Tumblers

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Bucksnort1

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Does anyone have experience with media other than crushed walnut shells? On the television show, "How It's Made", I see metal pieces being polished with stainless steel pieces or glass and other media reloaders usually don't use.
 
A bunch of You Tube Videos using Stainless Pins . The down side to me is it is wet tumbling . stainless pins and water
 
lots of people are using the ss pins and wet tumbling (myself included) mostly using rock tumblers, thumlers to the harbor freight cheeps. add some dish soap and a dash of citric acid and let it tumble for a few hours, rinse, separate the pins and let it dry.

if you are inclined to clean your brass (which is NOT necessary) it's hard to beat the results if you like your brass squeaky clean right down to the primer pockets
 
Ground corn cob. Get the 40 grit size, it doesn't get stuck in the primer flash hole.

Vibrating brass polishers are also called tumblers. Exactly a tumbler should be a drum rotated on rollers.

All I use is my old Midway vibrator, with 40 grit corncob, and some flitz tumbler additive. A couple of hours in that will clean and shine enough for me. If I'm looking to impress someone, I simply let it run for 6 hours, better wear shades when looking at them.
 
30-30 brass tumbled in SS Pins.



50BMG brass tumbled in SS Pins. 7 firing on these.



30-06 brass that was green with minor corrosion.



I like clean.
I like to inspect my Match Brass for defects prior to reloading.
I weigh my brass when used in competitions, light to heavy so least amount of differences from one round to the next.
 
You can if temp is kept to 175 degrees max to avoid annealing the case head and web which protects us from the potential 62,000 psi generated upon firing.

I use a LARGE air flow fan that will levitate 9mm brass out of a bucket. Dries all brass in 15 minutes or less.
 
I use my trusty 35 year old RCBS vibratory case cleaner and walnut media. A few hours and everything's clean. 6-8 hours and they are like new. But I clean cases prior to sizing and decapping so no issues with media in primer pockets.

I'm not as fastidious as some about primer pockets being clean, etc.
 
After 35+ years I FINALLY switched to steel pins (Wet Tumbling) and I have to say, the primer pockets, flash holes come out clean, no additional prep needed other than rinse and dry.

HOT water rinse dries them out in no time, and they are ready for resize/reload.

The only thing I've used my vibratory/media tumbler for in the past couple of years is polishing up loaded rounds...

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Respectfully, I have to disagree with on user,
The statement about never having to clean brass.

There is cleaning of the primer pocket/flash hole,
My brass can get pretty tarnished/corroded waiting to be processed,
And I spend quite a bit of time square facing the bolts, polishing locking lugs, honing/polishing chambers to size,
And I don't want contaminants, dirt, carbon, corrosion, tracked back into that bolt face/chamber.

Polished surfaces CLEAN UP so much faster,
And they provide the Consistency during the firing process that most of us pay big attention to while loading.
I just seems natural to continue that consistency to the rifle bolt, chamber, bore...
 
I like the SS pin idea but the tumblers big enough to handle the quantity of brass we reload are to expensive to justify the change over.
In addition you have to deal with a liquid and there is a potential electrical hazard.
I have a vibrating tumbler large enough to run 500 44 mag cases at once or 400 .223 cases. I have a 5 gallon home made media separator that makes quick work of getting the corm cob or walnut media out of the cases.
When I sit down to load it is 1000 rounds or more at a time.
 
I vibrate tumble to clean the outside. Resize/decap. Then wet tumble (1-hour; 45-minutes) with SS pins. It's a two-step cleaning process that some may find cumbersome. But it works for me and I'm very happy with the process and result. And . . . since I'm doing a second wet tumble, I now lube my cases for resizing (I load only straight walled pistol.) - even though all my size dies are tungsten carbide. It's much much smoother.
 
Thanks for the replies. At Harbor Freight, I see containers of some sort of crushed glass or other media (could be ceramic) and I see containers of what appears to be 1/4" (+ -) ceramic squares. What about these?

