Here's a hit.. without a media separator (I don't have one), leave some water in the bucket (4-5 inches).. the pins don't stick to the case walls when under water. Just pick up, in fingers shake while under in your hand for a half second and presto. Never had a pin in a case in the 2 years I've been running. Cheers!
Ive never done this before, but that's exactly what I would have thought to do. Been a mechanic for years, maybe I just know it'd be easier under liquid.... It's easier to get gunk off of parts when they're submerged.
Used to shake the pins out of each case. Now I use a $1 colander from Dollar Tree. Just dump the pins and cases in (over a bucket) and shake the colander. The pins let go and fall into the bucket. Slowly pour the water in the bucket out and then dry the cases and pins in the sun on separate towels (or on a cookie sheet in the oven at the lowest setting). Stir them around on the towels occasionally. Works like a charm. Dry clean cases and pins in an hour.
Thanks! Great video, didn't realize that dry tumbling produced lead dust. So from this video dry is out. Now to decide between wet tumble or ultrasonic. Much appreciated and gave the video a like. 🌊🤙🎨
Wet will likely be significantly cheaper and allow for greater volume than ultrasonic, but if you plan to clean parts and aren't a high-volume shooter ultrasonic can still be a solid choice.
Never had a problem getting brass looking like new in a vibrating tumbler. I use corn cob with a bit of cheap car polish added. My tumbler has a solid lid with no vents, so no problems with it spreading dust everywhere. You just have to inspect the primer pockets and flash holes to make sure media isn't stuck in the holes. Brass always comes out looking like new.
I recently decided to get into reloading after learning about wet tumbling, I had went to Harbor Freight a month or so ago and saw a double barrel rock polisher (which I initially bought to mill black powder lol) but a couple days later I realized I might be able to polish brass with it, and polish brass it does! I had thought I would need a vibratory tumbler to clean brass, I didn't even know wet tumbling was a thing until I did a few internet searches for using my rock tumbler for cleaning brass. I had a huge store of dirty brass I was saving for the day I purchased a reloading press and decided to try it out and it works fantastic, a little dish soap, 1/4 teaspoon of citric acid and a pound of stainless media got that brass nice and shiny. I polished up about 5k cases over a two day span, and after looking at all that fresh brass I bought a Lee Pro Sixpack reloading press😂, it was the motivation I needed to finally get one lol. For $70 the HF rock polisher is a great option in my opinion, I can polish around 700-800 cases (9mm) in one go with both drums, and it only needs to run for an hour or so. And I don't think I'll ever be using a vibratory tumbler with the dust issue, I've been leaded enough already after years of casting and working with lead, wet tumbling, despite the difficulty of seperating the stainless media, is definitely the way to go in my opinion.
Thanks for the informative video. I'll be making a tumbler similar to the wet tumbler in the video. I didn't know about wet tumbling so was planning on just using fine sand or aluminium oxide I've got for other jobs but after seeing this I might make the cylinder water tight to allow me to use it wet or dry depending on my needs at the time
Leave your brass in a vibratory cleaner long enough, they come out sparkly clean. Also, the RCBS vibratory tumbler has a solid clear lid and no dust is thrown up when using.
My Berry's tumbler has a solid lid also. And I put a little Berry's brass cleaner in with the walnut and shiny inside and out. I even clean brass we pickup that people leave in the desert.
Used Lyman tumblers for 20 years. The treated walnut shells last a long time/ years and is easily revived with Flitz metal polish. Keep the dust / noise to a minimum by placing a cardboard box over the tumbler. After seeing the mess involved with wet tumblers, I have no desire to switch. Extremely corroded cases belong in the garbage. My 2 Cents. : )
I do the two cycle two stage method. Step one start one cycle with wet tumbler. Step two put in media vibrating tumbler. Then repeat again. Tip: Pre-Soak overnight to help loosen up deposits. Always wear gloves..... Wash well when done.
