Why I wet tumble

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Greg -as long as we keep and create jobs in the firearms industry!:D

I'm confused. That FA tumbler in the video looks LARGE. Is there a smaller model? The reason I ask, and more specifically why I didn't buy a FA, every time I saw one in person it was tiny. My Rebel holds plenty, and I absolutely don't regret buying it, but I feel like I didn't do a fair comparison.
 
1st , the only one who sees the shinny brass is the one reloading the clips .
For me shinny means clean .
My Lee press will handle the 44's , but each of the 50 AE's are set on plate one at a time .
I de-prime and clean pockets before tumbling .
While I have a sonic and wet rotary - they need to be dried .
My wife had an old pot that the handle broke off . I mounted a hand massager / vibrator on it and it works good on anything larger than 357 and great on the 25 ACP / 380 ACP's for getting the walnut out .
We use latex gloves to check cases - spilt bent bases , They [ latex ] catch / tear on splits / cracks [ maybe 1 in 500 ] Probably 1 in 100 have bent bases [ mainly the 44's and 50's . ]
I am luckier than most of you - I have 4 nephews and 2 nieces that shoot and reload . 2 nephews and their girl friends shot yesterday . I deprimed and threw the shell into tumbler last night I have a couple of Xmas light timers set at about 1 1/2 hours .
 
Greg Mercurio said:
Long before we had tumblers, viratory case cleaners, walnut shells, corncob, NuFinish, and all that jazz... we were able to reload cases ... and go out in the woods and hunt.

I think we've become a little bling-sensitive.
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I would agree as I just need my brass clean enough to reload and they don't need to be mirror shiny.

But I noticed dry tumbling vs tumbling with NuFinish keeps brass surface cleaner (shinier with less dust/crud near rim) with residual polymer on brass surface acting like case lube to help with resizing and prevent tarnishing of brass for years.

And blame the bench rest crowd for wanting to clean the inside of cases and primer pockets with stainless steel pin wet tumbling. I can tumble outdoors so dust/lead residue is not an issue but reloaders who must tumble indoors, I could see the benefits of wet tumbling. I considered wet tumbling before but did not like the smaller capacity drums but now that Frankford Arsenal has 7 liter capacity (1000 .223 cases) wet tumbler, I am interested.

Keep in mind that this may be evolutionary progression of reloading. We used to shoot lead balls, then lubed bullets, then gas checked lubed bullets, then semi jacketed/full-length gas checked bullets and now fully gas checked CMJ/TMJ bullets along with plated and coated lead bullets with better and better results (higher velocities, no leading, lower cost etc.).

So we went from wiping brass to soaking/boiling brass to dry tumbling brass to tumbling with polish to ultrasonic/wet tumbling with SS pins with better and better results (cleaner brass with less dust/residue).

I think there are those who are still happy with wiping their brass and I still like shooting lubed lead bullets.
 
jmorris said:
I use both methods. If a doctor were going to leave a case inside me I would pick a wet tumbled case. The smallest group I have ever shot was with cases I wiped off with a cloth.
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Yes, I never have understood the amount of threads on "surgically clean brass"

Like a bunch of old Women comparing how clean their laundry soap gets their fine linens or something:D:rolleyes:

Clean enough to not mess up your dies, Good grief.
 
Greg Mercurio said:
You know what's REALLY amazing? Long before we had tumblers, viratory case cleaners, walnut shells, corncob, NuFinish, and all that jazz, we were able to reload cases with primer, powder, and bullets, and go out in the woods and hunt. The quarry didn't give a rat's rear about how clean or shiny those rounds were.

I think we've become a little bling-sensitive. Add the folks that make and sell these cool-tools are laughing all the way to the bank. :D
Click to expand...
I consider clean cases a safety issue rather than an appearance issue. It's much easier to inspect cases when they're clean. Long before we had seat belts & airbags, more people got hurt & killed.
 
