing. Just my OCD over-reacting to a perceived problem, perhaps. Small batches of pretty much clean brass just get run through the vibratory tumbler in walnut shell, half an hour usually does it up nicely.

merlynski said:

When I get a batch of 500 or 1000 lot of once fired range brass I like it to be nice and clean so I can do a good job sorting out the culls, and not damage my reloading equipment in the process. Just my OCD over-reacting to a perceived problem, perhaps. Small batches of pretty much clean brass just get run through the vibratory tumbler in walnut shell, half an hour usually does it up nicely.

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If I was using range pick-ups I might well do the same thing. I'm just far too lazy for any of it!

20/40 corn media for an hour or 2, with a little Nu Polish. Works well, plenty clean and shiny for me.

Rule3 said:

He does have a very nice hand made tumbler!

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He does indeed..FYI, just the barrel and plug alone cost $225 plus shipping and tax.

I started about 2 months ago pickling my brass. I use a glass bowl and plastic strainer with hot tap water, 1tsp of Lemishine and a squirt of dish soap. I squelch it around in that mix with my hands for about 10 minutes, rinse, dump it on a towel and then run it through the oven at 225 F for an hour. It’s shiny out of the bath, but the heat darkens it a bit. I use a universal decapping die before all that.

Walnut media for an hour, if it goes any longer its because I fell asleep

gonoles_1980 said:

I do mine initially in walnut media, after I later deprime and size, I run it with corn cob and Franklin polish.

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Couple of hours in Corn Cob and Iosso for me. https://www.midwayusa.com/product/2049432224

I run mine through the vibratory tumbler for 1~3 hours. Put a batch in yesterday and forgot about it, almost 24 hours later it looks brand new!

chris

One more thread of brass cleaning/tumbling. This is prolly the most talked about, but least important part of reloading. Many, many formula will be suggested, tumbling time, media every thread. I reloaded 12 years before I got a tumbler. No scratched dies/chambers and excellent functioning and accurate handloads. When I used the old NRA liquid formula (water, vinegar, soap) I never measured any thing (??? gallons water @ ??? degrees, some vinegar, a squirt of dawn, ??? time). But if you wanna, do it! I know a guy that even trimmed his 38 Special brass!

With the primer shortage right now, bling seems to be a bright light in the dark tunnel to keep some people interested.....I have primers, but many don't....at least they can make all their brass pickup new again while they wait......no harm no foul.



I loaded clean but dull ugly brass for 30 years.....I found dry, then wet tumbling and my tired eyes really like the bright new look. You guys who are happy with clean dull ugly, carry on......if you don't like these bling threads, I suggest you click your mouse anywhere else and ignore them. Wonderful to have that freedom.

IMO the video creator is a little more anal than I am......(or I'm lazier and I try hard to find quicker methods at least), but I think an hour of unattended tumbling, and 10 minutes of separating, rinsing, and blotting in a towel isn't too bad.....of course another few hours on my back patio in the hot NM sun, to make sure pockets and insides are bone dry is no big deal, as long as I'm in the cool house doing something more fun...

That said, my efforts are done in bigger batches usually.....like the two center pictures and last picture, above....last one is 7.62 LC MG brass post tumbled and post sized. A little more work, that MG brass, but it lasts just fine after the first difficult sizing.

I tried wet cleaning a long time ago and found it was a real trick to make sure all cases were completely dry before reloading; even roasting them in an oven and not loading until the following day.
Too much work and aggravation -- never again.

LOL personally I deprime(with a decapper not sizing), then wet tumble w/ pins soap and a bit of citric acid(why not have show ready brass ) mostly for my dies. I'll then size, trim and walnut tumble them to get the lube off. It's annoying to wait for them to dry, as a stated, so I only wash them once.

The only exception is 5.7 brass, I just let it soak in dawn for a 1/2 hour and rinse. I'll just wipe the lube with a rag as a I prime

Thomasss said:

I tried wet cleaning a long time ago and found it was a real trick to make sure all cases were completely dry before reloading; even roasting them in an oven and not loading until the following day.
Too much work and aggravation -- never again.

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The simple solution is to run them through dry media for another hour or so.

Of course, then you'll need to clean off the dust, and any media which has gotten stuck in the flash holes. Wet tumbling is really good for that.

I used to just run the cases in a vibratory tumbler with a little polish and be done with it. Now I have an elaborate, multi-step, complex process.
- Not necessarily because I like showroom cases, but because I need something to do while I’m saving my primers!

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