Wet thumbling vs regular thumbler?

[Cosmoline]

How about not using that kind of nut shell you probably bought at the pet store or tumbling before decapping?

I used only media designed for tumbling brass. And it inevitably got dusty and nasty. Depriming after tumbling got both my hands and the dies covered in dust and more than once a stray bit of media got jammed in the die. Since going wet I've had nothing but smooth sailing. I drain and rinse in the sink with no mess left behind, and the brass dries easily in a day or two laid out on plastic liners and flour sack rags. There's very little residue if any on the brass when I handle it for priming and loading. I don't even need to use stainless media, though I'm sure if I wanted high shine I could.

Wash the brass in water and detergent for a couple minutes, then dry tumble for 45 min.

?? So you're already doing a partial wet clean.

 

[GLOOB]

If you wash the cases you must wait for them to dry prior to dry tumbling or you will be picking the corn cob out of every case.

FYI, if you add dry cases to thoroughly dampened corn cob media, you will get corn cob cemented into the bottom of a rare case, here and there.

I've been doing this for a good long while, and I still don't understand why this is: When I add wet cases to dry corn cob, I get nothing but clean and shiny brass faster than normal. And that goes for bottleneck rifle cases, too. No problem. Not a single impacted case. I would have guessed it would go the other way around.

And I'm not talking about a few drops of water. With a big enough tumbler full of wet brass, I've had the media so throroughly wet it didn't turn for the first couple min. But no matter, it was still clean and dry in 45 min or less.

When I add just a small batch (of my 45ACP, say), to a tumbler full of dry media, the powder marks take a heck of a lot longer to come clean - presumably cuz there's less water:media ratio, but I concede there are some other factors in play.

So you're already doing a partial wet clean.

Yes, pretty much 1 min of washing, 2-3 min of draining, 45 min of "dry" tumbling.

I don't even need to use stainless media, though I'm sure if I wanted high shine I could.

Well, I thought "wet tumbling" and "stainless steel media" were synonymous. What kind of wet tumbling are you doing?

 

[Cosmoline]

Well, I thought "wet tumbling" and "stainless steel media" were synonymous. What kind of wet tumbling are you doing?

I just roll the brass in the thumbler with some concentrated brass cleaner (sidewinder) though I suspect it's just expensive dishwashing gel. The brass is very clean after a few hours, but not too shiny. That's how I like it. After a few cleanings it develops a very neat looking finish. Not the green corrision but a kind of black gold overlay you find on antique brass. It's so nice looking I've been thinking about sticking a brass frame in there to see if I can get it replicated.

Of course if you don't want that the stainless steel will shine up the brass like factory new. But you don't actually need it to get rid of the powder residue.

But I think it comes down to reloading methods. For me I do large batch only. For the .357 for example I have a rolling stock of around 600 brass that I go through in a few months, then do a mass resizing/depriming/belling/etc. before dumping load after load into the thumbler over the course of a week or so. Then after it dries I prime it all and put it into freezer bags. When I'm ready to load, it's a simple matter of pulling out 50 or 100 at a time, dumping powder from the auto measure and seating the bullet.

Other people do reloading in much smaller batches and don't keep big totes full of prepared and primed brass.

 

[RustyFN]

Well. Too late. I like nice things, I watched videos on how stuff turns out. I can plan ahead and I don't like dust.

Did somebody tell you that dry tumbling was very dusty or are you just assuming that? I tumble with 50/50 walnut/cob and don't have any dust. I add 1/2 cap full of Nu Finish car polish and a paper towel tore up into pieces. The cases come out looking like new on the outside, no reason to need the inside clean. If you are going to wet clean without decaping the primer pockets won't get clean and they will take a lot longer to dry.

so wet tumbling trumps the cost of dry tumbling if you clean a lot of cases, once you figure in the cost of media. Wet tumbling can also be done easily on a large scale, using a cement mixer.
wet tumbling takes about 10 minutes total prep time per 2 hr run of 500 cases, as far as filling, emptying, and sorting. Drying time for me is another 2-3 days spread out on paper towels, but I leave the primer in as I shoot a lot of lower pressure loads and don't want to run sooty cases through my dies. Drying time drops to about 3-4 hours during the summer when I can leave them out in the sun...the oven works as well at low temp. I can't see it being more work than sorting a bunch of dry media and worrying about getting media stuck in flash holes.

So how much did yours cost. My tumbler cost $45 and can clean around 800 to900 9mm cases at one time. I have $27 invested in media and have used around $3 in the last seven years. I have a feeling I won't catch up to what you have spent in my lifetime. To fill the tumbler, empty the tumbler and separate from the media takes me around 4 minutes. Once they are separated from the media they are ready to load. There is no media in the flash holes because I tumble with the primer in.