Brass cleaning before or after neck resize or after?

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canoetrpr

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May sound silly to you guys who have been doing it for a while but bear with the noob questions please.

I notice from pictures that many of you clean brass after the primer has been removed. Figured you must be running the brass through the die that decaps and neck resizes the brass first ?

Will the tumbling / cleaning process not affect the brass neck size a bit?

Do you run it through the resizing die again before reloading? Or are you using a universal decapping die to take the primer out?
 
I tumble clean before sizing/decapping because I don't want the crap on the brass going through my dies. Some like to decap first so the primer pockets get cleaned while tumbling.


Mark
 
I wipe down each rifle case by hand before resizing, so no grit to scratch the die. Brush the inside of the case mouth, lube, resize. Check case length, trim if required. Put all prepped cases in a mild solution of TSP (trisodiumphosphate) overnight to remove lube residue, take them out to dry. The last step is overnight in the case cleaner. Hope this helps.

Happy reloading.
 
I tumble, de-prime , tumble , then do my work.

Not very much effort since the tumbler does all the work anyways.

This gives me the most confidence that I am sizing and loading cases with no residue.
 
I use a universal decapper and remove the primer then clean, after cleaning i either run pistol cases thru my progressive and they come out compleatly ready to fire on the other end or for rifle I lube then process the cases then clean once more to remove the lube.
 
For rifle cartridges I use a Lee universal decapping die to pop the primers first, then tumble and load as normal. Using the universal decapper keeps my sizing dies cleaner.
 
I size then clean for several reasons:

- I want the primer pocket cleaned;
- I want the case lube removed; and
- a bit of powder fouling makes sizing a bit easier, even with case lube.
 
Deprime, tumble, clean out and wipe down, lube and resize. My dies stay very clean and the tumbling with the primer removed helps cleaning out the pocket(ever so slightly) but it does help. But then again, everyone does their thing a little different. Pick which way you feel is best for your equipment and have fun reloading.
 
neck size and decap, dump into tumbler with stainless steel media, take out and never cease to whisper jeeeeeeesus kreist!!!! at how impressive the cases look. better than brand new particularly to gleaming spotless primer pockets. - seriously.
 
I guess I'm the exception to the rule but I have found that tumbling deprimed brass with corncob does nothing to clean the primer pockets. In fact all I've found it does is clog up the primer pockerts with tumbling media (sometimes several pieces) which means an extra step inspecting each case to make sure the primer pocket doesn't have media in it. For that reason I leave the primers in when I tumble the cases. Depriming pops out the odd piece of tumbling media when I resize. I also add a teaspoon of paint thinner/varsol to the tumbling media which helps to remove residual bullet lube & powder residue. I understand that steel pin tumbling media WILL clean primer pockets without clogging them up and when I get some money saved up I'm going to get a rotary tumbler (right now I use a vibratory) so i can use the steel media.
 
I don't tumble my brass if it goes strait from the chamber into a ammo box (IE during load development). If it touches the ground it gets tumbled then decapped/sized then tumbled again. I clean the primer pockets on a RCBS powered case thing of a ma jig.
 
If brass is dirty form sand, etc,. I tumble first so as to not damage dies. i then tumble the loaded ammo to remove lube. if brass is not too dirty, it only gets tumbled after it is loaded.

i don;t like to tumble deprimed brass because media sticks in the flash hole.
 
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