Brass Sorting Machine

[jmorris]

Easier to build but everything smaller than .40 is in the same pile and everything 45 acp and up remains in the top “screen”, it takes more precision to sort 38 super, 9X18, 9X19, .380 etc from each other.

[Merlin Orr]

I am a little embarrassed to post my po boy approach to brass sorting but here it is....

[Front Man]

Is that in your new garage Merlin?

FM

[kevin c]

I am a little embarrassed to post my po boy approach to brass sorting but here it is....

Hey, Merlin, except for the fact that I have four or five old cardboard boxes instead of pails, no sorting table w/ holes, and sit on my basement steps instead of a cushioned chair, that looks exactly like my sorter!

[Merlin Orr]

Is that in your new garage Merlin?

FM

Yep... Susie got 2 stalls and I got one. I have 10 times as much crap great stuff as she does... Women! It'll do until I can get a shop built....

[GentlemanJim]

Is that in your new garage Merlin?

FM

Judging from the sheetrock and paint dust ...must be

Jim

[Merlin Orr]

I am a little embarrassed to post my po boy approach to brass sorting but here it is....

Hey, Merlin, except for the fact that I have four or five old cardboard boxes instead of pails, no sorting table w/ holes, and sit on my basement steps instead of a cushioned chair, that looks exactly like my sorter!

What's a basement?

[Heavy Metal Only]

Hey heres an idea, Could it be possible to rip a 4x8 piece of plywood in 2 and have a 2x8 piece with 2x4s on the sides. Next cut with a drill about 50 or 100 holes of 9mm 2 foot from the end. right after the 9mm holes drill 50 or 100 .40 cal holes and then 50 or 100 .45 holes of course the holes you drill would be just a hair bigger so the case could fall through. Staple gun some kind of material in a funnel shape around the section of holes and a bucket under each of the three sections. Lift up the side where the 9s would fall first as if you raise the other end everything would fall through the .45 holes. I would drill lots of small holes all over the board so dirt would fall through. I hope this idea is usefull to someone.When I get time I'll try to make one of these, I think it will work. The idea was based on my lee 1000 case feeder. the rounds fall through this tube base down.

[kevin c]

I am a little embarrassed to post my po boy approach to brass sorting but here it is....

Hey, Merlin, except for the fact that I have four or five old cardboard boxes instead of pails, no sorting table w/ holes, and sit on my basement steps instead of a cushioned chair, that looks exactly like my sorter!

What's a basement?

Actually my house is on a pretty steep hillside, so my "basement" is actually above grade.

Hey heres an idea, Could it be possible to rip a 4x8 piece of plywood in 2 and have a 2x8 piece with 2x4s on the sides. Next cut with a drill about 50 or 100 holes of 9mm 2 foot from the end. right after the 9mm holes drill 50 or 100 .40 cal holes and then 50 or 100 .45 holes of course the holes you drill would be just a hair bigger so the case could fall through. Staple gun some kind of material in a funnel shape around the section of holes and a bucket under each of the three sections. Lift up the side where the 9s would fall first as if you raise the other end everything would fall through the .45 holes. I would drill lots of small holes all over the board so dirt would fall through. I hope this idea is usefull to someone.When I get time I'll try to make one of these, I think it will work. The idea was based on my lee 1000 case feeder. the rounds fall through this tube base down.

I'm not quite visualizing this, HMO. Are you talking about round holes? Since all the cases we're talking about are longer than their diameter, I'm thinking not many cases are going to fall through unless the funnels you're talking about are for each hole, to guide the case to the hole upright, and if so, then I'd think the larger cases would jam up the works .

Edited November 27, 2007 by kevin c

[Michael Carlin]

I am thinking about the process of sorting brass with a machine. I have loaded for years with a Star equipped with a Free-loader.

The concern about the larger brass plugging the smaller orifices for smaller brass seems valid to me.

I am thinking that the solution to this is to sort the brass by diameter, then length.

Non-paralell roller above sort the brass into the bins that you see in the photos above.

Instead of bins though a set of Freeloaders, cascading from the smallest hole to the largest. The shortest brass will tip into the smallest holes to enter a tube, as tubes fill a new one is brought to take its place. The longer brass are dumped through a notch in the side of the bowl byt he agitation action to the next one. The one has a slight larger hole allowing the medium length cases to tip base down into tubes, and so forth.

In this way the 9mm can be sorted from the 38 Super, and the 40 S&W can be sorted from the much better 10mm cases. (Can you tell I like ten?)

[Cavediver]

jmorris,

Any chance you can share a couple of dimensions with me? I'm playing with the feeder portion of your design and I've no idea how big to make the space between the "gear teeth." Also, can you tell me the size of the pass-thru slot at the top?

I don't know how far I will get with this. I'm playing around with evaluating some engineering software during my spare time. I thought it would be neat to design one of these from common parts and materials while limiting the construction difficulty. I don't really intend to build one, but I'll be happy to post any drawings I do (provided it's OK with jmorris).