I use a Frankford Arsonel dry vibrator and it has a solid cover so there is no disk outside of the bucket. The static energy generated between the plastic buck and walnut shells makes the dust stick to the plastic bucket. I use a few teaspoons of Frankford Arsenal case cleaner every time I clean. Provided I let it run for 2-3 hours the brass outer surface comes out very shinny. The inner surfaces still look dirty but the outside is nice and clean. I have not had to replace my media yet. I probably clean 2-300 cases at a time. I think wanting the brass to be shinny is just us reloaders trying to one up each other. Besides allowing the press to run smoother there really is no need to need a clean case. Gun powder does not care if you case is nice and shinny. It cares about the amount of spark it gets from primer and air available to combine with.
Have a old Dillion Vibratory tumbler and a couple of rock tumblers. Use pins and Lemi Shine in the rock tumblers to clean then toss into the Dillion with clean media and blue case polish to dry and shine. Get the good clean up and trap lead in the water of the tumblers and get a good polish and dry with the media tumbler. Biggest question is how long till the pins and brass chew through the plastic buckets in the wet tumblers?
I wet tumble my rifle brass and use a vibrating tumbler for pistol . When I would use a vibrating tumbler on rifle cartridges it a chore to get the medium out from inside the case and I don’t use the steel pin when wet tumbling . I have damaged and broken a few decapping rods and pin when I didn’t get all the pin out of the case . I use vibrating tumbler for my pistol cases because they are straight wall and the polishing medium easily shakes out
Hi Ian, this is a great question, The lead dust that you're encountering when dry-tumbling your cartridge casings comes from lead residue left from firing bullets. While you're absolutely correct that the use of cast lead bullets generates far more lead dust, the fact remains that jacketed bullets can still leave lead residue behind as well. You likely already know this but for new shooters, when a bullet (jacketed or cast) is produced, it's intentionally made slightly larger than the diameter of the gun barrel it's designed to be fired from. This is done so that the bullet will 'engage' with the rifling in the barrel. Essentially, the rifling lands cut into the bullet, imparting a spin to it to increase accuracy. Depending on the thickness of the copper jacket, the temperature of the gun barrel and the velocity the bullet is traveling at, this can and often does cause some tearing of the jacket, exposing the lead core and transferring lead to the barrel and the air. If you dig a jacketed round out of a backstop you will likely see this for yourself. This lead 'exhaust' naturally travels throughout the gun, with a large amount of it ending up in the cartridge casing from back-pressure. This is why even guns used exclusively with jacketed bullets will still accumulate some lead residue, albeit far less than those used with cast bullets. It's also worth noting that many reloading bullets, particularly budget-prices ones, are not jacketed but plated. Plated bullets often have only a very, very thin layer of copper/brass on them which is perforated much easier than a true jacketed bullet. The bottom line is, although using jacketed rounds does make a major difference in the amount of lead dust that will end up in your tumbler/media, it's still a factor worth considering. In regards to your question about lead dust/fumes from casting bullets; yes, absolutely that's a concern. I myself only cast bullets outdoors and wear a respirator specifically designed for lead dust/fumes for this very reason. As always, common sense remains the best way to stay safe in all areas of firearms, including case cleaning. Provided you take some basic precautions I'm sure you'll be just fine. Restricting your dry-tumbler to outdoor use/keeping it in areas away from your living space such as the garage, shed or porch, as well as regularly changing your media will greatly reduce the amount of lead you're exposed to. Safety devices like latex gloves or a simple dust mask, while not essential, will further mitigate lead exposure. This probably sounds like overkill, but with lead's propensity for bio-accumulation over long periods of time, simple steps like these can go a long way to keeping you healthy for comparatively little inconvenience. Hope that helps!
I think the majority of lead left behind in cases & the bore with loads fired with jacketed bullets comes from the lead compound found in non-corrosive primers.
