2 tumbling lessons learned the hard way :(

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Dustyn19

Inactive
So I've been off work for 5 weeks after shoulder surgery and while I was at home eating well and gaining weight I decided to finally start to reload for when I can get back to the range. This is also the first time I've ever reloaded. I have some once fired 9mm brass with mixed headstamps that were quite clean so I began by sizing and depriming them. After I did a batch of 200 my shoulder was achy so I decided to call it a day... That's when I saw my tumbler and fresh green corncob media sitting there and my OCD kicked in and I thought, "might has well try out the tumbler"! So I tossed all 200 in and fired it up and took em for a 2.5 hour ride. I opened up the tumbler and found bright and shiny pieces staring back at me. In my glee I picked up one and looked through the mouth - clean and beautiful - then I flipped it over and examined the primer pocket hole...Darn!...I threw that piece aside and frantically grabbed another one...Darn!...a handful...long story short, 2 hours later with a small screwdriver and I had the pockets cleaned out... Never again.
Fast forward to today - my first range session with my freshly reloaded 9mm and 45ACP rounds. (I have a few questions about that - but I will create another post for them).
I got home after collecting up all my brass as well as my buddies 9mm and 45ACP cases that he so generously gave me, feeling very accomplished I might add because all my rounds fired without a hitch with very good accuracy...
My wife was going to be home in a few hours so I figured I would just throw all of my 9 and 45 cases into my tumbler and clean em up - then sort them out later while she watches the bachelor. So we ate dinner and relaxed until it was time for my sons bedtime. After he was snug and warm in bed I went on down to the basement, again excited to see the shiny brass in the tumbler...opened it up, grabbed a 45 case out flipped it over to inspect the case mouth (spent primer still in place this time I might add)... DARN, a 9mm case had found its way into the 45 case and all of that nice media decided to cram itself tightly between the two...this abomination occurred approx 178 times.... 49 minutes spent with needle nose pliers to undo the treachery that had taken place in a short 2.5 hour tumble session. Never again will I tumble pistol cases of varying size together...

Thanks for reading this ridiculously long post - my wife simply laughed at me and told me I probably shouldn't handle firearms let alone try to make my own ammo... I know most of you guys will understand the turmoil I went through... Have a good night lol...
 
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Sorry for your difficult learning experience, but very funny as I read it as I knew what your outcome would be!:D
 
I am just about to get started with reloading myself.

I have been told good things about STM, stainless tumbling media - this is the way I decided to go.

It shouldn't compact into the brass like the corn cob husks do... although I haven't started yet but its something you may want to look at.

You can pick up a cheap tumbler at harbor freight for 35$ if you have the 20% off coupon.
 
If you can hear me snickering over here, I truly apologize, but as I just started reloading almost exactly a year ago, I knew exactly where your story was going after "I saw the tumbler-," priceless.

By the way, I use walnut media (lizard litter to be accurate), which does not seem to get jammed into the primer pockets of your newly de-primed cases.

As for mixing brass, I've found that I can mix 9 mm, .38 spl, and .357 mag, and .223 rem. Also, .40 S&W can be thrown in, IF I don't throw in the 9mm. I toss .45 auto in with .44 spl and .44 mag.
 
This is a great post. Thanks for the honesty. I'm gathering stuff right now to get into reloading and this is the kind of stuff I like to see. I learned something today:D
 
I have been told good things about STM, stainless tumbling media - this is the way I decided to go.

It shouldn't compact into the brass like the corn cob husks do... although I haven't started yet but its something you may want to look at.
Click to expand...

It will be even worse. To the point where the two cases will not come apart without destroying at least one of them. DO NOT tumble any brass together with brass that will fit inside it.
 
As to your first problem, media wedged into the primer pocket/flash hole if I read your post correctly...I tumble all of my brass before it is sized. Then as I size/decap, the decapping pin knocks out any stray granule that's in the flash hole. I clean rifle brass pockets to ensure primer depth does not vary, but in 50+ years of reloading, I have never cleaned hand gun pockets. It just doesn't matter from a functionality/accuracy standpoing. I've never had a problem with high primers either and ignition is just fine. In the last two days, for example, I've loaded for a new to me S&W M19. Without cleaning the primer pockets as is my habit, the gun was easily producing 1" - 1-1/4" gps at 25 yds. Six inch gongs at 90 yds. the same...the gun shoots to my ability to see the sights, even with "dirty" primer pockets.

