Power cost of running a tumbler?

rfwobbly said:
Your wife's hair dryer costs more to operate !!
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Yep. Even my 500-watt lead melting furnace (for casting bullets) doesn't cost as much per minute to operate as my wife's 1,875-watt hair dryer. The key words in that sentence are "per minute" though. My wife probably doesn't run her blow dryer for 10 minutes a day. Back when I was into casting my own bullets though, I sometimes ran my lead melting furnace for 4 hours at a time, twice a week. :uhoh:
Even at that I never noticed our power bill going up when I was doing a lot of casting, and that's not the reason I quit. I quit casting my own bullets because simply I wasn't enjoying it.
Don't get me wrong though - I still like cast handgun bullets, and I shoot a lot of them. I just prefer paying someone else to cast them for me.;)
 
I looked through the manual and the Amazon listing for how much power that tumbler uses to no avail.

Guessing it's 100W and OPs kWh rate is $0.40 results in a cost of ~$0.04 per hour.
 
AJC1 said:
Some old timers will say that tumbling isn't required at all. Pretty brass is an expense to a barebones operation that is not needed.
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I’ve probably had kids, still wet behind the ears, call me an old timer but it actually isn’t required.

I do tumble a very large majority of the brass I shoot but I do use ultrasonic and my bench rest cases probably haven’t touched one another since they were manufactured. I wipe them off and brush them out, one at a time, by hand. They don’t look as pretty as some of the others but I haven’t shot smaller groups with anything else.
 
jmorris said:
I’ve probably had kids, still wet behind the ears, call me an old timer but it actually isn’t required.

I do tumble a very large majority of the brass I shoot but I do use ultrasonic and my bench rest cases probably haven’t touched one another since they were manufactured. I wipe them off and brush them out, one at a time, by hand. They don’t look as pretty as some of the others but I haven’t shot smaller groups with anything else.
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It’s like the old bikers saying, chrome don’t get you home. 👍😁

I tumble to get the schmutz off cause I don’t like to have dirty hands. Had enough of being dirty in this life. I haven’t been spending as much time shooting so I haven’t spent as much time reloading but I still prefer to work with clean-ish parts over dirty parts. It’s a personal preference not a rule of thumb.
 
The answers given for the cost to run the tumbler are pretty accurate. I have found that if I bring my brass home from the range and immediately throw them in the tumbler, it takes about 30 minutes to put a polish on them. They may still have some blemishes on them but the grit and carbon will be mostly gone.

If you want them shiny clean, 2-3 hours is what I use.
 
CQB45ACP said:
Or, buy a Tesla Model S, charge it at your local shopping center’s charging station, and run your tumbler in the trunk. Free!
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You are aware that Tesla then bills you ~$0.25/kWh for using their stations, right?

The key to life, and economics, is NFL. No Free Lunch.
 
CQB45ACP said:
Yes I’m aware—it was all sarcasm. Was also talking about buying a $100-$150K car to facilitate free tumbling.
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They’re down to $55K for the dual motor. They’re very popular with my work peers. There’re at least 40 or so T’s and double that number in other EV’s in the lot every day. I’m one of them iconoclast types who still burns dinosaur carcass and wears cotton.
 
GeoDudeFlorida said:
They’re down to $55K for the dual motor. They’re very popular with my work peers. There’re at least 40 or so T’s and double that number in other EV’s in the lot every day. I’m one of them iconoclast types who still burns dinosaur carcass and wears cotton.
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Well the S Plaid is $150K and that’s what I’d insist upon to tumble my brass appropriately.

Around here all Tesla models are getting to be as common as Subarus in Vermont. But only with the commoners. The Ashburn Data Center crowd sticks to Lambos, Mclarens, and Ferraris. Reminds me of Gordon Blvd in Naples.
 
jmorris said:
I’ve probably had kids, still wet behind the ears, call me an old timer but it actually isn’t required.

