Brasso! Don't use on brass cases! Why not?

[Willyp]

We always read or hear it said"Don't use Brasso on your brass cases,it will ruin them!"
Where did this come from?Is it a proven fact? Has anyone made a study on how it ruins brass? What does it do to them? How long is it supposed to take to ruin the stuff?
I an not trying to be a wise guy,but would like to know. I just never tried the stuff,because of the warnings on loading sites,but have never seen any facts of how it destroys brass casings .

[fishhawk]

Well it's supposed to be the ammonia that causes the problem in the brasso but if you put it into the media and let the ammonia evaporate before putting the brass in I fail to see how there's a problem. steve k

[texassako]

It contains ammonia, and ammonia will weaken brass. I don't know how much brasso would affect the brass, but I don't use it since there are plenty of ways to clean and polish brass without ammonia.

[hermans]

Well Willp, let me tell you about me and Brasso. I have been using Brasso for the last 30 years to clean my pistol, mostly 45ACP brass in my vibratory case cleaner together with fine apricot pips. The reason for this is that you do not find any of the so called ammonia free case cleaners easily here in Darkest Africa. The result...I get the occasional split case...but mostly I get about 30 plus reloads from my cases, and then I just retire them because they look somewhat ragged, but they still work ok.
So for me, I cannot say that it really is bad for my brass....it does give them a wicked shine though!

[ReloaderFred]

Quite a few years ago a friend brought me some 7mm Remington Magnum brass that was split and asked what I thought the problem was, since it was once fired and once reloaded. The first thing I noticed was the bright yellow color of the brass and asked him how it had been cleaned? He said his uncle had given it to him and had polished each case by hand with Brasso and a rag. I crushed one of the necks of the cleaned brass with a pair of pliers and it broke into several pieces. We did the same thing to some of the other brass, only crushed the body of the case, and it likewise broke into pieces, rather than crushed. The brass wasn't ductile at all and was ruined.

As I didn't actually see the brass cleaned with Brasso, I had to take my friend's word that it was Brasso that was used to clean the brass. At any rate, the brass was no longer safe to load and was scrapped.

Hope this helps.

Fred

[mdi]

This is one of those "no-nos" that could be true in theory, (yes, ammonia does degrade brass), but in real life has not been factually proven. How much of what concentration of ammonia for how long on what brass alloy?? I have read the stories too, but they are usually just stories and not reports. But, there's easier ways to polish brass than individual Brasso polishing, so most don't bother...

[Iron Mike Golf]

Well, the problem with ammonia and cartridge brass goes back a way. Look up "season cracking". Cartridge brass failed after the Brits stored ammo in horse stables during the monsoon season in India. The culprit was the ammonia in the air from horse urine.

What's left behind after Brasso "dries"? Any ammonium salts?

[jlchucker]

What's left behind after Brasso "dries"? Any ammonium salts?

I dunno about the Brasso of nowadays, but way back in the day, I was a young pup in an organization where lots of Brasso was used for polishing purposes. We dared not leave any brasso residue after polishing. If the drill sergeants with the hats with flat brims found any Brasso residue on what we'd polished, they became visibly and vocally upset with us polishers, to say the least LOL. As I recall, those brass objects that we polished would noticeably tarnish on their own overnight and we'd have to polish them over again. :oops:

[1hole]

"As I recall, those brass objects that we polished would noticeably tarnish on their own overnight and we'd have to polish them over again."

It's quite well known that liquid ammonia affects the crystal structure of brass and makes it brittle; brittle cases are not safe. The effect is greatest on thin stuff and the change is not instanteanous. It takes a lot of time for the ammonia chemical change to penetrate very deeply but case necks are thin and the walls really aren't very thick. Ammonia vapors are a gas that can condense on any cool surface, a lot of "season cracking" of old ammo is from long term exposure to the vapors.

There are red, white and tan powdered polishes, they can be sold as "rouge" sticks or mixed in some liquid. Polish is polish and it hardly matters which we use. Auto (paint) polishes and "buffing" compounds are often white or red polish in mineral spirits as a softener/surface cleaner and carrier for the polish. Brasso adds a small amount of ammonia (smells like old pee) in the carrier to help clean off any oily contaminates and the polished surface is left so clean it quickly oxidizes again.

Liquid ammonia will evaporate, same as any other liquid. Brasso is an unnessarily costly case polish but it won't hurt a thing if we pour it in tumbler media, run to mix it well and allow sufficent time for the liquid to evaporate and the smell to go away, maybe a couple of days.

[376Steyr]

Personally, I keep thinking of the Barry Sadler ("Ballad of the Green Berets") song about the "Garr-a-Trooper" who struts around the Saigon bars wearing spit-shined boots and two bandoliers of Brasso'ed ammo. No Brasso has ever touched one of my cases.

[jcwit]

Liquid Brasso is a No-No, dry Brasso is AOK.

But why bother, most everyone has an open bottle of auto polish which will work just as well and it will leave a coating on the brass case to retard tarnish. Sounds like a win-win to me.

[MtGun44]

+1 on keep any ammonia away from brass that will be stressed like cases. The last
Brasso I had definitely had ammonia, no idea if you bought a can today whether it
still does.

Bill

[fredj338]

+1 on keep any ammonia away from brass that will be stressed like cases. The last
Brasso I had definitely had ammonia, no idea if you bought a can today whether it
still does.