I'm with Greg. Functional is good enough. I use a vibrator with 2/3 corncob, 1/3 walnut, and dryer sheets. Dryer sheets pick up all the crud, media lasts forever, and since I inspect every piece before loading I don't mind the rare occasional piece in the primer pocket. My brass looks darn near as shiny as any I've seen here and neither me or my wife care anyway. Last range trip I got a 1/2 inch 3 shot pattern with my Ruger American 308, so I guess accuracy doesn't suffer too much.
 
The cleaner the brass - the cleaner my hands are .
I don't do cast , plated , coated or lubed .
I do lube them myself .
While I have a brass catcher . it does not catch them all and I don't even want to think about what is on floor from shoes .
The only people that see my brass are the ones reloading or shoving them into magazines .
 
One time I accidently mixed my walnut and corn media in the tumbler and reasoned it would be wastful to toss the media so I ran it as a 50/50 mix and the brass turned out cleaned and shinny enough for inspection. Now I run a 50/50 mix on purpose. I use the fine walnut lizard media and no longer have to bother with poking the flasholes open. I still check of course, but it has ceased to be an issue. Having to run the brass first through a walnut load then a corn load was a PITA and my accident turned out to be a good thing.
 
While I agree with the folks talking about how it doesn't make any difference accuracy wise, I still want to start wet tumbling.

I like em pretty too. Maybe I need to go to confession for my vanity, I dunno. :)
 
mahansm said:
Left to right:

As fired.

3 hours, walnut hulls/Nu Finish.

2.5 hours, stainless pins, Armor All car wash, citric acid, water (Thumler's).

Any questions?
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Yes, two.

How long did it take you to prepare things before and clean up and put things away after 3 hours, walnut hulls/Nu Finish?

How long did it take you to prepare things before and clean up and put things away after 2.5 hours, stainless pins, Armor All car wash, citric acid, water (Thumler's)?
 
Like anything the first time wet tumbling is a learning curve, the second time process mapping and improving, then GO. It's really so easy.

I'm on my 4th batch today. The pins are always in the tumbler with the brief few moments in the base of the separator. Throw the brass in, reach into the bin for the Lemishine and 1/4 teaspoon measuring spoon, reach for the soap, use tablespoon measure on the same ring, dump water in, lid on, return to motor drive, switch on. I mean if this takes 2 minutes, I'm loafing.

I really don't need to time it, but glance at clock, but come back in 2-3 hours. turn off, carry tumbler to sink, dump and rinse a couple times, spin in separator, pins drop to bottom very easily NONE in brass. Put brass in food dehydrator. Turn on. (20-30 minutes) Done. Bag super clean brass.

Dump pins back in. Start tumble process again.

Pins last a long time. Car Wax Soap and Lemishine will go a huge number of cycles using so little.
 
higgite nailed it. I don't care about the time so much as the work and mess.

If I could throw my dog in the dry tumbler for 90 minutes to get him clean enough, I would do it that way.
 
How long did it take you to prepare things before and clean up and put things away after 2.5 hours, stainless pins, Armor All car wash, citric acid, water (Thumler's)?
Click to expand...

Nothing really to clean up. The pins stay in the drum. The containers sit there just like anything you add to dry media. It's all really quite easy as I just stated. It takes longer to describe than actually do.
 
Greg Mercurio said:
You know what's REALLY amazing? Long before we had tumblers, viratory case cleaners, walnut shells, corncob, NuFinish, and all that jazz, we were able to reload cases with primer, powder, and bullets, and go out in the woods and hunt. The quarry didn't give a rat's rear about how clean or shiny those rounds were.

I think we've become a little bling-sensitive. Add the folks that make and sell these cool-tools are laughing all the way to the bank. :D
Click to expand...
+1
Finally a breath of fresh air and clear thought!
 
