Can't get my SS tumbled brass shiny.

Z

zanemoseley

New member
So I thought I was putting in too much lemishine making my brass kind of dingy looking. So I ran a big batch yesterday which contained some once fired new starline 38 super brass. I ran the brass for about 15-20 minutes with just a little dawn soap, then I changed water and added a bit of dawn and a very small amount of lemishine. I got the results in picture, it's the cleaned brass next to new starline brass.

Any ideas? I'm worried it might be my water.

 
your photo is not working for me, but it's probably my network.... but I will tell you my recipe and I get great sparkly clean brass. I have a tumbler somewhat like the thumler's model B. It holds about a gallon of water, but split in 2 halves. I use 5lb of pins, about half in each side. I fill each side loosely with brass until it is about 75% full sitting on the pins. I fill the tubs 90% full of tap water (warm when I can) then add a squirt of dawn equal to about a teaspoon to each, then 1/4 teaspoon of lemishine to each. I usually run mine for at least 2 hours, but sometimes I start it before I go to bed and run it 5-7 hours... but anything more than a couple hours they look the same.

if you want to rule out your water, I would suggest buying a couple gallons of distilled bottled water. wash your pins with 1 gallon, then fill yours tumbler as normal with the other, then see what happens.

other possibilities, since I don't know your setup could be not enough brass in the load, not enough pins, not enough time.


edit: just loaded the photo on my phone... did your tumbled brass look like the new starline brass when it went into the tumbler?
 
How long did you run it the second time? I typically run it 1.5 - 2 hours, then change the water and throw it on another half hour or so.
 
I wet tumble with SS pins also. I have noticed if you don't use lemishine the brass will get water spots by the end of the day after drying. Also, the brass will oxidize within a few days unless some type of oil or wax is applied. The brass will still be uniform in color but a bit less golden and more brown. If you tumble your brass or loaded ammo for 15 mins in a dry tumbler in corn cob it will regain the "blingy" shine. I'm mainly concerned with the insides of the case being clean and also the primer pockets. Although, that really doesn't matter much because you really just need the brass to be clean when it goes through your dies. It makes no difference in appearance between 3h and 12h of run time.
 
Wow you guys run your stainless tumblers for a long time. For some reason I though ss tumblers weren't run for long. Next time I'll experiment and run longer.

The starline brass was shot then cleaned. The brass on top is brand new.
 
I am new to reloading, so take what I say with a big grain of salt. Let me know if I took the wrong advice, ok guys?!?!

I was told "by the internet gurus" to use car wash with wax using cold water only, tumble for 3 hours. In addition, to help with water spotting, if you have a water source with near 0 TDS - like a Zero Water filter - will eliminate the water spots.

Again, no real world experience but I will report back next week.
 
One or two hours will be fine, it just might not get the insides or primer pockets all the way. I usually do alot of brass and leave it overnight and drain it the next morning.
 
I run 1 hour with a dash of Dawn and a light sprinkle of Lemishine. As another posts says, even the nice shiny brass turns dull after a few days, but it's plenty clean. As yet another poster said, you can always run the completed rounds through a dry tumbler for show quality stuff if you wanted to.
 
I just started using this method . I have found at least an hour and a full load is best . If your machine can handle 700+ pieces of brass and you only throw in 200 . If you then fill the tub full of water the the brass and pins have to much room in that big space and don't contact each other as much as needed .They need to rub/grind on each other in order for the system to work . If you are going to use less then full amount of brass . Reduce the amount of water as well forcing all the parties to work closer together .
 
Well looks like I'll start by running the tumbler much longer next time. If I still don't get better results I'll look into trying gallon bottles of water to isolate my water from the equation.
 
A simple test that would give you some idea if it's hardness in your water, etc., is just to put a tiny bit of Lemishine in a glass of water and mix it up. What you've got now is a dilute citric acid solution. Take a cleaned but tarnished-looking case and dip it in the water. If it's instantly shiny, then you might have more success by slightly increasing the amount of Lemishine that you add to the cleaning solution.
 
Brass should look better than that after 15 minutes.

Maybe the power was off when you left the room. Is the light switch hooked up to the tumbler?

I would use hot water, Dawn, liminshine, and tumble for 30 minutes. If is still dirty, throw everything away and get a new hobby.
 
15 minutes is not nearly long enough with any type of tumbler unless you are looking to just get lube off with a vibratory tumbler. But cleaning brass requires 2-3 hours with a SSTL tumbler and generally longer with any type of vibratory/dry media tumbler.

5 lbs pins
1 gallon (give or take) water
2 lbs brass
1 tsp Lemi Shine
1 TBSP Armor All Wash-N-Wax

Deprime brass first so you expose primer pockets.