Cleaning before resizing/decapping then again after is obsessive in my view...in truth, I only tumble to remove range grit to keep my dies from being scratched. Tumbling with pins, wet n dry, all the various methods to get shiny brass are a waste of time as far as accuracy goes. If you like shiny brass, march merrily on your way but you won't find that it positively affects accuracy.

And a hearty Plus One on the comments to tumble only one caliber at a time.

HTH's Rod
 
You don't need to resize/deprime before tumbling for pistol. My method is overnight in the tumbler with walnut loaded with a couple of teaspoons of mineral oil, loads up the media and runs dustless, followed by another overnight run in corn with a couple of teaspoons of NuFinish, polishes the heck out of the case and runs dustless, slippery enough to run without case lube. Stay away from Freedom Munitions (FM). Ammoload and IMT brass, they have a stepped case which will separate upon firing and live a brass sleeve in the chamber and you with a dead gun.
 
Semi autos are a little more finicky than wheel guns, I know lots of ICORE shooters that only wipe off the brass from their revolvers, however, the brass only needs to be clean enough to chamber. But because tumbling is an "off line" operation, it doesn't matter if you do it overnight, especially when you have lots of full 5 gallon buckets of tumbled ready to load brass. Here is an example of shiny brass versus clean brass, both are of the same accuracy.

image36994.jpg
 
We have all been in the same place with regards to nested cases in the tumbler.
After the first time it doesn't happen again.

Like others, for dry tumbling, in walnut I only run 1 caliber at a time with spent primers in.

Pistol brass no issue getting the media out with a collander, or sift pan.
Rifle brass is not the case. A rotary media separator is your friend on those.

As far as wet vs dry, I have both. I find it faster to do dry mainly for the fact I don't have to deprive and wait for the brass to dry.

On rifle brass where I want clean primer pockets, it's a toss up as far as time when you factor in decap and dry time, vs dry tumbling and brushing out the primer pockets. It does a very good job at cleaning primer pockets though in wet pin tumbling.

For rifle I may try it more, but pistol is not worth the additional time and steps involved over dry tumbling.
As far as media separators, I have 2 rotary models, a dillon, and one of those plastic clamshell ones with the enclosed top.

The dillon is used for dry, and runs full loads. The berry's one is used for wet pin and runs light loads.
 
1) Tumble your brass before you deprime.

2) If you want or need to tumble mixed caliber pistol brass together, put the largest caliber in first, run the tumbler for twenty seconds till all the cases fill with media, then add the next largest etc. Problem is if you do it this way you end up sorting brass twice. I just sort my brass from each range trip and keep it in separate containers till I have enough of each caliber to tumble.
 
We have all done this at some time or another. I try to separate my 45 cases and do them separately. What is bad is when you have the trifecta; 9mm in a 10mm in a 45 case. I hate getting 10mm mixed in with my brass.

BTW: after I have deprimed and sized my rifle cases I throw them back in the corn-cob tumbler to get the sizing lube cleaned off. I have a pocket brush with a center post as a guide that cleans all of the media out as a final step of case prep.
 
I don't worry about it because nine is most of what I run. Of course I get a few caught.. Last week I ran a bunch of mixed, and got a laugh. There was a nine case that got a forty case trapped on each end, and a .45 round caught on the end as well.

Once in a while they are so tight that I recycle them.
 
Yep, BTDT a few times! 9mms fits inside a 45 ACP case quite nicely. :p For me, decapping before or after sizing makes very little difference. I use 14-20 grit corn cob blast media in my rotary and my wobbler to clean my brass. The size of the granules is such that they don't get lodged in the flash hold tightly so when I inspect my brass after cleaning (you do inspect your brass, a quick glance in both ends, don't you?) if I see a piece in the flash hole a tap on the bench with the case, mouth first easily dislodges it...
 
This will be my seocond post on TFL but I was reading your story and already knew the ending. Also a new reloader. My B-I-L handed me a bunch of brass to get started. Right now I'll be loading 9MM and soon enough, .270Win. In any case i tossed the brass into my tumbler with my lizard litter and some nufinish. Thanks for That little nugget when I was a lurker hahaha. Anyway, run em through and started pulling them out well a lot of the 9MM turned out to be 380 auto and stuck inside nearly every one was a 32acp. Goooood tiiiiimes.......
 
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I have had the shell inside a shell as well, note to self, don't do that!

As for the pieces of grit in the primer pocket.