Greg Mercurio said:
You know what's REALLY amazing? Long before we had tumblers, viratory case cleaners, walnut shells, corncob, NuFinish, and all that jazz, we were able to reload cases with primer, powder, and bullets, and go out in the woods and hunt. The quarry didn't give a rat's rear about how clean or shiny those rounds were.

I think we've become a little bling-sensitive. Add the folks that make and sell these cool-tools are laughing all the way to the bank. :D
Click to expand...
Like many here, for quite a few years (decades) I reloaded cases that, at best, had been shaken/stirred in "soapy" water, hosed off & dried.

My reloads looked like crap (some of the many-times-reused, hard to find 792x57 cases quickly became downright fugly) but their looks did not effect their accuracy or reliability.

Now my reloads look a lot like new factory ammo :D which also does not effect their accuracy or reliability.

Given that choice I prefer the new-looking reloads ... but ... I do not ridicule or think less of those who prefer the former as that is their preference.

As an additional benefit, the bright, shiny, almost-like-new cases are easier for me to quickly inspect prior to loading them.

Oh ... and I also choose to periodically wash & wax my truck, even though it being clean & better-looking because of the additional cleaning effort does not make it run any better. ;)
 
Like a bunch of old Women comparing how clean their laundry soap gets their fine linens or something
Click to expand...

LOL @Rule3

We are a bunch of old biddies, talking about our washing and our favorite load recipes like they were an pineapple dump cake
 
Nature Boy said:
LOL @Rule3

We are a bunch of old biddies, talking about our washing and our favorite recipes
Click to expand...

Got that right:) It's not just here it's any forum. Seems the cleaning of brass is the most important reloading topic of all time other than pros and con of the LFCD!;)

Heck I clean my brass as shown in the picture. But it is not sent though a surgical Autoclave.:eek:
 
I've used most of the method available over the years, including the wet/stainless method. One thing about the wet/stainless method that I did not see mentioned is that it will make stained brass look new where as walnut or corncob will never remove the stains. When I first started using the stainless media I tumbled some cases that I picked up out of the burn barrel, just to see what it would do. 2 hours made them look ok and 4 hours made them look better than new. This was an experiment and yes, I crushed the cases afterward to avoid accidentally ever using them.
 
bds said:
I would agree as I just need my brass clean enough to reload and they don't need to be mirror shiny.

But I noticed dry tumbling vs tumbling with NuFinish keeps brass surface cleaner (shinier with less dust/crud near rim) with residual polymer on brass surface acting like case lube to help with resizing and prevent tarnishing of brass for years.

And blame the bench rest crowd for wanting to clean the inside of cases and primer pockets with stainless steel pin wet tumbling. I can tumble outdoors so dust/lead residue is not an issue but reloaders who must tumble indoors, I could see the benefits of wet tumbling. I considered wet tumbling before but did not like the smaller capacity drums but now that Frankford Arsenal has 7 liter capacity (1000 .223 cases) wet tumbler, I am interested.

Keep in mind that this may be evolutionary progression of reloading. We used to shoot lead balls, then lubed bullets, then gas checked lubed bullets, then semi jacketed/full-length gas checked bullets and now fully gas checked CMJ/TMJ bullets along with plated and coated lead bullets with better and better results (higher velocities, no leading, lower cost etc.).

So we went from wiping brass to soaking/boiling brass to dry tumbling brass to tumbling with polish to ultrasonic/wet tumbling with SS pins with better and better results (cleaner brass with less dust/residue).

I think there are those who are still happy with wiping their brass and I still like shooting lubed lead bullets.
Click to expand...
Bingo, sometimes people miss that brass can get too clean! The Nu-Finish acts a lubricant, even on dies that have carbide. For Rifle I'm lubing anyway so that's a "wash".
I'm with the dry tumbling at the moment, but as it dies I may get a Wet Tumbler, but I doubt, I'd completely get away from the dry method either. It's quicker and easier, and I'm not that OCD about it.
 
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