Advantages of steel pin case cleaning, if any?

[jmorris]

My benchrest cases get cleaned with a rag and a nylon brush. Fastest method from being fired to being ready to load again that I use and the most accurate ammo I load.

I separate my brass and pins pretty much the same way I do dry media, except I fill the tub with water.



Ultrasonic is OK, I use it for tiny batches when I have time to let them dry.

 

[jaguarxk120]

I haven't seen any peening of case mouths. But clean brass is easier to resize and less wear on my dies.
It also takes less effort when pulling the expander ball out of bottle neck case's.

 

[Prowler53]

Pro's....
Much cleaner
No dust
stainless pins will last forever unless you loose them. In the long run the initial cost of the pins will pay for themselves.
primer pockets are very clean when done if you decap first, which is what I do.
Less tumble time.....I only tumble mine for 1 hour and brass is very clean.
Brass separation from the media is easier to me than digging out corn cob media from primer pockets. after rinsing just dump everything in a wash bucket filled 1/4 of the way with water. Reach in and pick out the brass and shake it
under the water to remove any pins inside the cases. Throw on a towel and let dry for a few hours.
Con's...
A small dual tumbler such as harbor freights will only do about 150 or so 9mm cases at a time. Not sure on rifle cases but I'm guessing maybe half that.
If you need to do larger quantities at once, you will need to spend some cash on a larger tumbler.
Drying time before reloading. I don't have a problem with this because I keep plenty of brass ready to load. If you usually clean and load all at once it will be a problem.

I have not used my dry tumbler since I went to wet tumbling.

 

[Highland Lofts]

When I wet tumble i let it run for 90 minutes, i take the cap off onevendcand hold the pins and cases in the tub while I dump the dirty water out.
I will put fresh water in the tube and run it another five minutes to get rid of residual contaminets.
I then put fresh water in a small plastic bucket and dump the cases in. I grab a small hand full of brass in my left hand and grab two cases at a time and swish them around upside down to remove any pins in the cases.

I made up drying racks to hold the cases. I used galvinized 16 penny finnisf nails on some of the racks and 1/4" wood dowels on some ofvthe ravks for pistol brass.








After I place the brass on the drying racks I hit them with a air hose and blow a lot of the water out of them. I will let them sit out in the sun durring the summer. When it is nasty outside I let them sit inside a few days to dry. If I want to use them sooner I will put them in the oven for an hour or so on 190 degrees.

I predrill my wood blocks a little under size for the finnish nais.
I predrill just a little larger for the wood dowels and glue them in the blocks.
I tape five wood dowels together with painters tape or masking tape. Set a stop up on my chop saw and cut how ever many I need. I have a electric sander and sand the ends of the small wood dowel incerts.


I hit all the wood with polyurathine (mis spelled) so they will not hold water.

Works good for me.

 

[AJC1]

If you need to do larger quantities at once, you will need to spend some cash on a larger tumbler.

I think people always find a reason to buy bigger and better. I have a tumbler that may get one or two hours a month of run time. Buying a bigger tumbler for some may make sense but the duty time would have to be a lot more hours per month than i normally see. I also only run mine for about an hour per batch while it seems some run thiers up to three hours.

 

[Highland Lofts]

Depending upon how much brass people do most of the time dictates what they spend on brass prep.
I do a lot of reloading so I buy what I need to make my reloading easier and enjoyable. I boughtvthe bigger Frankfort Tumbler, when I have the extra $100 I will buy the smaller Frankfort wet tumbler for smaller loads of brass.
After wet tumbling I hardly ever use the dry tumbler.

I did pick up a Hornady sonic cleaner a couple of years ago and it is still unopened on the shelf under my loading bench.
I probably should open it up this spring and see how I like it.

 

[Dudedog]

I put off buying one for quite a while thinking probably not worth it.
It is, I have the Lyman Cyclone. It comes with some trays but it is faster to use my old Frankford separator that I had fro dry media.
Auto Wash and Wax (whatever the car gets, car gets what's on sale usually Turtle Wax brand) and about a 9mm case of citric acid powder. (canning section at the grocery store)
I do about a 1/2 hour pass with range brass (range has nasty abrasive dirt that could be used for blasting grit).
Then later I will deprime and run for a hour.
Sparkling clean, clean primer pockets, looks like new.

After the first batch I said yep it is worth the money for the tumbler and pins.

Nice clean brass may not make the ammo I load shoot any better but it makes me , so that's worth something.

 

[Skgreen]

A Pin had been left in a case , loaded and fired. Pin stayed in barrel. Next shot smashed pin into rifling. Seen on another forum.

I wish I could say that I've never seen that, but I believe I have an old barrel in the closet that would say otherwise,,,

I still use pins, but, I've refined/improved my 'pin separation methods' quite a bit since then!

 

[jmorris]

If you need to do larger quantities at once, you will need to spend some cash on a larger tumbler.

I made 3 of these for a manufacturer, they tumble 15 gallons of brass per drum. Also had to make a gantry crane so they could load and unload the barrels.



Also made a motor driven media separator for their post load dry tumbling. This is it before I put the bottom shelf for the tub on it. They rolled it down an aisle of cement mixers used with corncob media.