Excellent video! I agree with most of your pro & con points. Because of my anal retentive tendencies, I use both types of tumblers. Initially, after depriming, I wet tumble. To separate the cases from the pins, I use a standard Lyman "crank handle" separator. However, I fill the separator with water to about the half way point on the case chamber. The separation works perfectly. I then fold a bath towel into a "bag" and shake wet cases in the "bag" to remove most of the water. Following that, a few minutes with a hair dryer and the cases are perfectly clean and dry. Next, I lube the cases and resize. After resizing, I tumble again, this time in a vibrating tumbler with corn cob and polish. This second tumble is partly to remove the sizing lube and partly to add a little wax to the casings. The wet tumble cleans the casings so thoroughly they're more subject to tarnish. The corn cob and polish fixes this. One problem I have (that you didn't mention) is corn cob particles getting stuck in the flash hole. As a final step in the cleaning process, I blow the cases out with compressed air.
Wow that's a pretty thorough process. You're right about the WT causing them to tarnish a bit faster, although I've found if you keep them in sealed containers (I use large storage tubs from Walmart) this becomes a non-issue. I know what you mean about the primer pockets getting clogged, but for that reason I don't de-prime until after cleaning. One of my Winter projects is to the take the racks from my FA Brass Dryer (which is a piece of crap) and build a large, rotating drum to add centrifugal force. I'm going to line them with some kind of velvet or felt material to help absorb some water and pipe in heat from a hair dryer in the bottom to evaporate moisture and force it out the top. Should be interesting.
Honestly it really comes down to money vs performance. If you want your brass as clean as you can possibly get it, go with the wet tumbler. If your brass is already in relatively good shape and you just want it clean enough to shoot again, go with the vibratory system.
just bought the wet tumbler.....and i think im going to throw it all in the oven and then shake out the media AFTER the water is gone. but im sure everyone looks at the inside of their brass before reloading anyways while on the press.
I do have something I would like to add to the vibratory system. Although you are right to say it is less effective I can't help but point out the fact that your machine in this video was very very dirty and that a couple of ounces of mineral spirit can decrease the amount of dust drasticly and believe me when I say drasticly just try it for yourself (add two ounces of mineral spirit to your media and let it run about 30 to 45 minutes just by itself and you will see how little dust you will get) Also it helps refresh the media so you can use it multiple times. On that, have a good day!
To be honest I don't have a clue but I have seen almost no dust at all since i'm using mineral spirit although it stinks like hell, be prepared for that cheap quality industrial vodka smell when you enter the room XD
@@PPWarrior mineral spirits also kills the media and you end up buying more media making it more expensive in the long run. If you throw a damp paper towel over top of tumbler will help a lot but the dust sticks to casings as well so when you remove and you either have to Rinse or hand wipe. This is the major Con dust on case and not very clean primer pockets.
Wet Tumbling is the way to go. for people that are ocd like myself and want their brass to look as though it is brand new it is the best. a cheaper option is what i did was buy a rotary wet jewelry tumbler from Ali Express and have been using dish soap with a small sprinkle of citric acid with stainless pins to make them shine. in terms of speeding up drying i bought a food dehydrator for 20 bucks new and use that to dry cases and will be ready to load after a couple of hours.
Yeah I've seen a few people do that. For me issue was volume; it's a 45 minute drive to the range, so when I go, I'm there for three or four hours and the casings really pile up.
I have indeed! I bought one a couple years ago and while it works fine for large mouth, shallow cases like 45ACP, or 44M I still find it frustrating when it comes to 223, 38S or 308.
I separate the SS media from cases in my Frankford Arsenal media separator. It can separate both wet or dry media. Just fill it with enough water that the bottom of the rotating container is about 2 inches under the water. Pins fall out into the bowl easily, not a problem or hassle at all
I have the FA separator as well and while it works *pretty good*, pretty good isn't good enough for me when I have to pay $15 for shipping from the US to replace a deprimer that breaks off on a pin stuck in a 223 casing.
TATV Canada I guess I don’t get it, I deprime before tumbling and primer pockets get clean, then drain in a sieve before putting it in my separator and separating pins from brass. Never broke a decapping pin. Inspect before sizing and remove any pins then, not sure what you are saying here, anyway, happy loading, we all live and learn.
On wet tumbling, I have a video out that shows how to separate your stainless media, Just on the final rinse of your brass hand tumble it in a spaghetti strainer in the rinse water in the bucket, all the pins fall out and collect at the bottom of the bucket. Just take the brass out in the strainer and set it out to dry, I'm lucky to have a shoe rack that came with my dryer, within 30 minutes the brass is dry and ready to load. Dave.
