Soaking brass cartridges in diluted vinegar

[ms6852]

I purchased the hornady magnum sonic cleaner and am very happy with it. I have used the commercial cleaner from hornady and the homemade with vinegar,water,dish soap, and salt. The hornady won by just a hair. The brass is clean but not shiny but is easy to shine with000 steel wool. I did about 300 cases in two hours including polishing with steel wool.

The secret is not to overload maybe 150 cartridges at most of .223.

My question is soaking brass in a vinegar solution as described above over night for brass okay? I thought that this could Help in cutting cleaning time down. I have decapped about 3000 range cartridges and wanted to soak it into a 5 gallon bucket than transfer it to a neutralizing solution of baking soda in the sonic cleaner.

My theory is since it has soaked over night I could do larger loads in the sonic cleaner. So, if any brilliant mind chemist out there can tell me it is ok to soak the brass, I would appreciate it.

 

[rcmodel]

I would not.
A prolonged soak in acetic acid may leach the zinc out of the brass and ruin it.

rc

 

[Rule3]

Not a good idea. The vinegar solution is:

2 cups of white vinegar, 2 tablespoons salt, mix with water to make 1 gal.

Soak for 15 -20 MINUTES. Then rinse 3 times in fresh water.

You can save the solution to use again and again.

 

[243winxb]

See post by Unclenick here http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=708100&page=2

So, why not flock to vinegar? Same reasons given earlier. I don't like the surface activation. The dark colors that appear make great camouflage for cases ejected into the grass. If I don't use a round for several years after loading it, as occasionally happens, oxide welding of the bullet to the case neck is more likely to start with an activated brass surface. Exterior case oxidation in accidental poor storage conditions would be worsened by an activated surface.

 

[IMtheNRA]

I ruined some brass when I tried that vinegar solution. I ended up with pink splotches of copper on some cases and scrapped the whole batch.

 

[Rule3]

With all due respect to "Uncle Nick", 7 oz of the Citric Acid ( I have the same stuff from Duda) in 1 gal of water is overkill and a waste of citric acid.

Having used it and Lem Shine, the Vinegar is cheaper and works just as well. No you are not going to have to wear sunglasses or a welding hood but the brass is clean enough.

I just pick up the lemons. oranges and grapefruit that fall of the trees and throw them in a 5 gal bucket of water.

If you really need to dazzle and impress you shooting buddies, then tumble after with Nu Finish or any of the "magic" media additives.

 

[USSR]

ms6852,

Not a good idea to leave brass in a vinegar solution for a long time.

Don

 

[GJSchulze]

I first tried vinegar and water, but I found Hornady's solution to work much better. I can clean hundreds of 9mm cases in about 10 minutes, although it takes at least that long to rinse. After that I spread them out on a Shamwow and run a floor fan over them for a day. Given the length of rifle cartridges I don't know how well a fan will work. Maybe it would just take longer.

For a while I've reused the solution after letting the particulates settle and then siphoning off the clean fluid. Last time I used new solution and that gave me nice shiny brass. So I think you can reuse to save money, but not more than a couple of times.

 

[Vodoun da Vinci]

I have used soaking in a dilute vinegar solution with added dish soap for years. I have never tumbled. I rinse my cases to make sure they are free of grit or dirt and then resize, decap, and bell the mouths then I put them in a jar with perhaps an ounce of vinegar and a dash of dish soap and fill the jar with hot water (I use pickle jars) and shake them. Set the jar on the counter and go about my chores washing dishes or whatever and give the jar a good shake and agitation every 20 minutes for a few hours. Occasionally I have left them over night.

I then drain it and rinse completely in a colander with hot tap water, pour 'em into a towel and shake all the excess water off of them, put 'em in a microwave/heat resistant plastic tray and hit 'em with the hair dryer for 5 minutes until hot and bone dry. Usually they sit in the tray exposed to movign air in the basement reloading shop (which has a dehumidifier running) for maybe 2 days until they get primed, charged and bullets seated.

I have been doing this for years and recently used a set of .32 acp cases (250 once fired S&B and Fiocchi) as a control group over the last 6 months and they have been reloaded 6X at this time. No problems. They are not shiny and "new" but they are clean and functional and have not blown up, split, nor failed in any way despite being used to work up a *very* hot .32 acp load running 75 gr. bullets and over 3 gr. of Unique.

No problems. I have seen a couple pink spots now and again but it runs right off and does not come back. No case failures, no corrosion, no problems. I think the vinegar/pink spot/destroyed cases thing is overblown. Dilute vinegar is a very mild acid - I wouldn't soak them in a stiff mixture for days. I wouldn't tumble them for days either.

