Ultrasonic cleaning question

[Tikka223]

I got my hands on one of those “grass” things that people use to dry baby bottles and whatnot. I figured it could be handy to cut it to the shape of my ultrasonic cleaner to keep by brass from sloshing around and then help with the drying process. Now I’m wondering:

Will adding that much plastic to the ultrasonic bath reduce its effectiveness? Will the plastic absorb some of the sonic waves and reduce the cleaning power? The kit came with a little plastic tray that sat on the bottom of the cleaner but it’s nowhere near the weight of plastic that I have in there now.

Should I just dump in the brass with no plastic?

Thoughts?

 

[Ed Smurf]

I put my brass in ziplock bags with cleaning solution and suspend the bags with bamboo skewers in the USC which is filled with hot/warm water so that the brass is suspended and does not touch any part of the USC...but I do very small batches. Plastic should not interfere with the cleaning process unless your solution does.

 

[Tikka223]

The solution should not. I usually use the recipe written by Jason Baney. Lately I’ve been using the Hornady ultrasonic cleaning solution and I find that I works quite well too and saves a bit of time. So far nothing gets the primer pockets clean unless I take a brush to them before putting the brass in the bath.

 

[Alpheus]

So far nothing gets the primer pockets clean unless I take a brush to them before putting the brass in the bath.

I use a primer pocket uniformer, just a quick twist to remove the worst of the residue from the bottom of the pocket. Works well and doesn't take long to do 50/100 cases, just a few minutes.

 

[Chilly807]

Not really an answer to the original question, but all I use for a solution is hot water, a teaspoon of Lemishine, and a squirt of Dawn dish soap on a 30 min cycle.

It works really well, but the primer pockets need to get mechanically cleaned first. The ultrasonic won't get them perfectly clean otherwise.

In the Hornady 2.0 cleaner, it'll handle 25-30 rifle brass before effectiveness starts to fall off.

Any more than that and you're better off running 2 or more batches for 30 mins each.

Anything you add to the cleaner absorbs energy that would otherwise be used to clean your brass.