Resizing rifle cases takes a lot more goop (case lube) needed if you tumble first and avoid the plugged primer holes.

My solution was a low cost one caliber trip tool (223 in this case) that I had laying around, it has a primer sized pin on one end.

I just sit there with that, punch out the crud (each one, sometimes there is a bit in there deeper you don't see) and then clean the primer pocket with the motorized case prep tool ( can chamfer and deburr as well but I have the Gerard Tri Trimmers for my two rifle calibers that not only does that but trims to length as well in one step) well worth the $100 if you only do a couple of calibers.
 
Happens to all of us I think, as I have yet to see a reloading manual that talked about this possibility. I've learned that it is sometimes necessary to clean brass after decapping, but it's generally easier to just run in through a decapping die again to clean flash holes. As for the brass sticking together, that one is no fun either. All range brass get sorted when I get home per caliber, and then they get tumbled separately when I have enough of that one caliber to make it worth it. Enjoy the future of continued lessons!
 
Yeah, we've all either not thought ahead or made a wrong decision about which cases we could safely tumble together at one time or another. Plus, every once in awhile, a gremlin tosses a 40 S&W into your bag of 45 Auto, and you learn what telescoping tubing is all over again.

I like corncob for its speed of cleaning. One drawback compared to walnut, though, is that it absorbs moisture and swells much more easily. I've forgotten and left cases in corncob before and had the stuff lock itself into place by swelling so firmly that I had to use a drill bit to get it out again.

A lot of times folks add a teaspoon or two of polish to the corncob, then let it run a little and then add the brass. At that point the corncob hasn't finished swelling. The trick is to think ahead and add the polish the night before and vibrate it to mix. Afterward, take the lid off and let it dry. If you have a safe spot outside, you can vibrate with the lid off, but I cannot emphasize strongly enough not to do that around kids or where they play, as lead compound dust from the primers will get airborne in the process. Around vibratory tumblers is where most lead contamination is to be found in a loading setup. It's even higher in concentration around the tumbler than it is around bullet casting gear, assuming you dispose of your dross properly. Lead styphnate is the sensitizing compound in most primers, and it leaves water-soluble (the dangerous form) lead compounds behind. Decapping dust has the same problem, and I favor the sealed spent primer capturing methods, like that on the Forster Co-ax press for this reason.

Making cases really shiny is not, as mentioned a necessity for functionality in any way. Indeed, if you tumble in plain corncob for ten minutes, you've normally removed dirt and grit well enough to protect your dies. Moreover, the dark patina on cases like the second three in 9×45's image actually have better corrosion resistance than polished brass does. The problem with them, for someone shooting a self-loader, is finding them in grass. That patina is great camouflage. At the opposite extreme, shiny nickel is also hard to find in grass because it reflects the green of the grass back with such good fidelity. Yellow brass color is what you want for locating purposes.

Decapping cases before cleaning is important with cases that have crimped primers, like military 45 Auto will have. Those crimps have to be removed before you can reliably prime the cases again. The difference it makes to accuracy is typically something you only see in precision rifle shooting, where it is one more variable you can eliminate. The cushioning effect of the old primer residue can affect ignition timing slightly, and that can cause long range stringing in a rifle. I've never been able to detect a practical difference in handgun shooting. Since I don't know what primers you use and what firing pin energy your gun produces, I can only suggest that you fire a large number (like 25-50) rounds over a chronograph without cleaning the primer pockets, then repeat with rounds where you did clean the primer pockets and look to see if there's any significant difference in velocity standard deviation. Even if there is, you may not see it on paper with a handgun. But a smaller SD is a good indication of more consistent ignition, and you want that for critical load applications, like the revolver loads you carry into the woods just in case of an encounter with a bear.
 
Corn: get 20/40. It doesn't pack in the primer pocket or stick in the flash hole.
Running the cases through a decapping die will knock out the media.
Throw out that media and get the "right" size.
30 minutes is ALL you need. All you really want to do is clean the cases, not polish them or remove all the soot from the inside.
If your OCD demands that you have virgin-looking cases, sell the vibratory tumbler, get a real tumbler, 5 lbs of stainless steel pins and have at it.
 
Thanks for all of the awesome info! I might look into that walnut lizard bedding. I've seen it very cheap at our local pet store and you get a ton of it. I don't think I am ready to let go of my desire for shiny brass yet, so I will have to add a few squirts of polish along with it. I do like the idea of the ss tumbling but don't know if I want to have to go through the drying process every time.
 
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