If the brass is relatively clean to start with, run for a couple 2 or 3 hours, rinse, remove pins, pat dry with a towel then put in front of a box fan to dry. Should be dry within 45 mins to an hour on a good summer day in the garage.

If the brass is really tarnished, dirty, etc., run for 2 hours, change the water (add Lemishine and Wash-N-Wax again with new water), run for 2 more hours. Rinse, remove pins, pat dry with a towel and put in front of a box fan.

Works every time, without fail, and I have exceptionally hard water down here on the Texas gulf coast.
 
Zane,

Another factor is how full the tumbler is. If there is too little brass it doesn't seem to force the pins to move around enough and the liquid cushions their fall against the brass too much, so cleaning action is reduced.

I would also be looking at the water situation. Citric acid (I use the pure food-grade stuff, not Lemishine) is a water softener, and I haven't seen an issue, but then I do have a whole house water softener, too, so the water isn't very hard to begin with. I have been thinking of adding a reverse osmosis unit, as they seem to show up on sale from time to time now, and that should demineralize water well enough for this to do a spot-free final rinse without buying distilled water.

For those having water spot issues, something I learned in one of my chemistry classes was just how little distilled water it takes to prevent water spots. Rinse in tap water until clean and put in the tumbler drum for fifteen seconds to shake the rinse water loose. Drain the excess. Then tumble the brass for thirty seconds with just a cup of distilled water to let it pick up whatever tap water remains in the brass. Drain and you should be good to dry it. If you have very hard water you might need to repeat the last step once to get it to dry completely spot-free.
 
Don't use car wash or anything else.

Do use Dawn and LemiShine, they are inexpensive, readily available, there is no reason for substitutes. Dawn is more 'sensitive' and not loaded with phosphates. It has phosphates, but not too much. LemiShine seems to be the right level of citrus. Don't use too much.

You should be tumbling for 2 to 3 hours, and even longer will not hurt. You can change out the water and get pretty good results just doing that.

Get your ingredients and time down, check the result, and then see if you need to use distilled water or not.
 
I've been SS wet tumbling for about 4 years now. The results are spectacular. For brass that has a jewelry-like brilliance, here is my technique and recipe:

I use a Thumler's Model B high speed rotary tumbler with a 15 pound drum capacity,

I use 5 pounds of SS pins (.047" diameter) and up to 5 pounds of brass per batch,

I cover the pins and brass with just enough water to cover the brasses by 2 inches or so,

1 ounce of auto wash and wax. Armor-All and Blue Coral work about the same with plenty of suds,

1/4 TSP of Lemi-Shine. Much more Lemi-Shine is counter productive as it could prevent the brass from getting that brilliant, jewelry-like shine, in my personal experience, at least,

Tumble for about 3 or so hours. If the brass is extremely tarnished by being weathered for a long period of time, then 4 hours produces the brilliant shine,

After tumbling, the brass must be dried quickly so that water spots will not form on the surface of the brasses.

All of the above is my experience based on many trial and error tumbling sessions that I've done.

I hope this helps.

Happy Tumbling -

Bayou
 
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Lemishine, despite the company's protestations, contains a form of citric acid. Pure citric acid is cheaper and can be got for as little as $2/lb. It is the active ingredient in the old Frankford Arsenal case cleaning formula, which was 5% citric acid by weight (about 1 cup of acid crystals per gallon; but they cleaned a lot of brass in it before disposing of it). They used this before the military decided not to clean and polish finished cases and to leave the annealing stain in place. Citric acid is also used by brass manufacturers to clean brass prior to long-term storage, as it leaves the surface passive. It doesn't over-etch brass in any practical concentration. There is a long, long (38 pages) thread on this at the castboolits.com forum.

One drawback to any solution that it not pH neutral is that galvanic reactions can occur in it. One fellow near the end of that lengthy thread had his brass all turn black because a chamfering tool had fallen into the tumbler with it. He reminded me that the pins also come with some amount of cutting machine lube left and that it is a good idea to tumble them clean whenever you have an issue with how clean they are or are not getting your brass. For that reason, if I had unsatisfactory cleaning, I would suspect possible contamination and would run some of the acid and soap solution with the pins alone to clean them.
 
These threads are not complete without some pictures.

Before :(
IMG_1569_zpsf27bbdf8.jpg


After :)
IMG_1572_zps22671278.jpg
 
Very nice results, Gdawgs.

Photos are indeed called for when discussing SS wet tumbling results.

Here are a few snaps showing some typical wet tumbling results on my end:







Happy tumbling -

Bayou
 
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