Home made liquid case cleaner

[HotRodAl]

For those of you that like to do it yourself here is a recipe for liquid case cleaner that works really well, I've been using it for 10 years or so and its really {frugal} to make.

It will not damage your brass.

Here is a recipe for cleaning grungy brass,

1 quart of water
1 cup white vinegar
1/2 cup lemon juice
1/4 cup liquid laundry or dishwashing detergent

I use a net bag to place brass in and dip it into cleaner and let soak for 20 to 30 minutes, aggitating every 5 minutes or so. Rinse with water and towl dry, I usually tumble for 2 to 4 hours after.

[rugerman1]

HI AL! [smilie=s:

[45nut]

Thanks Al!

[Racer X]

I usually tumble for 2 to 4 hours after.

How clean do they get without tumbling? The thing I hate about tumbling is getting all the media out of the cases afterwards.

[ReAX222]

The media shouldn't stay in straight wall cases, and I have had pretty good luck with the Frankfort arsenal media separator. It shakes and beats the cases pretty well in just a few turns.

[hydraulic]

Just make sure the cases are dry before they go into the tumbler. Had the wife out shooting the other day and she had a misfire in her .38. Pulled the bullet and found dried, hardened tumbling media in the bottom of the case. Can't remember when I cleaned that .38 brass, but, then, I can't remember what I had for breakfast, either.

[Topper]

Thanks for the tip Al;-)
Now you got me thinking about another use for my newly acquired leaf blower.
Use one of my wife's old nylon stockings to suspend the wet brass in blast the water out:-)

[IcerUSA]

Welcome aboard Al, and thanks for the brass cleaner, I hate the smell of vinager tho LOL

[hunterldh]

For years I have been tumbling with corn cob media and I squirt in a little Westley's Concentrate Auto Polish. Works like a champ. I got the tip from a commercial reloader. I stocked up back then so I don't know if the stuff is still available. It was a Blue Coral product. - Hunter

[shooting on a shoestring]

I rarely tumble. Only do it when I want to impress someone (the older I get the less I care about that), or my brass is really dirty, like from dropping it in the mud, finding a disasterous lube recipe, or more than likely getting free range brass in the rotation. But when I do tumble, I get some good ventilation going, grab my air hose and blow each case out one at a time, turn it and blow through the opposite end. Often there's a bit of corn cob left in the flash hole. Before I turn loose of a piece of brass, I always sight through the flash hole just to make sure the hole goes all the way through. I'm sure I'm putting a fair amount of heavy metal particulate in the air when I do that, so its always in front of a good fan pointed out the overhead door.

[tommyn]

Hi Al welcome

[Shotgun Luckey]

Vinegar makes me think of french fries at the county fair...yum yum

[copdills]

welcome to the forum Al and thanks for the information

[DLCTEX]

I haven't had any problems with media stuck in the flash holes since switching to a finer ground corn cob, even in small primer holes. I still give them a blast of compressed air through the primer pocket a handfull at a time. DALE

[redbear705]

I used the water vinegar dawn dish soap for cleaning and boiled the lot for a half hour and it works well , the brass came out sparkling clean! but all polish and oil is removed and the brass will tarnish if no polish is applied to brass after the cleaning process.

I did use the oven to dry the brass after it was cleaned, as I was in a hurry to get the brass dry. Maybe the heat caused the tarnish?

JR

[Sig shooter]

Home depot tile cleaner with phosphoric acid . Dilute for a light cleaning - straight up for stepped on brown military brass . Warm water rinse with a towel dry / heat gun warm up .

[WildmanJack]

As far as Vinegar goes, my ex-wife had Tinea Versicola ( a skin fungus or so she said!)) and she used to bath in white vinegar EVERY NIGHT just before bed. I still can't eat a salad with dinner ! And the tumbling thing, hell I tried that a few weeks ago and dislocated my shoulder, sprained my neck, and broke a lamp in the livingroom. I'm gonna stick with a vibrator!!

[Dale53]

I can't understand the concerns about "tumbling media in flash holes". The first stage on my Dillon 550B is a "full length sizing and decapping die". Any media in the flash hole would be punched out along with the primer.

I have tumbled probably a couple hundred thousand cases (mostly the same few thousand a number of times[smilie=1:) and NEVER had a flash hole obstruction. I have NEVER had a clump of media stick in a case. I DO change my media when it becomes dirty (which is only after many uses..).

Dale53

[smokemjoe]

How would that work without the soap on copper.