I bought my Frankford Arsenal wet tumbler as a kit that included their big magnet. Separating stainless steel pins from the brass is a snap. So that's another Pro for the wet system. As far as drying wet brass? I use my fruit/vegetable 9 shelve dehydrator. Thousands of pistol brass take about 1 hour to dry at 145 degrees. You couldn't PAY me to go back to the dry method.
@@Russell-1 From start to finish you can clean and dry brass in 4 hours. The dry method takes longer than that. I agree with Joe, you couldn't pay me to go back to the dry method.
Never use any liquid ammonia type of cleaner or add ammonia type abrasive into dry tumblers because it causes brass to become brittle. Both types are fine for most people but be aware to never allow any stainless pins left inside brass especially with smaller caliber bottle neck cartridges. One pin can break your decapping die pin or cause possible barrel rifling damage if a pin is unknowingly left in case and fired.
@@WYO2K The pink is a chemical reaction from brass reacting to traces of ammonium within the cleaning solution. If cases become age hardened from the ammonium, split cases will start to occur. This was discovered by the military when they used horse cavalry decades ago and stored ammunition in horse stables. The natural ammonium from horse urine gassing off caused brass cases to split when left there for a long time.
Im gonna try some fine dry abrasive medium in my ultrasonic cleaner. Think it will work? (I havent found any reference to it online, but someone has to be the first!)
Separating the pins is absolutely the main downside of wet tumbling (to me, anyway). The most effective approach I've found is to use a salad spinner. I dump about 75 - 100 cases into the basket of the spinner and shake it over the spinner's bowl. This separates 99% of the pins and removes much of the water. Then I spin the basket for about 30 seconds and that separates any remaining pins and almost all of the water. The brass is spread out in a paper towel lined disposable aluminum roaster pan and left overnight to dry. It is still more work than dry tumbling, but I prefer the results that wet tumbling gives.
if you want to clean dust up from the room where you vibrated the brass for the next two weeks then use the vibrator type cleaner are do is I did set it outside
Works good with new brass as you just wash it in the tumbler(no need for the tumbler as its chemical cleaning). I bought a rotary tumbler after this review and for older heavily tarnished and scratched brass you have to leave it longer and then it comes out with a brushed look. Looks terrible, worse then just leaving it tarnished and scratched. I ended up having to machine buff each shell. Annoyed me so much threw the rest of the brass out! Haven't found anything apart from hand or machine buffing that makes older scratched up brass look like new!
If you're using lead bullets and standard primers (which contain lead) there will be lead dust in there. With the price of ground corncob or walnut being as cheap as it is at pet stores or paint shops, I just can't see bothering with reusing it for long.
Not sure what media you use, for your vibratory cleaner but it looks like it does a terrible job, I have never had cases come out of mine looking that dirty. Other than primer pocket and inside mine are considerably brighter and cleaner than what yours look like
The only thing I've ever been able to think of was adding some liquid or even just carnauba wax to the mix, but I always came to the conclusion that it would just wash off when rinsing.
Honestly I do it mostly for cosmetic reasons; I like that the slugs look more like factory. It does also smooth out any sprue lines, but those are pretty minimal.
A vibratory tumbler with a solid or completely closed lid can also wet tumble, just add your stainless media, your soap , and brass cleaner such as lemi shine. Just use common sense and don't overfill with water ( doesn't take much ) as you would with a rotary tumbler, unplug it or remove the bowl when emptying, every bit as effective !
A few folks have mentioned that, and I do not doubt it to be true. What turned me off of it was the relatively low capacity in the units I could find here.