I've been using dry media and ultra sonic cleaners.

For those using SS pins, are you having problems removing them from smaller bottle neck cases like .223 or .243?

Where do you buy the SS pins?

Can the pins be used in a traditional vibrating cleaner?

Here is a tip to make your dry media last longer. Add some "used" dryer sheets while vibrator is working. Don't ask me why it has to be used sheets. I've never tried un-used. The sheets will come out looking like the devil. I paid $5 for this bit of information, a few years ago.
 
Thanks for the replies. At Harbor Freight, I see containers of some sort of crushed glass or other media (could be ceramic) and I see containers of what appears to be 1/4" (+ -) ceramic squares. What about these? TOO BIG AND TOO ABRASIVE

I've been using dry media and ultra sonic cleaners. I DID TOO FOR 38 YEARS.

For those using SS pins, are you having problems removing them from smaller bottle neck cases like .223 or .243? NO, ONLY VERY OCCASIONAL ONE STICKS.

Where do you buy the SS pins? STAINLESSTUMBLINGMEDIA.COM and other places.

Can the pins be used in a traditional vibrating cleaner? NO - MUST TUMBLE IN WET SOLUTION.

Here is a tip to make your dry media last longer. Add some "used" dryer sheets while vibrator is working. Don't ask me why it has to be used sheets. I've never tried un-used. The sheets will come out looking like the devil. I paid $5 for this bit of information, a few years ago. OLD INFO - YOU GOT SCREWED.
 
To sorta answer your question (I have used SS media, but that wasn't your question:rolleyes:) I have worked in a shop where parts were tumbled to both remove burrs and for polishing (depending on media). For deburring, ceramic pieces of various shapes (cubes, pyramids, balls) are used, mostly wet. Also hard plastic pieces are used (I got some pyramids from HF, about 3/8' tall), and I've tried this one wet and dry. I have not used any glass beads for "tumbling" but did use some fine glass sand/beads for bead blasting parts.

When I first started "tumbling" I experimented with different media (dry). I used the normal stuff; crushed walnut shells (the dark coarse grind lizard litter works better than the "Desert Blend") and corn cob media. I also tried dried beans, beach sand (too heavy for a wobbler), rice, wood chips, BBs, small SS nuts/washers/screws (wet), sawdust, plain solution (water, soap, vinegar) w/no media, and prolly a couple more that I can't remember. Some work, some don't, and none stand out.

After a few years I settled on this http://www.drillspot.com/products/499763/econoline_526020g-40_40_lbs_blast_media For some high gloss polishing I'll add some auto polish, and some deep cleaning I'll add some plastic pyramids.

Experiment. Try rice or whatever you think might work. Most will not harm your brass and you'll get different finishes from different media (hard ceramic and plastic will leave your brass an even dull, matt finish, walnut will leave your brass a semi-gloss, and most of the time you'll get high shine from corn com)...

But, FWIW; to me it's all academic. I reloaded for 12 years before I started tumbling my brass (rotary and wobbling). I merely wiped my cases with a solvent dampened rag as I inspected it before processing. Nope I didn't ruin any dies, and yep, I could spot any defects. Today I clean my brass in whatever is in my tumbler, and I only polish brass for my Garand and my 45 ACPs (that fling cases hither and yon), makes them easier to spot in the dirt, rocks, trash at my "range"...
 
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No problem removing pins, but some will get caught in the primer pocket flash hole. Quickly removed with needle nose pliers.

Must use the pins in water. Best effect is obtained with addition of dishsoap and Lemishine or citric acid.
 
I have been using the same batch of tumble material for 6 months plus. Still does a great job. Being a chicken keeper I went out on a limb and tried a type of chicken feed called crumbles (had some in the barn). Any good grain store should carry it. 50lb bag for around $12. PM if you want more info.
 
After switching to wet tumbling with SS pins from dry media in a vibratory cleaner, I couldn't go back. SS pin wet tumbling is faster and cleaner.
 
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