55 Gal drum tumbler..... Go big or go home!!

[82ndMedic]

Hey everyone,
I wanted to share this with you, and kinda wanted to brag a little bit at the same time!
My buddy is a bit of a craftsman who is ALWAYS building stuff out of things he finds. Soooo, me being the reloading and brass salesman I am, decided I needed something big, REALLY BIG to (eventually) wet tumble all my brass in. He comes pulling up to my house one day to go what we refer to as "Desert shopping" out here in El Paso, and asks what I'm looking for that day. I say to him, I need a 55 gallon drum that you are going to turn into a tumbler for me. So anyway, here are some pics of the near complete project! Feel free to "ooh" and "aah" at my 100% FREE 55 gal drum tumbler!





Basically, it's a wood frame the drum sits inside of on castor wheels, with a 1/3 HP dryer motor (may be getting upgraded to a 1 1/2 HP treadmill motor) hooked to the tail end as a drive train. I'll post more pics as the project is completed!

[Daddyfixit]

Nice! I guess your doing more then my 200 or 300 runs. love good old ingenuity

[Bayou52]

Super -

How many pounds of SS pins do you use?

[Gunslinger1911]

That's great ! I wish I could shoot enough to need that !

Reminds me of John Ross talking about using a cement mixer to tumble brass.

[USMC87]

How's the loading and unloading of the beast going to be? Man that's the biggest tumbler I've ever saw, Too bad I don't have a use for that monster. Keep us updated on the progress of the build.

[Bullshop Junior]

We used to have a concrete mixer we used for a tumbler. It works quite well.

[Walter Laich]

I'll be watching
.
weight of 40 gallons of water = 332 lbs. built it strong

[82ndMedic]

Looking to get about 40 lbs of as pins to start, going to use one 5 gallon bucket of brass at a time plus the water. She's designed to hold aviation fuel, and smells a bit of JP-8 but it's clean as a whistle on the inside an strong. The backup plan as it were, if the frame won't hold it, is to put that baby on a treadmill and let er spin! Figure that'll hold the weight if nothin else.

[82ndMedic]

Oh and I'm a brass seller, getting about 5000 lbs of .223 Speer headstamp on the 18th of April. Gotta have a way to tumble it all quickly. Sooooo, if anyone needs brass lol, feel free to PM me as I'll have enough for a small army!

[Themayor]

That's an awesome tumbler. Would love to see video of it running.

[SSGOldfart]

Oh and I'm a brass seller, getting about 5000 lbs of .223 Speer headstamp on the 18th of April. Gotta have a way to tumble it all quickly. Sooooo, if anyone needs brass lol, feel free to PM me as I'll have enough for a small army!

well if the price is right I'm in the market for a few thousand,how are you planning to deprime that military brass?

[Themayor]

Oh and I'm a brass seller, getting about 5000 lbs of .223 Speer headstamp on the 18th of April. Gotta have a way to tumble it all quickly. Sooooo, if anyone needs brass lol, feel free to PM me as I'll have enough for a small army!

Will it have to be swaged too or just deprimed?

[pretzelxx]

I want one. And the brass to clean. And the powder to dirty it all again....

[82ndMedic]

Swaged too, I was going to get a Dillon 1050 with the auto drive to handle the task since its all homogenous headstamp, but my partner and I won BOTH the lots we were bidding on, so looks like I'm doin it all on the 550 and the super swage. I'm selling it at different levels based on no processing and amount, pre processing and amount, and full processing and amount. Feel free to PM for info. Hopefully I'll have a video of the tumbler running in the next week or so! Hell, I may try to finish it this weekend if everything works out right!

[mozeppa]

i just went to lowes home improvements store...bought a big cement mixer made by cobalt tools.

replaced the steel mixing paddles with ones made of stainless steel (made em myself) and stainless nuts, bolts & washers.

why you ask?



because when i use ss pins, water, dawn detergent and powdered citric acid.....steel causes a bi-metal reaction that leaves black blotches on
my brass....or turns them pink.

the drum on this beast is as big as a full size clothes dryer drum....and i can do a 5 gal bucket of 40 cal brass at one feeding!
along with 4 gallons of water and 25 lbs of ss pins.........mmmmm! shiny!

[82ndMedic]

So is that a good ratio? 25 lbs to a 5 gal bucket of brass and 4 gallons of water? Thinking about doubling that for the big drum. Have any pics of your results?

[rondog]

I use a small cement mixer from Harbor Freight, 25# of SS pins, water, small squirt of Dawn, .45 case full of Lemishine crystals. I tie a piece of plastic over the mouth with string to contain the sloshing, and it works awesome!

The biggest problem I have is that after the brass is rinsed, it all needs to be blotted with towels to get the bulk of the water off. If I just spread them out in the sun while soaking wet they'll tarnish quickly. Towel 'em first and they dry shiny.

This is without the mouth covered, obviously.

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=dejE4iL9UK8

[leeshall]

Want to keep that brass from tarnishing so fast? Replace the dish detergent with an automotive wash & wax in one product like Armor All or Turtle Wax or the like.Gets the brass just as clean & puts a very thin coat of wax on the brass and keeps it from tarnishing.
You're welcome.

[Walter Laich]

+1 on auto wax
use Armor All wax and a batch I did before first of the year is still bright and it's in the garage in an open box

[M-Tecs]

so looks like I'm doin it all on the 550 and the super swage. !

The Dillon 600 Super Swage is works great but be careful on the 223 cases not to damage the inside of the case with it. With the small Case Locator Rod it is easy to collapse the inside of the case above the primer pocket. After you think you have it adjusted for the crimp removal inspect the inside of the case with a good light.

I loaned mine to a buddy. It was set for 556 but he wanted more radius so he adjusted it. He did 3K. On about half he collapsed the primer pocket enough that you could not seat the primers flush.