Brass Cleaning - My solution

[Restricted]

i just tried it. my brass looks like s**t, i soaked it in hot water and lye for about 10 mins stirring it every so often. the brass was still dirty .

+1 on that.

Would not recommend this, I tried it with bout 400 brass and everyone turned out tarnished. Worst of all the insides are just as bad as they were before.
Was worth a shot though

 

[zippy_the_wonder_chimp]

i just tried it. my brass looks like s**t, i soaked it in hot water and lye for about 10 mins stirring it every so often. the brass was still dirty so i let it sit for about an hour. my brass is still dirty and now tarnished. im not sure where i went wrong with it. maybe it depends on what type of powder your using or maybe what type of primers. i dont know. maybe others have had or will have better luck than me.

did you use the same concentration as the op? (1 tblspn + 3 L water)

 

[travellerw]

Oh wow.. I'm not sure why you would be getting different results and me. I have attached a couple of pictures of some brass that I randomly pulled off my shelf that was cleaned with this method. It not any more tarnished that it was when I picked it up from the range.

I have 100 brass that I shot on the weekend. I'm going to run through a clean and post the pictures on here.

 

[TCBF]

- I wonder if hardness of the water (ph) or amount of flouridation has an effect. Also, one stores 'lye' may not be another stores 'lye'.

 

[finstr]

I picked up the 3kg jug of lye crystals and tried this with some old cases. It turned my brass blue. looks like I blued it with gun blue! Kinda neat colours but definitly NOT shiny brass. So I can't see mee using on my Weatherby brass any time soon...
I'll use the lye for the toilets maybe but for the brass- I'll stick to my ultra sonic method.

 

[KODIAK BEAR]

I tried a small batch of semi tarnished brass in a solution as described above and the result was that the brass turned even more tarnished. It did not clean any of them. The only difference was that I used potassium hydroxide (Lye) instead of sodium but as far as I can tell they are one and the same. Maybe someone else can enlighten me.
I certainly won't be using this method again.

 

[John Y Cannuck]

I've used Lye with other chemicals for hot bluing rifle parts.
The solution I was using was a lot stronger than being discussed here, and the temp was near 300 degrees.
It boiled over, stripped all the stain off my deck in an instant.
I can't stress enough to be very careful when messing with the stuff.

Found this on a soap making site:

http://www.zetatalk.com/shelter/tshlt05d.htm

Lye, lye/water and freshly-made soap can burn and irritate skin. You'll notice itching before burning. Lye/water on skin is first noticed by a slippery feeling. Rinse your hands with vinegar and immediately rinse them with running water. Since lye can burn skin, you can imagine what it does to eyes! Always wear eye protection! Wear sunglasses if you have to! Lye can be fatal if swallowed. If you have small children, keep lye (and essential oils) in a locked cabinet. Lye/water sitting at the edge of a counter can easily be reached by children and even swallowed. Drinking lye/water is like drinking liquid fire. If someone ingests lye/water, do not induce vomiting or otherwise try to treat them. Take them to an emergency room immediately.
Fumes are produced from lye/water. Some people are extremely sensitive to fumes that come from the lye/water. Fumes also come from the stirring container. Fumes from small batches (1 pound) usually isn't enough to cause a problem. Be aware than larger amounts of lye (larger batches of soap) create more fumes. With prolonged contact, fumes can burn the eyes and skin of sensitive people. If you make soap in large amounts and afterward feel as if your face is "sun burned," chances are it was caused by fumes.

 

[Kayser Sose]

I use a bucket of hot tap water and half a cup of Castrol Super Clean from Canadian Tire (purple jug). Good stuff, tho the slippery feeling is the oil getting leached out of your skin...

Yup, nice long soak with a stir, and the brass is as clean as I would care to make it. I also fire up the convection oven, 180F for 15-20 minutes and make sure that they're dry before priming.

 

[travellerw]

Ok.. I didn't get a chance to do the cleaning tonight..

I promise I will get to it..

On another note, I was looking over some of the brass that I tried to clean with the vinegar solution. Its now blue, but my lye solution brass isn't.

 

[wapitiwhacker]

Well, I tried to clean some brass with lye today, and wasn't nearly as successful as the OP. I tried two loads, one of Lapua .223 brass, fired multiple times and moderately sooted primers in, and one of once fired winchester .308 brass, deprimed.

pre soak Lapua .223.

solution after five minutes and a couple of stirs.

.223 Lapua post soak.

.308 primer pockets.

The .223 soaked for 10 minutes, the .308 for 15. The lye did dislodge quite a bit of soot from the .223 both inside and on the necks. However, it leaves the cases, although very clean and smooth to the touch, quite mottled in colour. The once fired .308 was cleaner inside, but the same outside. Primer pockets were cleaned 50% or less.

 

[p210sig]

Yesterday I purchesed a 3kg jug of Lye from Home Hardware in Streetsville, Mississauga for 21.99$ + tax. Like to see the results i get this weekend.

 

[travellerw]

Has everyone been using boiling water? I use boiling water from a kettle.

Also.. This process does not remove the tarnish, only the black soot and crap. I don't care about how tarnished my brass is, only that the back stuff is gone.

Maybe we should try to increase the amount of lye in the solution.

 

[KODIAK BEAR]

That explains a lot. From your first post I thought we were talking about removing any tarnish from the outside of the cases.
Guess I will just stick with my vibrator.

 

[travellerw]

Ya ya.. It doesn't remove tarnish.. but it shouldn't add anymore either..

 

[wapitiwhacker]

I used the same concentration you stated earlier. Brought the water to a rolling boil. For the most part it does a decent job of desooting, bit if it won't clean primer pockets it's a non starter for me.

 

[joe-nwt]

It's summer. If you guys spent as much time shooting as you waste trying to make your brass purdy, you would be better shots for sure.

 

[mkrainc]

I realize this method isn't in the spirit of the "run to your local hardware store and get what you need", kind of deal. This is just something I tried, because I had all the materials on hand. It's more for information purposes.

These materials wouldn't cost much more than purchasing a tumbler and media, if someone wanted to go this route, and less, if things were purchased second hand.

Jewellers use a heated "pickle" solution to remove scale from jewelery after soldering. A 5 to 15 minute soak is all that's needed for that application.

After some experimentation, the method that worked for brass cases was, a two hour soak in the heated solution, turn off the cooker and leave the brass in the pickling solution over night. Next day, rince off the brass in water, and run it through three cycles in a sonic cleaner.

Then, wipe dry, put the brass in a strainer and dry over one of those 220 volt basement heaters you can get from Canadian Tire. (got one of those famous "hands on hips stare downs" from the wife when I suggested the kitchen oven for drying)

The result? Clean shiney brass, with no soot in the primer pockets or inside the case.

 

[Gatehouse]

I'm surprised at the lengths some peopel go to.

I just chuck the bras sin the tumbler and walk away for a few hours, come back and dump the brass out through a strainer, and it's good to go. Shiny and clean.CHeap and easy.

 

[masonicshooter]

i've shot my brass up to 10 times, with out cleaning, after neck sizing and cleaning primer pockets with a redding primer pocket uniformer. shot the same .25" groups at 200 yards with my match barrel rifle. for the most part, i think cleaning is a waste of time.

 

[762nato]

Any one try just boiling the brass for the same period of time in water only as a control? Perhaps the lye is not doing much of anything....
I still have a hard time thinking getting my brass wet, will improve the quality of or speed up my reloading experience...