Wet Tumbling Brass | The Complete Guide 

I have been running my one Thumblers with the same media for 8 years in August. Have no problems with dullness or whatnot. Of course back when I got my media it was the only kind widely available. I’ve seen now they have smaller diameter pins and the chips like you mentioned. That being said I would estimate my media has seen over 100k pieces of brass, and I don’t notice any difference in cleaning ability or time.

I’ve used both, warm/hot seems to clean slightly better for me, but I typically use cold out of the hose out back.

I’ve experimented with a lot of different run times. If you have the newer, higher speed model, your times will be reduced. Both of mine are low speed. I usually load my tumbler up with more brass than suggested, so need a longer run time. For me, I’ve found anything under 4 hours typically will get the brass looking good, but leave residue in the primer pocket. Obviously you don’t have to run it that long, especially if your brass went from gun, to range bag, to tumbler.

It is ill advised to wet tumble brass with primers in. Your primer pockets won’t get clean, but the much larger problem occurs with the primers “welding” themselves into the pocket. When you go to decap, you won’t notice that the bottom of the cup came out, but the wall is still stuck inside. It really becomes annoying when you’re running progressive presses, and you find out the hard way your primer won’t seat. I have personally run into this problem rather extensively with Speer nickel plated 9mm brass that sat outside for a while before collection, dew and rain welded a good number of the primers in.

In a Thumbler's Tumbler like the one in the video, I use one tablespoon of Dawn and one quarter teaspoon of Lemi Shine. Works perfect for me. If anything I may be able to use a little less of both, but I'm not too tempted to try because I love how my brass looks.

I have found that one teaspoon of dawn and 1/8 of lemie shine to 6 pounds of brass and run it for 2 hours then rinse it several times till no sud's and put it on a screen in the sun till dry .

I only use dry tumbling to remove lube from rifle brass after sizing. Otherwise, wet tumbling is superior in every way, in my opinion.

Hahaa. Someone else said that in the comments here. Just listened to a bit of the video. I started cracking up cause in this video my buddy definitely does sound like the Lock Picking Lawyer. It’s not so much his voice, but rather the tone fluctuation. (If that makes sense).

Yes that is very true lol

Two of us run this channel. My buddy (the other guy) made this video. I’m gonna have to listen to this video again cause I enjoy the Lock Picking Lawyer! 😄 (In person I’ve never noticed him sounding anything like the Lock Picking Lawyer)

If your time is free, building one might be cheaper, sure. Once you factor in drying time of the brass (unless you spend even more on a dehydrator/drier) yes, wet tumbling does take longer.

@@bane762 yeah, drying takes longer but on the other hand, you don't have dust everywhere. Also, I have one hell ecological drier - trunk of my car. In summer, when I do most of my brass processing it's dry very quickly :) Moreover, I have plenty of brass, both 9 mm and .223, so I can wait as I have a lot already cleaned ready to be reloaded and another batch is in tumbler so time is not an issue. Obviously, if you circulate few hundreds of cases it might be a problem. Also, making your own tumbler doesn't take too long, one nice saturday and you are done. Beer, BBQ, sunny day and you are just relaxing making it :)

I made a wet tumbler with a cheeseball container, roller stand, drill, and a cut piece of plywood to attach the drill to the container lid. It literally cost me nothing. Because I had it all on hand.

StraightWhite Male exactly what I was talking about. Creativity is your only limit. You just need some powerful hi torque motor, power adapter and some cheap items from HW store. If you are really into high capacity, concrete mixer is a way to go. To dry all that cases, in this hot summer you can just use trunk of your car or truck. If you are using steel pins, just use Dillon hi capacity separator (no problem for 2000 cases of 9 mm) and some strong magnet to pickup rest.

RanchRange 45 p

If you have the room, more power to you. Wet tumbling produces the cleanest brass you can get, including the primer pockets. The amount of work is negligible compared to anything else you do along the reloading road.

Does the metal walls of the concrete mixer scar the brass? The metal walls seems as if it would be a little rough on the brass

leroybrown505 I use a plastic drum mixer, the paddles are steel but no noticeable damage. I run it with at least 10,000 5.56 cases at a time.

leroybrown505 ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-cgSgQV4zMDo.html

Wes Richards Wes Richards nice, Iv worked with cement mixers but didn’t know they had plastics ones. I was going to make one out of a 55 gallon rain barrel and plastic weld some plastic flipper for the inside and put it on a rolling system with a motor and some rollers. Might have to try this.

Media doesn’t last forever? I’ve been wet tumbling with the same media for the last ten years, amazingly it still works. You can tumble for less time if you want. Or more. It doesn’t matter. On a low speed TT I prefer the time I stated.

@@bane762 Not to be difficult but maybe that's why it takes you 8 hours when the rest of us are doing it in 2-3.

Funny because it’s been working fine for me for about 10 years. Maybe different stroke for different folks is real.

@Luke Calacci This guy's a doofus. No idea what he's talking about. And if Bane762 reads this and is all butt hurt over it, i don't care, it's the truth. He doesn't know enough to call the dry "tumbler" what it actually is, an oscillating vibratory cleaner. And no, i don't use that exact lengthy term every time i talk about them; "vibrating cleaner" is sufficient. But the point is, it's NOT a "tumbler". And to what you said, i agree; just about spit my coffee out when i heard him say the wet tumbler "takes longer" and needs "4 to 8 hours". Wtf?? 1.5 to 2 hours is plenty. Which is less time than most ppl run a vib. unit, AND does a far better job. Like i said, the guy has no idea wtf he's talking about.

You got really worked up over this.

@@bane762 If that's your way of admitting to putting out low quality "helpful" info. on YT, then i accept.

Not at all, as I wasn’t in this video, nor was I involved in any part (other than hosting it on the channel). My buddy who made this video makes some quality ammunition, so what he does seems to be working. About 5 likes per dislike isn’t great, but it clearly shows the majority of people liked it. Have a better day. 😉

And directly into your lungs when you open up the top. It’s pretty crazy that naturally occurring elements can all be found in water.