I do tumble a very large majority of the brass I shoot but I do use ultrasonic and my bench rest cases probably haven’t touched one another since they were manufactured. I wipe them off and brush them out, one at a time, by hand. They don’t look as pretty as some of the others but I haven’t shot smaller groups with anything else.
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It's more about a time when needs and wants were more accurately assessed. Shiny brass is trendy, and clean brass is the expected norm now. Tons of small groups were shot and will be shot from brass that is not the envy of every Harley owner for being spotless. I like wet tumbling because I dig cases out of the mud that have been their for months.... I dont expect that is the norm.
 
A 1/20 hp motor as used on a tumbler draws 1.8 amp at 115 volts, 207 watts. So if you run your tumbler four hours that is 828 watt hours, .8 kWh. National average of 15 cents a kWh.

A friend let me use his lead pot to cast bullets but was concerned about the cost. I figured it out and handed him a quarter.
 
If your household uses the normal stuff you will never even notice any difference in your bill from tumbling. Your refrigerator, freezer, washing machine, dryer, multi bulb light fixture, ect ect all use more power than your tumbler. You will spend more for polishing media than on electricity.

I never even notice an increase in my bill when I have 2 buddies come over to cast and we're running 3 melting pots and a hot plate.
 
AJC1 said:
I drink a minimum of two pots a day, there is no way my power bill isn't effected.
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just 2?

CQB45ACP said:
And to drop cost further, late at night, run an extension cord to your neighbor’s outlet.
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Is your name Jack Benny? Lol

I doubt seriously that it will be a big difference. My power bill has dropped a very little bit now that I’m not running all my grow lights and pumps for the hydroponic beds(lettuce, basil, and strawberries if you’re wondering). But ac and so forth affects it so much more. So does running my woodshop for that matter… table saws, chop saws, circular saws, various sanders, not to mention 18 extra lights running…
 
JmacD said:
just 2?


Is your name Jack Benny? Lol

I doubt seriously that it will be a big difference. My power bill has dropped a very little bit now that I’m not running all my grow lights and pumps for the hydroponic beds(lettuce, basil, and strawberries if you’re wondering). But ac and so forth affects it so much more. So does running my woodshop for that matter… table saws, chop saws, circular saws, various sanders, not to mention 18 extra lights running…
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Surrrre! Growlights are for lettuce. Does smell like lettuce.

I still use corded lawn/garden tools. Edging and weed whacking takes much more than tumbling and never see a difference.
 
CoalCrackerAl said:
I have to ask. Why would anyone worry about how much it cost to run a tumbler?
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It's a valid concern if someone didn't know how little power a tumbler draws. 75 watts isn't a lot but if it was 750 watts, then maybe that could cut into someone's cash flow or cost of calculating their savings on reloading.

If I look at my monthly budget with a mortgage, car expenses, insurance, food, etc...ammunition is pretty cheap. Using the current government tax allowance of 65 cents a mile, it costs me more to drive to and from the range than it does for the ammo to shoot.
 
JmacD said:
Ha. That’s first thing people think. But I can assure you it was genuine salad fodder.
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I believe him. Finding quality grass is easy. This is Florida. Every Circle-K has that legal concentrated stuff. Finding quality food is hard. What you get in the chain grocery stores is all infected with E.coli or listeria or other bacterial 💩. Same reason a lot of us only eat critters we know.
Which brings us back to the topic: handloading to save costs is kinda like eating gas station Sushi. Not a bad idea - in theory.
 
This is what the "Kill A Watt" meter is made for. My old Ultravibe 10 is very similar. I just turned it on plugged into the "Kill A Watt".

It was a pretty steady 43.4 watts. About a kilowatt hour per day.
 
.308 Norma said:
Yep. Even my 500-watt lead melting furnace (for casting bullets) doesn't cost as much per minute to operate as my wife's 1,875-watt hair dryer. ……..Back when I was into casting my own bullets though, I sometimes ran my lead melting furnace for 4 hours at a time, twice a week. :uhoh:
Even at that I never noticed our power bill going up when I was doing a lot of casting, and that's not the reason I quit.
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I once left my Lee pot running over night. I got kind of worried about the electrical use over 12+ hours. Once I did the calculations and figured it cost under a dollar to run it that long I realized there’s basically no one thing you can plug into a 120 volt outlet that uses enough energy to worry about unless you’re running it for days at a time.
 
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