Buildup after tumbling

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evan the cdn

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Do any of you have a buildup of dust in your brass after tumbling them in corn media? I'm getting a decent amount of residue building up and it's a real pain to get out. What can I do to avoid it?

Here's the inside of the brass.
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Here's an example of how much gets built up in one piece of brass. Definitely enough to have an impact on the volume of the case.
img0240mj.jpg


Here's the result of spinning the brass in the media separator for about ten minutes. The junk comes out but it's a really slow process and to get it all out I think it would probably take about an hour of spinning.
img0239to.jpg
 
I use both crushed walnut shell and corn cob with 70/30 ratio at the same time. Both come from petstore, they seem to be low dust media that doesn't require subsequent cleaning/dust removal. Adding some NuFinish (1-2 caps) and breaking up lumps before adding brass helps keeping media somewhat dump-ish that seems to reduse dust formation too.
 
I take a dryer sheet and cover it with nufinish then throw it in the tumbler. All the dust sticks to it and I throw it away afterwards. The nufinish really makes the brass shine too.
 
could it be too much polish? With a new batch of media (corn, pet store walnut, etc).. i start with a level teaspoon and only recharge it after the brass is no longer shiny after 2-3 hours.. probably 3-5,000 rounds. Peek auto polish (blue paste) also work well.. of course Dillon, Graf, others make great liquid polishes too..
 
This was happening before I was using polish in the media. It seems to be getting much better now that I added polish and a dryer sheet.
 
One thing I've been wondering is how long do you guys tumble brass? I have a new Hornady tumbler with cob media, I'm new to reloading. I've been following the ratio of brass to media from the instructions that came with, however the instructions don't suggest a general time to have the tumbler running for.

I suppose I'm just looking for a general time. I understand that it may vary depending on dirt/fouling.

Thanks!
 
I rarely use cob, I'm mostly a walnut shell guy; but I run the brass for about 18-24 hours usually. On brass that was already pretty clean, 2-3 hours is enough.
If it takes more than a few hours, I'm just coming back tomorrow, hence the 18-24 thing.

As for the dryer sheets, I use both used and new ones, they really help with static build-up too. I usually cut the sheets into about 6 long strips, then cut the strips in half and put them one-at-a-time into the bowl so they don't get bunched-up.
 
If you use corn cob only, you are not cleaning (scrubbing) your brass, just polishing.
If you use crushed walnut shell only, you are not gonna get nicely polished brass, it just keeps on scrubbing it.
Use both at the same time, more cleaning needed - more walnut, more polishing - cob. I use 70/30 shell/cob.
Make sure cob is small enough to freely fall out from case or inside the case will get plugged and stay dirty.
Use a cup or 2 of NuFinish or some metal cleaning/polishing stuff, it helps ... to clean and polish, and keeps media a bit dump preventing dusting.
 
CeeZer said:
If you use corn cob only, you are not cleaning (scrubbing) your brass, just polishing.
If you use crushed walnut shell only, you are not gonna get nicely polished brass, it just keeps on scrubbing it.
Use both at the same time, more cleaning needed - more walnut, more polishing - cob. I use 70/30 shell/cob.
Make sure cob is small enough to freely fall out from case or inside the case will get plugged and stay dirty.
Use a cup or 2 of NuFinish or some metal cleaning/polishing stuff, it helps ... to clean and polish, and keeps media a bit dump preventing dusting.
Click to expand...

You use a cup or 2 of NuFinish in each batch?
 
Wrencher2008 said:
Since adding dryer sheets, I no longer have to wipe the brass before sizing. It works great. I use 2 1/4 sheets.
Click to expand...

+whatever. I throw one used dryer sheet in with my brass and it picks up a huge amount of the dust. I still wipe the brass off with another used dryer sheet afterwards, but there isn't much to get off.

For time, I usually run 2-3 hours on brass that is not very dirty. I have let it run overnight when cleaning up a pile of range pick up 9mm brass that was pretty dirty and corroded.

Mark
 
evan the cdn said:
You use a cup or 2 of NuFinish in each batch?
Click to expand...

What do you mean in each batch? I do it all in one shot and in 2 hrs max.
Cup is not your kitchen cup either, but NuFinish's bottle cup.

You sure can run it twice, once with shell and cleaning compaund and then with cob and polishing compaund.... I like shooting more than fussing with brass.
 
Walnut is what, <$0.50/lb? You certainly won't catch me washing/dryer-sheeting/wetting/straining/anything with tumbling media. When it gets dusty, I throw it out and add another 50 cents worth into the tumbler and carry on.

This works for me.;)
 
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