any ideas on dull brass

[hiram]

I through brass in the tumbler today with a dab of dawn and sour salt. Four hours later it was clean but dull, not shiny. Any ideas? This never happened before.

One thing I did for the first time when I previously used the tumbler was to drain out the dirty water, add clean water, a dab of dawn, and some Johnsons liquid floor wax to wax coat the brass to keep the shine. Could the ceramic media been coated with wax and lost its abrasive capability?

Thanks

[BrassMagnet]

One thing I did for the first time when I previously used the tumbler was to drain out the dirty water, add clean water, a dab of dawn, and some Johnsons liquid floor wax to wax coat the brass to keep the shine. Could the ceramic media been coated with wax and lost its abrasive capability?

Maybe.
A simmer in detergent might remove the wax.
If that doesn't work, maybe a quick wash in solvent might.

[hiram]

Something is wrong. The water keeps coming out dirty after 3 washes. I will remove the brass and vibrate it to see if it shines up. The ceramic is coated with 'dirt'. I tried tumbling with Tide detergent to clean it but no good. I also tried Goo Gone -- no good. Any ideas.

[Dryball]

I had the same problem...it was very frustrating and it almost got to the point of me ordering new guts for the tumbler. What ya need to do is use clean water and Simple Green and tumble your pins/ceramics for a couple of hours. I read this somewhere and worked like a charm the first time around.

[hiram]

Dryball-

Many thanks.

Simple green worked like a charm. The migrating 'dirt' is gone. The ceramic is snow white. I threw the brass into the vibrator with walnut to clean that up. Strange type of dirt. It stuck to ceramic, brass, my skin, and a container that I poured everything into to do case separating.

I used a mix of about 1 simple green to approx 3 water. The water was hot from the tap.

Thanks again -- Hiram

[mold maker]

Dryball-

Many thanks.

Simple green worked like a charm. The migrating 'dirt' is gone. The ceramic is snow white. I threw the brass into the vibrator with walnut to clean that up. Strange type of dirt. It stuck to ceramic, brass, my skin, and a container that I poured everything into to do case separating.

I used a mix of about 1 simple green to approx 3 water. The water was hot from the tap.

Thanks again -- Hiram

Along the same lines.
I tumbled 223 brass and it came out dark. as soon as I rinsed it, it turned almost olive drab. Even a couple nickle cases were stained beyond recognition. I have tumbled many K of them successfully before in, SS pins, citric acid, and Dawn.
Among them, I found two copper plated steel cases, that were badly pitted.
I had a devil of a time getting rid of the tarnish/stain on the brass.
From now on there will be a magnet involved, beforehand.

[Smoke4320]

"Among them, I found two copper plated steel cases, that were badly pitted."

Bingo .. found the same thing and got the same results .. took a while to get everything back to normal

[runfiverun]

many waxes and water do not mix.
lanolin is super horrible in a wet system.
it will coat everything, mix with the grunge from the cases, and is a huge pain to get out of the system.
I would imagine anything with paraffin would be worse.

[w5pv]

Had the same problem brass was tarnished and looked like it was coated with wax.I had used citric acid and turtle wax car wash/wax.I think it may have been the citric acid that caused the problem.I rinsed in clear wat until the water was clear and then added Dawn Ultra and retumbled for aboout three hours and the brass came clean but not a good shine.I put it in the viberatory tumbler for about a hour and got the results I was looking for.

[Sasquatch-1]

I have found that an hour or two in a hot bath of citric acid will remove almost any stain from the brass. I have an old 4 gt crock pot that I use for this purpose after annealing brass for jackets. If left long enough it even removes the burn mark from the torch. You do have to run them trough a tumbler afterwards.



I had a devil of a time getting rid of the tarnish/stain on the brass.

[jonp]

Do you not find leaving the brass in a hot citric mix long enough will cause some to turn pink?

[Dryball]

They will turn pink in spots but an hour or two in a vibratory tumbler takes care of that

[Bad Water Bill]

simple green s ALMOST safe enough to drink.

Just might clean you out as well.

Yes from a factory rep about 10 years ago when I helped build their booth at Mc Cormac place in Chiraq.

[hiram]

Found some more info.

Although simple green cleaned everything up, it might not have

https://www.cooltools.us/v/vspfiles/images/tumblercontamination.pdf

[hiram]

Found some more info.

Although simple green cleaned everything up, it might not have been the best choice.

https://www.cooltools.us/v/vspfiles/images/tumblercontamination.pdf

Also:

Dawn Dish Detergent (pH7.44) is made from ethanol which is neither acid or base unless water is added. White vinegar(pH2.4) also starts life with ethanol.
Theoretically you could take hydrochloric acid(pH0.0) and mix it with sodium hydroxide(pH14.0) and get a seven(pH7). Might explode before neutralizing.
Acetone has the same pH as distilled water. Dawn dish 'soap', Ivory dish 'soap' and human blood share the same 7.4pH. The pH of water changes with temp getting more 'acid' with heat. And a chemical mixed with water can become acidic or base. Confused? That's not 0.001% of it.

..........ACID.....................pH............. ...........BASE.............
0.0 hydrochloric acid..........................14.0 sodium hydroxide
1.0 battery acid.................................13.0 lye
1.0 gastric acid..................................12.0 chlorine bleach
1.4 oxalic acid...................................12.0 TSP
2.0 lemon juice.................................12.0 Liquid Plummer
2.4 white vinegar...............................11.0 ammonia
2.6 Coke...........................................10. 0 milk of magnesia
3.6 Dr Pepper....................................9.9 toothpaste
4.5 tomatoes.....................................9.5 detergents in water
5.0 pickle juice..................................9.5 Borax
5.8 BeptoBismol................................9.5 simple greeen
6.0 urine..........................................8.5 sea water
6.2 hydrogen peroxide.......................8.3 baking soda
6.2 OxyClean....................................8.0 eggs
6.6 root beer....................................7.44 Dawn Dish
6.8 skim milk...................................7.4 human blood
7.0 distilled water.............................7.0
7.0 acetone