I'd just do the sweet three.
wallnut for the dirty range brass
corn cob to polish
and or stainless pins
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I'd just do the sweet three.
wallnut for the dirty range brass
corn cob to polish
and or stainless pins
I use corncob and Flitz, but I'm changing over to corncob, Nufinish, & mineral spirits after i use up the Flitz. I have two 40 lb bags of CC from a buddy at a water dept. They use it for media blast cleaning brass valves. if the bag gets torn they cannot use it, so lots of bags get "damaged" by the forklift[smilie=1:
Don't do what I did this afternoon: walnut and too much NuFinish and mineral spirits. The media got really wet and the end result was a mess of black goo clinging to the plastic tumbler bowl. On the other hand the tumbler needed a good cleaning anyway, and its done now.
I agree with you grumpa. Now that i am thinking about it you never know what they cleaned it with? Did they use ammonia based product to get it really bright?
Though i dont think once would hurt? Does anyone know if brasso used once would weaken a case?
I like this. It sounds like good common sense. I agree, it should be a sticky.
Pretty much anything with some corncob and walnut shell. Throw a little automotive wax in there, a little goes a long way, and a drier sheet to keep the dust down. The problem you will run into is separating the media from that much brass. one of the lymann media separators works great.
Greetings all;
I didn't read ALL the threads, but see a large % of y'all advocate the use of polish ot the tumbling media. I also did at first, until I read somewhere that:
"... polished rifle brass prevents it from "gripping" the chamber wall during ignition, thus not reducing the forces upon the bolt as the system was designed. Rifle brass should be 'clean', but not 'pretty'. Long term effects are apparent as the lugs begin to swage from the excessive hammering."
Pistol brass is not a player in this game. Good luck & play safe.
Wally
Where did you read that Wally? I'd like to check it out
As far as polish versus unpolished for selling (I have a small shop in FL) most 90% want the brass sized deprimed cleaned and polished yes I get a couple cents more for them but not sure its worth all the extra time a one man shop puts into it
I noticed today that there is a cat litter made from walnut media available. I haven't checked prices, but might be good
Being Retired, If I had a source for range brass I would have the time to totally prep brass. I have in the past even tried doing that. I had accumulated some military lake city 5.56 brass. I Cleaned, Sized, Swaged, Trimmed, and Primed them but really didn't seem to be able to sell them. So I think most people do want there brass as it is when picked up off the range. So they can inspect it for them selves. I wouldn't mine having it cleaned and ready to load if it came from someone I could trust but in the end I guess it really comes down to cost too.. Being Reloaders or Casters we just don't want to pay for something we feel we can or should do our selves... No matter how cheap the service is...
wallnut media is what i like
I'v been using Stainless media for a couple years now, far superior to Ultrasound, rice, corn, walnutt and so on.
45ACP before and after 4 hours in SS tumbler
Attachment 118340
I have also used lizard litter, with Nufinsih, but have found it is so fine that I get an awful lot of dust when separating it. I solved part of that problem by having the Bride save dryer sheets and putting one or two of the used sheets in with brass. It collected a lot of the dust. A few weeks ago I was with the Bride at Petsmart when she was buying catfood, and was looking thru the lizard litter trying to find some that was a little courser. I asked a young clerk if they had anything using walnut shells that was courser. The manager overheard our conversation and asked if I was using it for brass tumbling. I answered yes, and he said, "Oh, you want the Blue cat litter. He proceeded to get me a bag, cut it open and show it to me. He said that he sells a lot of it to reloaders. (he was a shooter) It is actually Blue Buffalo brand labeled "Naturally Fresh."
I found after getting home and dumping it, that was generally what I considered a perfect coarseness, but did have a small amount of fines mixed it. I had a fairly large wire kitchen strainer in the shop. I poured it full, shook it around over a pan that caught the fines in less than five minutes had it separated. I get almost no dust with this. I still throw in a dryer sheet to pick up what little dust there is. I think I paid $10 or $12 for the 14 pound bag.
Jackpine