what brass cleaner?

chola

chola

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I am going to reload about 500-1000 rounds a year...am not treally word about cost per say, but am torn between a rotary, vibratory or ultrasonic cleaner..

Say ya had $200 ish budget give or take depending on the unit..what should ya be looking for feature wise in any of them

It will be used indoors downstairs for now..I like to keep all relaoding sutff in one area..

If there alternatives out there other than the big reloading manufacturers, I am all ears...I only want to buy once and be done rather than buy cheap 3 or 4 times over
 
I bought a Thumlers Rotary one mainly because when I am not using it my kids can tumble rocks in it. I have no idea if one is better than another but am interested in seeing what the more experienced reloaders have to say about their experiences.
 
I have some brass running in my ultra-sonic right now. First time I have used it. Results are so-so. They are clean but dull. The first batch is now in the vibrating tumbler getting shined up. after being in the oven at 225F for an hour to dry them.
 
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Thanks for all the replies...
Ebay has a ton of these things in all 3 styles for pretty much the same amount of dollars.

I was going to build one, but by the time I got the parts priced out, was darn near $100 anyway...our damn dump/transfer station wont let a person do any picking anymore either, or I would have evrything I need there.....
 
im all for stainless id definatly cleans the cases the best and if your on a budget you can definatly build your own tumbler i use the thumblers tumbler and it works well you can get whole setup from www. stainlesstumblingmedia .com
 
A production/or homemade tumbler with Stainless Steel is the way to go.

I started off with a vibratory type when I was in University and used corn cob for years. It would clean the outside of the cases and I tried various concoctions to get them clean and shinny. After using it for 20 years and having it running at least 48 hours a week it finally gave up the ghost.

So I bought another one and continued on. I hated cleaning the media out of the primer pockets and having it take so long to clean the brass.

I then jumped on the bandwagon with the ultrasonic. It works OK but you have to constantly babysit it. Most only run for 8 minutes and then you have to reset it again. It will get the brass clean inside and out but not shinny. You can go thru various stages of different concoctions to get the brass clean and shinny but with the amount of brass I have it would take forever to get done.


I recently built my own rotary tumbler and use stainless steel pins and it is fantastic and I never have to buy a thing again other than soap. I have a large quantity of brass to do so that is why I went with making my own. I can have 500 30-06 brass clean at once, takes 3 hours on the tumbler, 15 minutes to separate the pins from the brass and spread the brass on a towel to dry over night. No baby sitting involved. I bought a cheap 10 buck timer and turn it on before going to work and it turns off 3 hours later.

Commercial tumbler will do smaller batches but still as effective at cleaning the brass. I took some WW2 range brass that was corroded so bad I thought they were throw aways but 3 hours in the tumbler and they look new.




Here are some before pictures of the range pickups. Really nasty, scaled on dirt and green rust (not sure what it is), and I thought were basically just throw aways.
IMG_0361.jpg


Look at how nasty the insides are.
IMG_0366.jpg


IMG_0359.jpg


Now 3 hours in the tumbler later.

IMG_0375.jpg



IMG_0370.jpg


Now look at the insides. Much cleaner. They are the same brass as before and you can see that they are by the mouth of the brass was squished by people walking on them in the dirt.
IMG_0377.jpg



This stuff really works and I wish I had made my own tumbler earlier. Hope this dispels once and for all people not believing that it works. As they say Pictures are worth a thousand words.
 
Get one of them green ones or a orange one or the red ones that vibrate.
You know the vibratory type, you can not go wrong and use the crushed walnut shell.
In the end it is your money and your choice.
Tight groups,
Rob
 
I've tried all 3 methods and in the end the wet tumbler with stainless steel media will end up cheaper than all the others since all you need is a little dishsoap and some lemishine.

I have a vibratory tumbler that cost me nearly $100 but in the last year I've spent over $70.00 in corn cob, ground walnut and several different types of polish.

I bought the Thumler Model B with the stainless steel media from Sinclair International for $219.00 + $12.00 shipping. I haven't looked back since and my brass looks better than ever.
 
corn cob

I just a Cabelas cleaner and corncob media with some auto polish, although I have yet to try the other methods I like that the brass is never wet and you do not have to mess with drying them out. I like to use my brass over and over, then put in in the to be annealed pile. FS
 
I use a hornaby ultrasonic cleaner and it has served me well. Admittedly I don't think it is easy to get a bright finish with this, but I rinse them off in warm water with some baking soda in it .. then give it a quick polish with a cloth, which allows for a good inspection of each shell, and they come out pretty good.

My reason for going with the ultrasonic cleaner is that I understood it was a bit quicker. I run 3 cycles of 6 or so minutes and they are good to go. Also, I can use it clean other things like my dies etc.

I am very tempted to get a tumbler for when I want the shells to glow!!
 
I use a V-8 bottle, it has ridges in it, a half pound of SS pins, a little water and a few drops of dish detergent. The bottle holds about 50 pistol casings. I put it on my wifes tread mill at about 2 km an hour, after an hour they are shiney and clean inside and out. I de-cap prior to this and even the primmer pockets are spotless. Small batches but works very good.
 
Been There, Done That

I tried all 3

1) Vibrating Tumbler using a variety of materials. Case exteriors looked clean but need to be wiped down to get the dust off. The inside of the cases are caked in burnt powder and the flash holes often get jammed with particles.

2) Ultrasonic. Extremely clean cases inside and out, however, the process of cleaning is simply time consuming. The ultrasonic runs for 8 minutes at a time, I found I spent hours dumping solutions in and out of the cleaner, and on the table, and on the floor. Definitely interfered with watching the game!

3) Stainless Steel pins in a tumbler. Turn it on and leave it for a few hours. Drain when its done and lay out to dry. Spotless inside and out.

In my opinion save money and buy the SS Pins and tumbler the first time, I wish I did. On a side note, my SD's went down when I switched to the Ultrasonic and the SS Pins. Apparently all that crud affects case capacity, go figure!
 
hunter64 said:
A production/or homemade tumbler with Stainless Steel is the way to go.

...

I recently built my own rotary tumbler and use stainless steel pins and it is fantastic and I never have to buy a thing again other than soap. I have a large quantity of brass to do so that is why I went with making my own. I can have 500 30-06 brass clean at once, takes 3 hours on the tumbler, 15 minutes to separate the pins from the brass and spread the brass on a towel to dry over night. No baby sitting involved. I bought a cheap 10 buck timer and turn it on before going to work and it turns off 3 hours later.

...
Click to expand...

Any pics of your machine? and how about some plans? I have the resources to make one and would be very interested in doing do. Where did you get your Media from, and how much was it?
 
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