Tweaking the separater step

[Guy48065]

Since I started wet tumbling recently I have been using a progression of buckets & a colander to separate the brass from the pins. Always used a paint strainer sack to catch the pins, though. It's cheap, gets them all, and it's easy to rinse the pins while still in the mesh bag.

Last week the postman left a Frankford Arsenal rotary separator on my doorstep. I went the cheap route and bought just the ball since I have plenty of buckets. My latest modification has been to cut the bottom out of the bucket so that I can stack it on top of another bucket, with the strainer in between. Leave it just long enough that the sifter ball doesn't extend beyond the edge & snag the strainer cloth. Now as I rotate the separator the pins are caught in the strainer while the water flows through to the lower bucket. This saves me the extra step of straining the pins from the dirty water.

 

[WeekendReloader]

Pretty slick solution!

 

[bullseye308]

Well that’s definitely better than the way I do it. Where does one get the paint strainer, if you don’t mine me asking?

 

[FROGO207]

I have the Dillon seperator and rectangular bin. I find if I have the bin 1/2 full of water and slowly rotate it around alternating with back and forth I get clean and pin free brass. With all the pins in the bottom of the bin.

 

[kalielkslayer]

With straight wall cases, I just use the magnet.

I have a colander inside a large plastic bowl. I dump it in and rinse. Gently lift the colander since the media will fall through, dump the water and repeat. Then I run the magnet over the brass and dump back into the tumbler. I pick up each piece to shake out the water and extra media. I repeat the magnet as media becomes visible. Straight wall cases will usually tune up and release the media to the magnet.

I have issues with .223. The tiny bottle neck cartridges get impacted with media and it can be hard to get it out. The 7mm (7mm-08, .280 and 7 Mag) don’t have this problem.

But I’m always looking for a better mouse trap.

 

[Dudedog]

I had the Frandford separator from when I used dry, works well for wet to. Glad I have it.

 

[Guy48065]

Well that’s definitely better than the way I do it. Where does one get the paint strainer, if you don’t mine me asking?

2-pack $4 at Home Depot or any paint supply. 5-gal size. I don't see any signs of wear so one bag could last months of use.

 

[bullseye308]

2-pack $4 at Home Depot or any paint supply. 5-gal size. I don't see any signs of wear so one bag could last months of use.

Awesome, thanks.

 

[GoldieMI]

Nice solution there

 

[rfwobbly]

I have the Dillon separator and rectangular bin. I find if I have the bin 1/2 full of water and slowly rotate it around alternating with back and forth I get clean and pin free brass. With all the pins in the bottom of the bin.

I do the same with the smaller Berry Mfg separator from Grafs.