How do you clean your brass

I have an RCBS vibrator, I'm sure it's no better or worse than any other, and when I have used it it worked fin (walnuts). But it's been many loads since I bothered. Dull brass doesn't bother me.
 
Frankford Arsenal Platinum with stainless steel pins, for me. I'll admit it's a bit of a bother making sure case by case that no pins remained stuck in there, but on the other hand I had to inspect them for neck cracking or shiny base rings anyhow, so it's all done at the same time.
 
Grawfr said:
Frankford Arsenal Platinum with stainless steel pins, for me. I'll admit it's a bit of a bother making sure case by case that no pins remained stuck in there, but on the other hand I had to inspect them for neck cracking or shiny base rings anyhow, so it's all done at the same time.
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I never found many pins get stuck if you use a good separator ..
 
Reeferman said:
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Those look like the same Princess Auto pillow bearings I used on my homemade tumbler!

Edit: looks like the same auto heater hose on the shafts too!
 
Sizing die just glides over a SS WT brass. Shiny doesn't hurt.
Had som 44Mag brass that wouldn't clean properly with corn/walnut, had to use lube to for sizing (all other stations empty) to avoid damaging my LNL. After SS WT could load up all stations.
yomomma said:
Amen...shiny is over-rated
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burnaby said:
Sizing die just glides over a SS WT brass. Shiny doesn't hurt.
Had som 44Mag brass that wouldn't clean properly with corn/walnut, had to use lube to for sizing (all other stations empty) to avoid damaging my LNL. After SS WT could load up all stations.
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I've found the same thing and the press stays cleaner
 
pistol brass I dry tumble with walnut hulls due to the amount I reload, walnut is harder than corn cob and cleans a bit better.

For rifle I use a sonic cleaner
 
Well I've always liked clean and shiny but that's not what sold me on using wet tumbling. For me its much easier and cleaner. It may not be for everyone and that's ok but it works for me.
My son is a HVAC mechanic and had most of the parts. Not sure if he bought those bearings at Princess Auto or had them. The reason we left the shafts long is we might make a bigger tumbler or two smaller ones for small amounts or for ones that don't tumble together well. All we have to do is unbolt and put in longer uni strut.

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Magellann said:
But you have to admit that it looks nice.
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Oh, 100%. But it is a long step when your opportunities to reload sometimes come quickly and without much warning. Really, it would just make sense to deprime and vibrate coming back from a shoot, and then just store clean brass. In reality I com home, and hardly give myself enough time to do a basic gun clean before I put it all away as is tilll next time.
 
I don't really care about shiny brass, I'm actually fond of the way tarnished brass looks with shiny plated bullets.

That said, I use an ultrasonic cleaner. It cleans the all the junk out.. I reload, I shoot again...

ITB
 
BCRider said:
Tried the tumbling, found that even with care I had a lot of the corn cob media all over the place. And I didn't like now long it took or the fact that on the deeper .38Spl that it hardly cleaned the insides at all.

Bought an ultrasonic cleaner and found the heaven's opened and angels sang ! Yes I need to set the brass aside for a few days to dry. But I find it's far easier to use and faster to do a big batch of brass. And best of all any spills are easily wiped up or if I miss them are polite enough to go away by themselves. The insides of .38Spl are not pristine but they are darkish brass coloured. And that's a heap better than sooty black which the vibrator and corn cob with polishing cream did.

Stainless pin media is better by seen in the evidence of many videos. But then I'm back to separating pins out. And it's simply so much easier to just rinse, dump, spread out and then get Mother Nature to dry that for me US only is the best way and the easiest way.
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It takes me less than 5 minutes to separate the pins from a load of cases and rinse them.
 
I have a stainless tumbler built with a 1/3 hp motor.
I can clean 2000 rounds of 223 at a time and the motor is free spinning.....
 
I am debating the ultrasonic vs wet tumbler at the moment.

Am looking to do it on a budget so try a build it myself, so that means SS wet tumbling.


Do see several ideas on home made tumblers on YouTube, looks pretty straight forward.

Any tips on cheap SS pins??

Besides a hacksaw and lots of heavy gauge SS wire :p
 
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