Laundry tumbler

[sirgknight]

My brother is a taxidermist and he acquired a discarded dryer with a bad heating element, free for just hauling it off. As most of us know a dryer runs on 220-240V. The motor runs on 110v and the heating element on 110v. My brother discarded the element and changed the wiring to run just the motor so he could run the dryer on a 110v circuit. He then sealed the vent inside the drum to keep the media from falling out during tumbling; I think he just used duct tape for this. Whaalllah!....a huge tumbler is created. So, this just goes to show that a dryer can make a very good tumbler, without mess. The only reason you see a mess in this pic is because my brother had just completed tumbling a bunch of hides and he's a little messy pulling the hides out of the media and just dumping it on the floor. I could see where one could place a large amount of brass in a net bag of something similar and tumbling them this way without any mess at all. Thought this may give some of you an "idea" to pursue. Good luck.....

http://s66.photobucket.com/albums/h241/sirgknight/?action=view&current=photo1.jpg

[lwknight]

The rotary cement mixer workd pretty well for large batches too.

[Andyd]

The rotary cement mixer workd pretty well for large batches too.

...and for the ease of getting the brass out of it, I'd pay the extra $$$ but it is still a good idea for someone on a really tight budget and time on his hands.

[GREENCOUNTYPETE]

The rotary cement mixer workd pretty well for large batches too.

do you take the paddles out or leave them in , have to admit the cement mixer sits probably 364 days a year but it paid for it's self on the first project

[lwknight]

My cheapie little mixer has only 2" high mixing paddles in it so they don't need to come out. Thats just something to test and trial.

There is a larger heavy duty mixer that actually has real paddles that mix and the tub never moves and I can't see that working out very well.

FYI in case anyone thinking of doing such a thing, the cheapest way to get media is from an industrial sand blasting supplier. Its like 19 bucks per 50 pound bag of walnut of corn cob and you get your choice of grain size too.

[BulletFactory]

in a word :

LOUD!