I don't use range brass or brass from unknown sources that is laying in dirt/grit so I don't worry about scoring or hurting my dies by resizing and such before tumbling. If I had to use range brass I'd probably tumble first, the decap/resize etc and then either tumble again or just wash them to remove lube and whatever. I'm skeptical that vinegar soak (if diluted) is a demon that destroys brass. It does get my cases clean enough to reload again without tumbling and all that. Usually I have my cases clean and ready for reloading with only minutes of prep time in 2 or 3 days after firing.

YMMV.

VooDoo

 

[eeh]

Question,,Why ?

It's just brass,for shooting.I clean mine in corn cob and reload

 

[Rule3]

Question,,Why ?

It's just brass,for shooting.I clean mine in corn cob and reload

+1 on that. Dirty brass shoots as well as clean. Not saying you want to run brass full of sand and mud through dies, but it does not need to be blinding bright.

I have washed brass in citric and acetic acid, rinsed, dried in the Sun on the driveway and it's more work then I care for. Just throw it in a tumbler,

 

[788Ham]

YOU polished it with 000 steel wool? Now thats a total waste of time. I tried that method with a drill motor and steel wool years ago, bought a tumbler, put the drill motor away, have never looked back !

 

[fguffey]

Diluted vinegar? I use straight vinegar, +/- 5% for the worst of cases. I use vinegar for a maximum of 15 minutes for the worst of cases. In the early years I had a choice, spin or tumble, tumbling the worst of cases required at least 5 plus days. I cut that time down to 2 hour maximum.

Between vinegar for 15 minutes maximum and tumbling there was cleaning in boiling water, boiling water is an old army trick, in the old days cases were pickled, that was a process that existed before I started using vinegar for the very worst of cases. In the pickling process the case was boiled twice in clean water to rinse the cases.

F. Guffey

 

[ms6852]

Question,,Why ?

It's just brass,for shooting.I clean mine in corn cob and reload

I'm learning, so far everyone cleans their brass either by a tumbler, sonic cleaner, or wet tumbling , since I have not reloaded ammo yet, I am to understand it is not necessary to clean the brass?

 

[GJSchulze]

I am to understand it is not necessary to clean the brass

Yes, you can get away with not cleaning brass. It will shoot fine, but will certainly dirty up everything it touches. I have seen factory ammo that after being shot the first time is shiny on the inside. If I ever find out what powder that is, I'm switching to it! I have picked up brass from an outdoors competition and rinsed it before cleaning it just to get dirt and grass out. Since you have the USC, you should use it. I can clean hundreds of 9mm cases in 10 minutes and then let it dry overnight spread out in front of a floor fan. It can have a tarnished look and will never be as shiny as a tumbler, but their brass will never be as clean inside as mine is. I don't bother to deprime before cleaning. Pistol brass primer pockets do not need to be uniformed. People often, maybe usually, ask and give advice without saying whether it's about pistol and rifle. Rifle cases have more preparation required.

And since you have a USC, you can use it to clean your guns and other things if you have the right solution.

 

[Vodoun da Vinci]

I'm learning, so far everyone cleans their brass either by a tumbler, sonic cleaner, or wet tumbling , since I have not reloaded ammo yet, I am to understand it is not necessary to clean the brass?

Nice , clean, new looking brass is very, very nice. Easy to spot cracks and defects and see consistency in visual checks. No, it is not an absolute thing. As I already said, I don't have a tumbler and never have - I clean my brass for a few minutes by soaking in a mild acidic medium to get 99% of the old firing residue off and loosen any crud that might be in the primer pockets.

Then I reload them. Many, many times without ever tumbling and without bright shiny new looking brass. I spend the time I save here at THR and a few other forums watching folks argue about things that don't matter. :banghead:

Clean and shiny is good but the reason for tumbling and all that is consistency in preparation. Like cleaning the kitchen and putting everything away...it's procedure and a "reset" to a nominal controlled state. I have never had spare money or time nor a place to run a tumbler without annoying other people in the living area or I'd have one. Since I learned to reload from an old guy from before there were tumblers I just pick up my brass and rinse it clean as I can and reload it.

Not trying to make a political statement nor circumvent the reloading universe...brass does not need all the fuss but it's nice if you have the time and inclination to do that if you want it/need it for satisfaction. Vinegar does not ruin the brass. No, don't soak it in super strength acid for 4 days...don't tumble it for 4 days either.

By the way, ammonia *will* compromise the brass. Don't use or soak cleaners or prep routines with ammonia in them. This includes many generic brass cleaners and polishes and many generic glass cleaners like Windex and such. Don't use ammonia. Tumble if ya got 'em....

Good luck.

VooDoo

 

[PhotoBiker]

In my sonic cleaner, for brass I use:

Lemi Shine
Dab of Dawn Dish Soap

Brass comes out "wicked clean".

I tumble it for about an hour (or overnight if it's my last batch) to dry and finalize the polish.

Since I switched over, my brass inside and out is spotless.

I never messed with the vinegar solution, not sure I'd want to.

