One of my not so brilliant ideas for wet tumbling

[Dudedog]

OK, I use Flitz with corn cob, dry, great shine.
Wet tumble with wash and wax and citric acid nice shine.

So I get this "brilliant" idea to try adding some Flitz to the wet process.
BAD idea Grey brass, I should have taken a picture but was freaked.
Like I painted it all with a light grey coating of soot.
Pins are all grey to. Inside of drum is grey, yuck. Bang head against wall.
Running again with wash and wax didn't clean them up much.
Used up a bunch of 409 to get stuff clean. 3 or 4 more passes to get the grey coating off.


One would have though I should have learned my lesson but no, a month later I get to wondering if maybe it was just the Flitz or a dirty barrel or pins.
Cleaned barrel and pins, threw in some car paste wax to the mixture attempting to get extra shine.
Yuck, grey brass again. (At least this time I had a cleaning strategy)

If you haven't tried this all I can say is it didn't work out well for me at all!
If you have and it did work out let me know I am curious if it is just Murphy and me.

Honestly it seemed like a reasonable plan at the time. (well at least the first time)

 

[hdwhit]

Thanks for the warning.

 

[Dill]

glad I'm not the only one that's done this...

 

[Dudedog]

Dill, did not work for you as well? Same sort of result?
I was expecting nice shiney cases and when I dumped them out and it was

 

[Dill]

Dill, did not work for you as well? Same sort of result?
I was expecting nice shiney cases and when I dumped them out and it was

Same result. Ended up having to wash the pins 5 or 6 times with pine sol floor cleaner and massaging them in my hands over and over to get the slime off. I also took each of the 100 .223 cases I had tumbled and rubbed all of the slime off them with a rag. My hands HURT after wards. I re tumbled them and they came out clean. It took about 15 cycles to get the pins totally clean (they were black before cleaning)

BAD BAD IDEA! I'll stick to citric acid!

 

[Dudedog]

Yep, BAD idea!

 

[Dudedog]

Well Dill, looks like we were the only two to try it. (or the only two that will admit it)

 

[AZAndy]

I once had the bright idea to try cat litter as a medium. Do not do that.

 

[Tinybob]

I've tried the cat litter. Brass was clean, but had a sandblasted look and feel. Also a fresh step smell. Terrible, but lesson learned.

 

[bbqreloader]

OK, I use Flitz with corn cob, dry, great shine.
Wet tumble with wash and wax and citric acid nice shine.

So, first thanks for not sending me the gray brass
Meant to ask you, the 45 brass you sent, was that the corn cob or wet tumble?? That brass is CLEAN and shiny!!

 

[Kaldor]

I run my pins in Simple Green if they get funky. Seems to clean everything up nicely.

 

[Dudedog]

BBQ,
a quick wash to get the dirt out, (range has some fine grained sand, and if wet it makes nice abrasive mud!) then 1/2 hour in the wet tumbler. Dry, deprime then an hour in the wet tumbler.
I use auto wash and wax and about a 9mm case full of citric acid. So those were done in the wet tumbler with pins.
For wash and wax I tend to buy what is on sale. I have used Armour All and Formula 1 both seem about the same. Citric acid powder from the canning section of Wally World.

After making grey brass twice I decided I didn't like it.

 

[judgedelta]

I tried the wet tumbler with some Armorall Wash N Wax one time and came out with the same mess described above. Apparently I used too much. Those who advocate adding the wax to the wash don't advise how much to use. I gave up on the wet wax and now just run my brass through the vibrator with corncob and some (a little) Nu-Finish before sizing. 30 min. will do it.

 

[Dill]

I just decided that soap + citric acid was 'good enough' in the pretty case dept.

 

[AZAndy]

I've tried the cat litter. Brass was clean, but had a sandblasted look and feel. Also a fresh step smell. Terrible, but lesson learned.

Mine was some sort of powdered clay which became flour-fine and got everywhere, including in the motor. Had to wash the brass in soap and water to get the stuff off. Seemed like a great idea at the time!

 

[muncie21]

I did something similar to the OP and wet tumbled too much car wash/wax with my load. Same as the OP, I was greeted with a gray, slimy mess when I opened the can. It took a few rounds of cleaning with detergent and rinsing to get rid of that mess and in the end, my cases still had lots of petro byproducts embedded in them. The cases looked a bit darker colored than the rest of my tumbled brass, but you could definitely see it on your hands when handling these rounds when loading up your mags.

 

[icanthitabarn]

Me too and so far NO successful wet tumbles. Always a 4-5 hr go thou. I tried orange pumice hand cleaner, for one. No sliminess thou. Mega dry tumbling brings them back...and how

 

[Zaydok Allen]

Hmmm. Guess I just want my ammo to shoot, not sparkle like a disco ball. Glad you got it sorted out.

 

[Dudedog]

I have never had and issue with wash and wax and citric acid, just when I decided to try to add "extra" wax. (or dry polish cleaner)

I don't need them to sparkle but shiny is nice, but not required.
I reloaded a lot of ammo with no tumbler and just washed the brass in soapy water by hand. Not shiny, but shot fine.

Grey mess=yuck