Bill

^^THIS^^
I lost quite a bit of brass back in the day using Brasso. Today there are so many better products to use. Dry media w/ a tsp of NuFinish, run for 4hrs, about as good as it gets.

[Lloyd Smale]

Ive used it on and off for 30 years. Yes things like nu finish work but not near as well as brasso on really tarnished brass. Ive never noticed a big differnce in brass life. Id bet most people who say its happened to them have started with real crusty brass that was corroded and weakened before they even cleaned it or was just a bad batch of brass to start with. We used it by the quart on the ship i was on to polish everything brass and copper in our engineroom and there was ALOT of brass and copper. It got polished weekly and the ship i was on was built in 1934 and it was 1976 when i left it so a TON of brasso was wiped on pipes, guages, valve handles ect and most of it was still going strong after 40 years. Dont get me wrong. Im not going to put brass in a bowl of brasso and let it soak for a week but a spoon full of brasso in your tumbling media sure isnt introducing any volume of amonnia. Like anything else in this hobby it has to be done with a bit of common sense. To me its right up there with glocks blow up with cast bullets or marlin micro groves wont shoot cast or bullets have to bump up to shoot well.

[Willyp]

I checked the MSDA on Brasso. Ammonia is listed as 2 to 3 percent.

[Norbrat]

Ammonia dissolves copper, which is why it is used in Sweets 7.62 as a copper solvent.

Brass is an alloy of copper (about 70%) and zinc (about 30%), so ammonia can leach the copper out of the brass, leaving it brittle.

I've heard of one case where a shooter stored his bottle of Sweets in his ammo box, and his brass could be snapped like a pencil. Whether this was actually true, I don't know.

[bangerjim]

I have used ammoniated soap solutions (printer's ammonia, acetone, green soap, and oleic acid) especially formulated for clock brass and it works very well! But clock frames and gears are thick.

Brasso is the worst stuff ever invented, If not completely cleaned out of nooks and crannies, it corrodes the brass!

NEVER.......never use ammoniated cleaners and polishes on thin brass. As norbrat says, it dissolves copper!

By the way......who cares if the brass is sparkly shiny anyway!!!!!! A quick tumble is all I use.
Bangerjim

[Mk42gunner]

I used enough Brasso and Never-Dull while I was in the Navy to thoroughly detest shining brightwork of any kind by hand. Since I retired, a can of Brasso has never darkened my door, (and probably won't).

Flitz works much batter anyway.

To get back on subject, I tumble my cartridge brass with lizard litter sometimes with a bit of Nufinish. Clean is all it has to be, not shiny.

Robert

[Wal']

I tested brasso a few years back by leaving a couple of 9mm brass soaking in it.

After a few weeks the brass shells could be crumbled/crushed with my fingers, not that any brass would be subjected to this abuse with just a quick clean.

[Beagle333]

I use Brasso. I don't soak cases in it, but really dirty ones get a little Brasso, and I haven't noticed a difference in use/non-use of it in regards to case life. (since 1985). 'Not a study, just my report on how I use it.

[Lloyd Smale]

I dont think anyone suggests you clean cases with by wiping it on them or soaking them in it. Were talking a tumbler where you put a teaspoon of it in a gallon or more of media, let it work in and then add your brass. Id bet most if not all of the ammonia is evaporated out and even if its not consider how much is soaked into the media compared to how much is on the cases and that 2 percent amonia becomes about nothing. Like i said ive used it for years. I dont put it in every batch i tumble. I mostly use it for really cruddy brass and for the most part it is used to clean brass that if i didnt have it would probably get pitched anyway. Ive also been told by some that tumbling brass causes brass to continuously bang into each other and that work hardens the brass and makes it brittle. Maybe we should quit cleaning brass alltogether ;) I think it commical that some people have the time to sit and think these things up. Ive been around loading like many here for over 40 years. Ive yet to hear of someone who got hurt because there gun blew up because they tumbled there brass with brass cleaner in the media.

[pmeisel]

I don't put anything in my vibrating media and the brass cleans fine.

I haven't used any Brasso since I discovered Flitz.

So I guess no worries for me!

[jlchucker]

Personally, I keep thinking of the Barry Sadler ("Ballad of the Green Berets") song about the "Garr-a-Trooper" who struts around the Saigon bars wearing spit-shined boots and two bandoliers of Brasso'ed ammo. No Brasso has ever touched one of my cases.

I never used Brasso for anything after I got out of the Army, way back when. Noxon either. Like Pmeisel, I've always used dry tumbling media. I tried some of the commercial liquid that you are supposed to put into media in order to reactivate it, but gave up on that after trying it only once or twice. Dry corncob media in a tumbler seems to work pretty well. Clean brass is nice, but spit-polished brass never did anything for me. Maybe for "Garr-a-Trooper"--don't know. I must have missed that one.

[jcwit]

One of the major benefits of using a polish such as Nu-Finish is the tarnish retardation because of the film on poly it deposits.

[fredj338]

One of the major benefits of using a polish such as Nu-Finish is the tarnish retardation because of the film on poly it deposits.

Plus it does make the cases just a tiny bit slick, perfect for pistol ammo in carbide dies.

[DLCTEX]

I use LemiShine on tarnished brass and NuFinish polish in my media. Lemishine passificates the brass to inhibit tarnish and NuFinish adds a protective coating IMHE.