 

[Nordeste]

Been there, done that.

I started washing my cases with a mix of hot water, dish soap and vinegar (30% white vinegar solution). Then giving it a rinse with hot water+baking soda to neutralize the acid and either let it dry on a towel or put it in a metal colander and hit it with a hair dryer for five minutes, if they were to be reloaded straight away. No problems. They wouldn't be shiny nor pretty, even sometimes I got the famous pink spots, but the brass wouldn't be affected. It performed flawlessly, at least talking 9 mm which is all I reload. This method is perfectly valid in my experience. The cases will come clean both inside and outside. They don't shine, though, and your ammo will look "poor". I could live with this, no problem, but I have to admit that the look of a well finished, shiny ammo is charming.

Now I own a small ultrasonic and a small tumbler. I weighed if I needed something bigger and decided against it. How do I do now?. Depends. If I'm in hurry and have no cases to reload they'll go straight to the tumbler for a couple of hours and that will do. If I have nothing else to do, feel like it and want to be thorough, I'll deprime them, give them an ultrasonic bath (primer pockets spotless) and once they're dry with the hair dryer they'll go to the tumbler. The feel is wonderful. Clean in and out, shiny, primer pockets are pristine. It feels like handling brand new brass. When I load that ammo it goes to a different box. That is the ammo I'll grab if I have a match. I also try to keep a stock of cases cleaned that way, trying to ensure my ammo is close to the highest quality.

Some say this kind of care is not needed in handgun ammo and they're probably quite close to being right. I say quite close because the only two instances in which my handloads have failed have taken place when I used cases that didn't have clean primer pockets. Probably just a coincidence, who knows, but I know that factory ammo is loaded in clean cases and it seldom fails. YMMV.

Choose whatever method suits you better, but at the very least, use the water+dish soap+vinegar+rinse with baking soda method. Your dies will be grateful.

 

[243winxb]

Vinegar

Brass washed in the old NRA vinegar formula will activate the brass turning it brown. In the short term, not a problem. Long term brass becomes brittle. Annealing of the neck/shoulder of 223/5.56 brass will not return cartridge brass to a usable condition. Give it a rinse with hot water+baking soda to neutralize the acid after the wash.

 

[243winxb]

Ethanol/alcohol effect on cartridge brass

The test fluids selected for this investigation were Fuel C, CE10a, CE17a, and CE25a. Fuel C was selected as the control since it is representative of premium gasoline and is a standard test fluid widely used for studying material compatibility to gasoline. CE10a represents an aggressive formulation of E10, and as such, it can be viewed as a baseline test fuel since E10 is currently available in many, if not most, fuel dispensers. Dawn dish detergent contains as much as 5% Ethanol. Ethanol may cause stress crossion cracking.

 

[Rule3]

A test of some cleaning solutions


http://www.6mmbr.com/ultrasonic.html

 

[243winxb]

NRA Formula

"1 pint of water, 1 cup of white vinegar, 1 tablespoon of salt, and 1 teaspoon of detergent". Mix the solution in container. Shake 10 minutes with brass. Rinse 10 minutes clean water. Sun dry. This was printed in an NRA reprint of loading for the 45 acp many years ago. Dont forget to

Give it a rinse with hot water+baking soda to neutralize the acid after the wash.

< Baking soda Not in Reprint of article Use at your own risk.

 

[LBEE]

Brass Cleaner...Shine..Homemade

I have used this for Years after a lot of testing on my own
1-1/2 QT. water, 2TBS Simple Green, 1/8 tsp. Lemishine...1TBS of Dawn DW liquid Soap, Works great in my Tumblers Tumbler, brass comes out looking like Gold. Might give it a try.

 

[ms6852]

I have used this for Years after a lot of testing on my own
1-1/2 QT. water, 2TBS Simple Green, 1/8 tsp. Lemishine...1TBS of Dawn DW liquid Soap, Works great in my Tumblers Tumbler, brass comes out looking like Gold. Might give it a try.

Thanks

 

[fguffey]

The question from the OP had to do with cleaning/soaking in vinegar overnight. From the responses the OP could get the perception vinegar is case friendly. Many years ago it was possible to purchase other case cleaning chemicals. soak time was 3 minutes maximum. I used vinegar, straight vinegar, nothing added, if I wanted to increase the time I added water.

With straight vinegar, the maximum soak time is 15 minutes, 15 minutes is not always necessary but 30 minutes soaking in vinegar will change the color of the case to orange/pink. Extended soak time will cause the case to disappear. I have always thought vinegar was a bad habit, I have only cleaned the worst of cases in vinegar, I have never left the cases in the vinegar for more than 15 minutes and I have never cleaned a case in vinegar more than once. As with the old cleaning solutions rinsing the cases after soaking was/is mandatory. The old formula instructions listed rinsing in hot boiling water twice.

F. Guffey