Do you decap pistol brass before tumbling?

ss tumbling makes pistol cases so clean that I need to lube them to size.... even w a carbide die, they don't glide.
With corncob+polish, cases have a little "lube" to them, and they resize SO much better.
I like ss tumbling to clean the hell out of a huge batch of super dirty ammo, but the vib tumbler is much less hassle to use for smaller batches.
 
Dirty dies? Quick spray with brake clean and done.

I find resizing before cleaning easier and saves having to clean a second time to remove the lube.
 
I used to use lee lube but I found it gums up my dies. Now when I'm sizing rifle brass I rub some RCBS lube on my fingers and coat the brass as I'm inspecting it. No issues now.

Pistol (straight walled brass) I don't lube. I just tumble, primer in, to clean it a bit.
 
I also recently picked up a universal decapping die so now I'll just quickly dump all my day's brass in a heap and deprime them all, dumping the brass into the tumbler as I go.
 
07blackwater said:
I use the lee decap die for my rifle brass but I don't bother with pistol.

That lee die is one of the best pieces of kit I've bought, worth every penny. Inexpensive too!
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Agreed. It's deprimed thousands of rounds without any issue. Haven't even broken a rod yet, despite encountering a number of Berdan primers.
 
redddogg69 said:
Just decaped 2000 or so 9mm cases on my lee single stage. I will now ultra sonic them and hand prime before running them through my dillon 650. In the future I'm just going to grab a spare tool head and decap on the Dillon. On the bright side my right arm can tear the head off a bear now.
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I really don't think there is any advantage to going that way although, there is certainly no harm in it either. I load about 15-20K a year on my 650 and going thru those extra steps seems a little bit like getting out of the shower to pee.
 
I know I go a little overboard, but I like working with clean and shiny pistol brass. I start by tumbling in corncob media with the primers still in. Then it's off to the press to de-prime. My next step is an ultrasonic cleaning to get the primer pockets and inside the case nice and clean. Most brass finishes up looking like new.
 
here's my routine for 45acp and 9mm (lee turret press with 4 dies)

tumble
resize/de-cap
clean pockets
hand prime (RCBS)
hand charge with dipper (700x)
seat bullet
crimp

some day I may switch to a progressive but for now I have the time and I'm having fun.

(I've been making beer for 30 years. it was fun at first using old beer bottles. eventually it became more like work and now I use CO2 charged kegs.)
 
1911Kevin said:
I know I go a little overboard, but I like working with clean and shiny pistol brass. I start by tumbling in corncob media with the primers still in. Then it's off to the press to de-prime. My next step is an ultrasonic cleaning to get the primer pockets and inside the case nice and clean. Most brass finishes up looking like new.
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Sounds good to me ... I'd follow that regime..
 
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