[Mumblypeg]

I tumble mine first then lube and size them, that takes care of the flashole stuff. Then clean them in liquid to remove the lube. Warm oven for awhile dries them out.

[Jim]

Somebody on this forum told me years ago that vinegar hardens cases and causes them to fail much earlier than usual.

[bcp477]

Welcome to the forum. I have used approximately the same (homemade) case cleaner formula for a couple of years, always with good results. Last time I made a new batch, however, I omitted the vinegar and just used lemon juice, detergent and water. I am mildly allergic to vinegar anyway, so I thought I would give it a go without it. Same results - I can't see any difference. So, apparently, the acidic nature of the lemon juice (and the vinegar, for that matter), is the important issue. I cannot comment on the sustained performance of the mixture, i.e., whether it will be effective as long as the original formula, etc.....but it seems to work just fine. As it happens, I use Hornady Unique case lube - which is vegetable oil- based. Oddly enough, after washing the lubed cases (after re-sizing and trimming) in the homemade cleaner, they come out even cleaner and shinier than with the case lube I used before. Oh and I do not tumble cases - I never have. Perhaps the veg. oil has some positive effect, in combination with the lemon juice ? Anyway, the stuff works very well...and is cheap and environmentally friendly. Good enough for me.

Oh and (as someone else already mentioned) the cases cleaned this way WILL tarnish pretty quickly, if left out in the air.... that is not much of a concern for me. I simply store them in plastic bags, as soon as they air dry....which reduces the tarnishing problem.

[waksupi]

I believe that vinegar causes the copper to precipitate from the casing alloy. That is what you see, when there is a discolored spot on a case. Don't know if citrus would do the same, or not.

[remy3424]

I need to clean some cases that had Pyrodex used in them...Any special words of advise needed here???

[Dale53]

I have used Pyrodex in pistol cases a good bit (won a bunch of it at matches).

I decap the cases at the range (immediately after use) and drop them in a gallon milk jug half full of water with a couple of squirts of Dawn Dish Liquid. By the time you get home, most of the work is done. I then rinse them well in hot water direct from the faucet (while still in the jug - fill, shake and empty several times) then dump them in a colander:

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and shake them a bit - it'll remove most all of the water. Then I dump the cases (still damp from the water) into my large Dillon Vibratory Tumbler for a couple of hours. The cases come out looking like new.

Pyrodex can be insidious stuff - if you leave your cases dirty, it can seriously corrode them to the point that they are destroyed for further use. Black powder can do the same thing. I use the same method for black powder cartridges for both rifle (40/65, 45/70, etc) as well as pistol and revolver cartridges.

It takes less time to do it than tell about it. The key is to do it as soon as possible. Right after shooting works well for me (let them soak in the jug while I am doing other things).

I use a Pope style re-decapper to remove the primers but a simple "punch and base" will do the same job for far less money. There are all kinds of decapping tools on the market and most any of them will work just fine.

I am kind of a lazy guy but have found that doing some jobs promptly saves a lot of effort and time in the long run.

A little of pre-preparation goes a long way (remembering to bring the jug of cleaning solution with you along with a decapper), etc.

The VERY necessary chore of decapping done before dropping the cases in the jug are simple but important. The primer pocket must be rinsed also. Otherwise, when you fire the next shot (after reloading) you take a chance on depositing that very corrosive mixer in your gun with smokeless powder (I use the same cases for both black and smokeless. Most importantly, if they are NOT decapped, you have a very real chance of the tumbling media packing in the case (from the water trapped in the case). That is NOT a good idea for many reasons.



Dale53

[Calamity Jake]

70/30 mix of water/Simple Green, ASAP after shooting, I do not decap first.
Rinse well then tumble for a couple of hours.

[remy3424]

Thanks Dale, I'll have to acqure some kind of a hand press to use at the range to decap there or get creative and make something, I only have about 220 w/ pyrodex to shoot yet. I will try the bath the next time out. Thanks again for the advice. I hope to get a smelting pot going this weekend and make some ingot mould from an angle iron bed frame. What a site, invaluable to anyone casting!!!

[dromia]

Dale thats my process exactly.

I have a Pope style decapper for the 45 - 70 and use a Lee hand press and the size dies with the decap pin well out for the .577" and the 450/577".

I tried the vinegar mix once with Winchester 45 - 70 cases and they corroded beyond use in 24 hrs soaking.