Having tried both, Im back in the camp of “dry” media vibratory. Here’s my thoughts. At first I dry tumbled. I very quickly went to lizard bedding from the pet store as it is cheap, add to that a big fat squirt of cheap wet car polish from the auto parts store and results we’re fair. I got tired of the dust, so I got a wet tumbler, a big one, it cleans ok but can be kinda of picky about how much media to brass there is. Add in the fact that Im on a septic and didn’t want to be dumping lead riddle water into my septic. Then there is, as the video mentioned, drying the brass. A hand full of squibs due to wet primer pockets and I was frustrated. Then, separating the SS pins, pain, a magnet was a joke, trying to use a media roller/separator just send SS pins all over my garage. Nice results but that was enough. I went back to “dry” media vibratory. Now I say dry in quote because of this reason, I had been told by several old scuts to put in a heavy splash of mineral spirits ti my dry media. Well I did and the results have been great. Wet SS pins still have the edge on getting all the soot out of cases but thats it. The dry media with a bit of polish and a splash of mineral spirits works great. It cleans ALMOST as good as SS pins, it is 10 times easier to separate, it polished the brass like SS pins do and the moisture of the mineral spirits puts a end to the nasty dust. It also makes the dry media last alot longer. Hope this helps someone.
baymeo split also, if you use liquid car polish, put your media in the tumbler, squirt in a healthy squeeze of polish into the media, pit the lid on and let that run on its own for about an hour. This will distribute the polish in the media and prevent clumping.
Pardon my ignorance please.... with dry vibratory tumbling - where does all this lead come from if your not shooting cast lead bullets? Theres no lead in the brass? The projectiles you fire are copper jacketed, so non of that lead is exposed, there's no lead in the double based nitrocellular gun powder, just like theres no lead in the primer compound. I am at a loss to understand where this lead danger comes from please? The walnut media has no lead in it. The nulon polish if added likewise has no lead. The plastic vibrating tub has no lead. So wouldn't the dangers from lead dust ONLY apply to those who shoot cast lead projectiles? In that case likely they are inhaling the lead vapors when casting their lead projectiles anyway?. I've never fired cast lead projectiles - so I am trying to choose between dry vibratory and wet tumbling and this video has me questioning the lead risk comments is all. Many thanks in advance!.
Adding a sheet of clothes softener (Bounce) removes a LOT of dust and keeps the media cleaner - replac the pieces of Bounce. Not everyone melts their own bullets, I don't see how jacketted bullets produce lead. Also, the primer pockets don't get blocked if you decap after cleaning. So there are options available to remove the CONs for dry tumbling.
I'm not sure I agree on the cost of media - you can buy giant bags of the stuff at big box pet stores for just a few bucks. Treat it yourself. Also, most tumblers have a lid these days to the dust issue is WAY overblown. How about, some people just like shiny brass? If that's you, go with the wet system.
Hi Carl, that's a great question. Unfortunately, I've never used an ultrasonic cleaning system before. I've seen them used in workshops for cleaning gun parts and they seemed to work very well for that, but I've never tried one on brass nor do I have access to one to attempt it. Anecdotally I've heard they work fairly well but are very expensive, but I'm afraid beyond that I can't offer much insight into them. Sorry!
I don't think it's the device itself so much as the cleaning solution. The ultrasonic's also don't process nearly as much brass as a rotary will. I'd still be interested in trying one some day but it's not in the budget for now.
@@Crlarl I own all three systems. The vibratory sits in the corner collecting dust, not sure what I will ever use it for again. The ultrasonic cleaner is only used to clean gun parts, mainly suppressor parts. It works great for that. The wet tumbler gets used and abused. It's fantastic! I dip the brass in a tarnish inhibitor then dry it with a food dehydrator.
I've never used one personally nor do I have access to one to say. Just in chatting with other folks who do, I'm told they work fairly well but are expensive.
