Cleaning 12ga shotgun hulls?

[Falconeer]

I tumble my brass for metallic reloading, but do shotgun hulls need to be cleaned? If so, what's the best method? I have a Franklin Arsenal tumbler for metallic brass but I couldn't get too many hulls in there. Thoughts?

 

[mscott]

I personally don't clean them, but I've known a couple of guys that put them in a mesh laundry bag and run them through the washer. You might want to wait until the wife's gone to try that trick.

 

[Smokey Joe]

Dirty shotgun hulls

Falconeer--Re dirty shotgun hulls: If it's dirty enough you have a though about not reloading it, toss it.

Shotgun hulls are easily available at almost any trap range; you can normally pick up for free more than you could reload. If your club has rules about that, go to any public trap range and scrounge hulls there.

We clean rifle and pistol brass because the crud on the brass might scratch the dies. The plastic part of the shotgun hull is much softer, and the brass part is much thinner than rifle or pistol brass, so there is much less pressure on the shotshell reloader resizer, therefore less wear and tear.

I've never heard of anyone cleaning a shotshell before reloading.

 

[ATAShooter]

Don't bother trying to clean... I reload them till they split at the crimp then chuck them. If the brass is corroded, chuck it. I shoot and reload on avg. about 500 + a week. I use the Rem STS or Nitro 27 hulls and get usually 12 or better loads out of them.

 

[Falconeer]

Thanks kindly for the info! One less step to have to worry about.