The photo in #26 is of one batch from my smaller homemade wet tumbler. Thousands of cases at a time and during the summer in the Texas sun they are not only dry in 2.5 beers but also to hot to hold in a bare hand

 

[Dudedog]

and during the summer in the Texas sun they are not only dry in 2.5 beers but also to hot to hold in a bare hand

That's how it is in the summer where I am at.
Only positive thing I can say about those 110 degree days is brass dries fast

 

[Skgreen]

I do believe that different needs may often require different equipment.

Started with the HF dual drum. Liked it, but knew I needed more capacity.
I've been using the 'large?/original size' Frank. Arsenal unit for quite some time now w/ oven dry.

I tuned my technique up a bit since I first started with it. I now have a routine, that, once started/put into motion, can do a full "dirty to clean and dry*" cycle in 90 - 100 minutes.

*I do not deprime first, so 'dry' in my case still requires them to be left in an open container for 10-24 hrs. (I use cheap plastic shoeboxes)
After that,,, Airtight container.

 

[PWC]

]
A Pin had been left in a case , loaded and fired. Pin stayed in barrel. Next shot smashed pin into rifling. Seen on another forum.

This is what I would worry about. Wet case and pin stick together even after dry.

We used to put pennies on the railroad track to flatten. One time we took a cutter from the shop metal lathe. After the train went by, the cutter was mashed into the rail; no getting it back.

I'm sure the barrel suffered the same thing.

 

[rskent]

I use a Thumler to clean my rifle brass as well. It’s messy and it takes longer but the brass comes out remarkably clean. I decap and anneal the brass before I tumble it. Process the brass then give it a final cleaning with just “wash and wax” and no pins to clean off (out) the case lube.

I think its well worth the extra time and trouble.

Note: I have had the pins mess up my case mouths. Now I do the main cleaning before processing the brass and clean up without pins after.

 

[Demi-human]

For the record, I have case mouth peening without pins, too.
Dropping brass case mouths into case heads hundreds of times in a half hour will do that.
I wait until everything is clean before I anneal. I don't want them softer before I abuse them. Then the Hornady One Shot doesn't need to come off.

This is what I would worry about. Wet case and pin stick together even after dry.

They may not have been sufficiently rinsed then.
I also don't want to send a pin through a four hundred dollar barrel, even if it doesn't get embedded into the rifling.
Very powerful Neodymium magnets are pretty inexpensive, comparatively. I pass one over the towel dried cases. Any pin is identified as the magnet is strong enough to lift the case with only one pin in it.
A sweep quickly back and forth from further away will jingle the pin in the case, even if they are wet.

The pins are no problem, but move the silverware off the table! I got too close to a fork and the magnet squished the handle to my finger hard enough to pinch a cut.

I got ones with holes bored into them. I can hang an AR, loaded, under my kitchen table! (I don't, but I could.)


With the great results I get, I find no down sides to wet tumbling. The cons are easily rectified in my loading and I got to have the bling!

 

[GBExpat]

... Are there any advantages to using steel pins to clean cases ...

... Thanks for any opinions. ...

I gave up using my two vibratory case cleaners as primary case cleaners in 2014 after using a "F.A.R.T." with pins (Frankford Arsenal Rotary Tumbler) once. The cases that emerged from the process looked almost new.

I tried one batch of cases without the pins and, while they were "clean", they were not LN ... so, why bother.

I quickly fine-tuned the process and replaced Dawn with ArmourAll Wash&Wax (I was already adding citric acid powder, which I have been using to pre-clean cases for decades).

I use the RCBS case separator that I already had. After rinsing them clean in the basement bathtub (the pins remove a LOT of crap) I towel them partially dry before pouring them into corrugated cardboard flats (think, cases of catfood cans ) , place them in front of a 16" circulation fan that I fan in the basement 24/7 and walk away for a day or 3.

The AAW&W helps to both keep them BRIGHT for quite a while and eases their passage in the resizing die.

===========

I have not read all of the responses in this Thread, I rarely do.

By now someone may have (sometimes condescendingly) commented that cases don't have to be shiny-bright to work just fine. True. But having used some reeeeeeally ugly "clean enough" cases for reloading for many years, I appreciate reloading used cases that look almost new.

 

[rskent]

or the record, I have case mouth peening without pins, too.
Dropping brass case mouths into case heads hundreds of times in a half hour will do that.

I can see how that could be a problem. For me it has not been. With the pins I was getting a noticeable burr on the outside of the cases. I run the final cleaning about an hour, more or less.

 

[Tilos]

For those concerned about pins being stuck inside cases after drying, you can shake them out by putting the cleaned, dried brass into your VIB tumbler, without ANY media and run it for a few minutes.
With NO Media the brass shakes much more violently and will dislodge any pins stuck inside.
Try it

 

[frankmako]

i pin clean all my rifle brass. hard to beat.

 

[hdwhit]

Over the years I have tried processing brass using a home-built rotary tumbler. I have tried wet tumbling using carbon steel balls, stainless steel pins and bronze wire pins. I have tried dry tumbling using corn cob, walnut shell, lead balls, carbon steel balls and alluvial sand. Wet tumbling cleaned out the primer pockets better than dry tumbling and resulted in a higher shine, but I regarded them as largely cosmetic issues.

Eventually, I settled on washing (not tumbling) brass with a weak acid (acetic acid [Vinegar], citric acid [Lemi-Shine] or oxalic acid [Bar Keepers Friend]) and detergent solution, allowing the brass to dry and then after re-sizing, dry tumbling to remove the re-sizing lubricant.