For a good sonic cleaner, such as the RCBS one, You pay maybe 2/3 to 3/4 the cost of a wet tumbler. With wet tumbling, no other method gets you results that are 100% on par with wet tumbling. I've found sonic cleaners can get you maybe 80 to 90% towards the wet tumbling results, depending on how dirty the cases are. A couple things I've observed: -Sonic cleaner can be easily over burdened with too much brass, making cleaning less effective -sonic cleaners are time sensitive in that once you run a 30 minute batch, you can't really do another 30 minutes without new cleaning solution, and the effects aren't going to make much od a difference it seems. -sonic cleaners running for 30 minutes is a HELL of a lot quicker than 2-4 hours in a wet tumbler -Cleanup with a sonic cleaner is so simple compared to wet tumbling, having to separate stainless media adds an entire element of work and headache to the labor process -it's much cheaper to utilize wet tumbling cleaning supplies than it is sonic cleaning specific solutions -a sonic cleaner you can still use for things other than brass, such as cleaning dies, gun parts, tools, etc -wet tumbling definitely allows you to process larger quantities of brass in the same amount of space without sacrificing quality
If your going to buy an ultrasonic cleaner avoid any from “gun” brands - buy one from a tool shop, they’re just as good (if not better) and are cheaper to boot. As for the cleaning solution, there are plenty of home brew solutions out there, again just as effective and a hell of a lot cheaper
Water tight container, some lemishine and dish soap, stainless steel pins, and your arms to shake the hell out of it for a few minutes. You have now turned yourself into a brass cleaning machine and gotten a good arm workout.
@TATVCanada naw, it only takes about 5 minutes or so if vigorous shaking. You gotta remember how slowly the wet tumbler agitation is. Obviously, if you can afford to have a machine that will do it for you it is very convenient. I have a big ass wet tumbler and use it a lot. For quite a while I just used a plastic coffee can, about a pound of stainless steel pins, and the water with generic dish soap and lemishine.
Totally biased against dry tumbling. I disagree. You say dry is less effective - yes the inside of the cases are not as clean as wet tumbling as if this makes a difference to anybody. You say media produces lead dust - use a different media and keep the lid on. And, disposing of the media is a problem because of lead - but putting the dirty lead filled water into the sewer system is the way to go? You say you must replace the media - I use mine many all year without a problem and it only costs a few dollars to replace. Also, your dry tumbled cases shown are horrible - did you only tumble for 30 min? Change your media to fine corn cob and add small amount of Nu Finish to the batch, tumble for a few hours and they will come out spotless. Mine has a discharge chute so no separating is needed. You say tumbling in the garage is just not practical for some - really? why not? Ask the wife if she will allow you to use the kitchen sink for your wet cleaning routine - good luck with that. Dry tumbling is way cheaper, less complicated, way less cleanup, does not require drying of cases, and can be done anywhere with equally good results.
I stated much the same to the guy - he didn't take kindly to it. I've been trying to find a reason to make the move to wet tumbling, but as of yet can't seem to come up with any real reasons to.
The depictions of vibratory cleaned brass in this video isn't accurate - my cases come out considerably cleaner and brighter that what was shown in this video. It seems that this video is biased toward wet tumbling.
The footage in this video is exactly what was recorded. I buy all my own equipment, and don't produce, sell, or receive any money from any of the manufacturers who's products are shown. Use whatever method you like, I couldn't care less.
@@TATVCanada Nice attitude. If you couldn't care less, why bother responding at all? The point that I'm making, for those who may come across my comment, is simply what I stated above - your depictions aren't indicative of what is possible with vibratory tumbling. I have no doubt it's what you recorded, but I'd venture to guess you may not have used any media additive, and you may not have allowed for enough time in the vibratory tumbler. I literally, just today, dry tumbled some pretty gnarly looking 223 in corn cob with Flitz additive, and they came out looking shiny new so either I'm doing something right, you're doing something wrong, or possibly a combination of both.
@@TATVCanada I dont understand your reply. Isn't dumping the water full of lead down the drain a Con of wet tumbling? Touching and handling all that lead water and wet brass probably a con as well.
@@TATVCanada That's great maybe point that out in the video because all your brass handling in the video is done barehanded. The issue of dumping all that leaded water into the public water supply is still not addressed.
The dangers of lead are addressed in my very first video on casting as well as several subsequent ones on reloading and cleaning brass; I'm not going to cover it over and over. As far dumping it down the drain; your municipality has lead remediation processes in place to handle the miles of lead solder and pipes in your city, as well as the runoff from lead paint, shingles, eavestrough, roof flashing and wheel weights. The amount added from reloaders would be beyond infinitesimal.