[testhop]

welcome AL
i use a dillontumbler and 2to 4 hr is plenty for 99 percent of the cases
most times 2 hrs is all i need use thefinesy tombling medium and you wont have any problums

[jimkim]

No one uses orange kool aid? Has anyone ever tried mineral spirits?

[870TC]

The lemon juice, Kool-Aid, Lemonade, Soda pop, recipes for cleaning brass all work because they all have Citric Acid in them. Citric Acid, sometimes called "Sour Salt" is used in alot of foods. You can buy it in bulk online for cheap. It comes as a powder, its eidible and safe to handle. Mix a tablespoon in a bucket of water and let soak or boil to speed up the process.
I have used Phosphoric acid also and this works fine, you can find it in toilet bowel cleaner or tile cleaner or Birchwood Casey's "Concentrated brass cartridge case cleaner".

[JSH]

I have no desire to clean any of my brass in liquid. It is enough of a pita to anneal them and get them dry after quenching. Seems like a little water bubble always sets up in the base/web area of cases.
I have tumbled and used walnut a CC media since I started reloading. I still have all the "old" CC and walnut media. I use this to clean dirty range brass. I always put a big dose of mineral spirits in the media, regardless. I say a big dose, about 2-3 T full at least. I put enough in so that it is damp looking. Make sure and put the lid on or it will evaporate away pretty quick.
The last batch of brass I run through I let run with out the lid on for the last 30 minutes or so. This lets the MS evaporate, so as not to cause a fire from combusiton.
I have had several fellows comment on how nice and clean my brass is. When I mention mineral spirits, they raise an eyebrow. I have yet to have a missfire I attribute to the MS.
BTW, a cap full of MS seems to wake up the polish of a lot of the compounds. I have used Flitz liquid and the Dillon polishing compounds. I was putting some in about every other batch, a bottle didn't last long and seemed to build up a residue on the inside of the bowl. With the MS this has not been a problem.
Jeff

[vinceb]

lime-away and water...the only issue i had was some 06 brass from 1952 turned green on the inside .

[Crash Corrigan]

I buy that cheap walnut media from Graingers and add so Nu Finish car wax and let them run in the tumbler for 4 hours. This is after they are decapped.

They come out reasonably clean but not as nice as new brass but who cares?

I usually prime by hand and then run them thru the progressive without the decapping pin and assemble my rounds.

With the BPCR cases I immediatly decap with a univerasal decapping die in a Lee hand press and dump into a milk jug of dawn and water. This stops the crud from attacking my brass {$1.39 a piece thank you} and when I get home I rinse them and again dunk them in a stainless steel bowl with boiling hot water and dawn. When the water cools enuf to be touched I brush out the interiors with a .50 nylon brush and rinse again.

Then they are ready for reloading after they dry off some. My rifle gets a few wet patches with water and Windex w Vinegar. Then dry patches and then a wet patch with Ballistol. Then I wipe the whole gun with Ballistol. It stinks but it does keep things nice and shiney.

[deltaenterprizes]

Somebody on this forum told me years ago that vinegar hardens cases and causes them to fail much earlier than usual.

That is ammonia found in Brasso and it attacks the zinc. The brass is "pickled" during the drawing process after it is anealed. The "pickle" is an acid bath.
Just about all soft drinks contain phosphoric acid, read the label.That is also the active ingredient in lime away.

[geargnasher]

That is ammonia found in Brasso and it attacks the zinc. The brass is "pickled" during the drawing process after it is anealed. The "pickle" is an acid bath.
Just about all soft drinks contain phosphoric acid, read the label.That is also the active ingredient in lime away.

You are correct, Sir.

Observe on which end of the pH scale is ammonia.

The acids are fine as long as the brass isn't left in them too long, they are tumbled afterward, and the tumbler media is treated with some sort of wax like the car polishes mentioned to "seal" the stripped brass surface from flash-oxidation.

Gear

[ammohead]

[QUOTE=Crash Corrigan;779460]I buy that cheap walnut media from Graingers and add so Nu Finish car wax and let them run in the tumbler for 4 hours. This is after they are decapped.

Crash,

Go to your local pet store or ranch supply. Crushed walnut hull can be bought in 50# sacks as bird cage litter for less than $20 per 50#. I am pretty sure you can get corn cob media as well. They may not stock it but they should be able to get it for you.

ammohead

[Marine Sgt 2111]

I got lucky, my neighbor manages a Pet Smart and they had a 50# bag of ground walnut shells...that someone ordered and didn't pick up...oh but I did....sometimes you fall into good deals...