Wet tumbling

[Griff]

A guy over on the SASS Wire posted about his results wet tumbling with Hornady's Sonic Cleaner. So I tried it today. Decapped my brass last night and tumbled the brass in the solution for 3 hours. Looks better'n new brass, inside, outside, and in the primer pockets.

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[GunnyMack]

WOW! I might have to look into getting a wet tumbler.
My worst gun for making brass look dirty is my 257 AI. One firing and they look like they have been neglected for years.

[Griff]

WOW! I might have to look into getting a wet tumbler.
My worst gun for making brass look dirty is my 257 AI. One firing and they look like they have been neglected for years.

My worst are of my 45 Colt rifles. They get a lot of blowby as my SASS loads definitely on the light side. I use 6 grains of RedDot behind a 200 grain bullet for about 800-900 fps. I have a bunch of 45 Colt, 45ACP & C45S brass to clean from my last 2 matches to clean & I'll take before & after pics.

[Shasta]

I've been wet tumbling for some time using water, a good squirt of Dawn dish soap, a pinch of Lemi Shine, and stainless steel pins. You absolutely cannot get brass any cleaner or shinier inside and out and you get spotless primer pockets too. It is important to rinse the pins and tumbler drum thoroughly after each use to remove any contaminants. I use a Frankford Arsenal brass dryer to speed up the final drying process.

For those thinking about getting set up for wet tumbling, I highly recommend the Extreme Tumblers Rebel 17. It is not cheap, but features strong pillow block ball bearings and will last a lifetime:

https://stainlesstumblingmedia.com/extr ... el-17.html

Shasta

[Griff]

Gunnymack,

Here's the before and after pictures of the load of various 45 caliber brass I just took out of the tumbler. If you expand the photo you should be able to see inside quite a few cases and into primer pockets on others.

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There are both brass and a few nickel cases of the 45 Colt cut down to C45S length.

[marlinman93]

I switched to wet tumbler a decade ago when I bought my friend's tumbler and ceramic media from his wife's estate sale. I was shocked how quickly it came clean, and how much cleaner brass was inside and out. I liked it so much that this summer I bought a 2nd larger tumbler when Midway USA had a clearance sale on a Northern that was much larger and rated for 1000 pcs. of .223 brass.
I use the larger tumbler more now, but I often run both at the same time when I have different cartridges and I like keeping the brass separated.

[Ysabel Kid]

Griff - what equipment do you use for your wet tumbling?

I tried doing this with a rock tumbler this year with great results, but it only handles small batches.

[Griff]

I'm using a Frankfort Arsenal "Platinum" tumbler I got on sale from Midway earlier this year. To date my best results are with the Hornady One Shot Sonic Cleaner solution. I am letting it run for the full 3 hours available on the timer. I believe, given the shine I'm getting, I could probably cut that down. I'll have to test it out with the next batch I do. But, I'm leaving out on Friday with a load of tires to MS. Don't know when I'll get back home to shoot some more to be able to clean more brass.

[Malamute]

Many people are wet tumbling without pins, its simpler and works well. Several people say that the cases cleaned with pins are too clean, the cases stick on the expander or powder/expander die more.

Some are using lemi-shine, the citric acid powder made for a dishwasher additive, walmart has it, then armor all wash and wax, which helps the cases go through the dies easier.

If you want to get serious, use a concrete mixer to clean cases. One that hasnt been used for contrete. You can do a 5 gallon bucket of brass at once.

ive used the lemi shine in a harbor freight dual drum rock tumbler. Its small, but works well. Even sloshing around brass in a plastic bucket with lemi-shine for a while and letting it sit a bit has worked, just not quite as well as an actual tumbler.

I think Im done with dry tumbling.

[TedH]

I just got into wet tumbling last week. I too am thoroughly impressed! I wish I had started this years ago.

[marlinman93]

I use a squirt of almost any dishwashing liquid soap. I'm not interested in making my brass look like jewelry, just making it really clean. I've found that around 1.5-2 hrs. is plenty of time to get them very clean. My old tumbler had no timer, so I used a plug in wall timer, but the new one has a timer that works great.

[Bill in Oregon]

I follow Malamute's routine: squirt of Dawn, 1/2 tsp Lemishine and capful of Armor All car wash in the Thumbler's, but with the SS pins. Only downside is that, occasionally, two pins will stick side-by-side in a flashhole. They come right out.