Shell_wheel___Sheet1.pdf

Michael, what is a "Freeloader?" Any chance you can send me a picture?

Edited November 27, 2007 by Cavediver

[jmorris]

I haven’t had a problem with 10mm mixed with 40S&W (I guess we don’t have any/many 10mm shooters and I have a bunch of 40 that I sorted from 9mm (police range pickup) so I’ve been swapping any 40 I have sorted lately for 9mm or 45. I have leftover from the first bullet feeder I built the failsafe device in the photo below. If the bullet passed by the limit switch nose up the reduced diameter of the ogive would not activate the switch and continue on to the feeder. However, if the bullet happened to get past the collator nose down the larger diameter of the base would trip the limit switch and trigger an adjustable (on) timer that energized the solenoid (on the left side of the photo) hooked to a trap door dropping the “wrong way” bullet into a bin below. With little modification (making the switch adjustable for height) this would work to sort for most any height.

Cave diver,

I went a little over board trying to get as many “teeth” on the wheel that I could. Using Hyvar (as I did) I would probably now go for a 3/8” “tooth”. It’s really going to depend on the strength of you material. If the feed wheel is plastic and the teeth are too thin they will be more likely to break off. The tube that drops the cases from the feeder down to the sorter is 2” box tubing with 1/8” wall so the hole is about 1.75”. Drawings would be fine; the ideas are free for non-commercial use, as always.

[Michael Carlin]

jmorris,

Any chance you can share a couple of dimensions with me? I'm playing with the feeder portion of your design and I've no idea how big to make the space between the "gear teeth." Also, can you tell me the size of the pass-thru slot at the top?

I don't know how far I will get with this. I'm playing around with evaluating some engineering software during my spare time. I thought it would be neat to design one of these from common parts and materials while limiting the construction difficulty. I don't really intend to build one, but I'll be happy to post any drawings I do (provided it's OK with jmorris).

Shell_wheel___Sheet1.pdf

Michael, what is a "Freeloader?" Any chance you can send me a picture?

Freeloader looks like a salad bowl on top of a Star loader case tube. I took some pictures will post them tomorrow night, it is late and I have not installed the camera software on this computer. I will post from my laptop tomorrow night.

Basically you drop a hand full of cases into a free loader. They roll around around the inside of the salad bowl and when the heavier base rolls over the centrally located and correctly sized hole the case falls base down into a tube. The tube feeds a Hulme case feeder. If you had a KISS bullet feeder I think you could crank out ammo as fast as the handle could be operated, pausing only to fill the primer tube, replenish the bullet supply, top up the powder measure and every ten strokes throw a handful of brass into the Freeloader.

Edited November 28, 2007 by Michael Carlin

[slavex]

I feel so dumb when looking at Jmorris's stuff. I bet you have all sorts of other neat electro/mechanical devices hiding in your house. I'm almost scared to think what kind of mousetrap you'd design!

[markcic]

I am a little embarrassed to post my po boy approach to brass sorting but here it is....

Hey, Merlin, except for the fact that I have four or five old cardboard boxes instead of pails, no sorting table w/ holes, and sit on my basement steps instead of a cushioned chair, that looks exactly like my sorter!

What's a basement?

In Corpus a basement is a hole under a house that would be quickly filled with water. Isn't the water table about 3 inches under the grass?

[Cavediver]

jmorris, thanks.

I'm thinking about an MDF or plywood "gear"; rough shape with a bandsaw and finished with a router.

I've got access to a CNC router and some better materials, but this is all about "home building" with common tools. It looks like the really tough part will be finding an appropriate drive motor for a reasonable price (under $50?).

I'm guessing I need to make the spaces between the teeth (dims A& B on the attached image) large enough to grab a fired .45 case with a little room to spare?

Michael, that sounds a lot like the top plate for the Lee case feeder. Similar design and concept?

[Jeff686]

This thing is cool!

I thought you could buy replacement bowls for Vibratory Case Cleaners, is that true?

If so, use a few of those to cut the slots in. Mount them on the cleaner's base with spacers between them! Hands free brass sorting!

Edited November 28, 2007 by Jeff686

[jmorris]

It looks like the really tough part will be finding an appropriate drive motor for a reasonable price (under $50?).

I'm guessing I need to make the spaces between the teeth (dims A& B on the attached image) large enough to grab a fired .45 case with a little room to spare?

Several have wanted to know what motors I used for the collator so there is a photo below. I’m not sure if they are still available as they were given to me some time ago. As for the “A&B” space, cavediver, I used .550” for both (large enough to handle 45LC). You might also want to shorten the length of the “agitators” in your drawing as you don’t want a pile to make it to the top and jam up the works, when the cases below drop.

[Michael Carlin]

jmorris,

Michael, what is a "Freeloader?" Any chance you can send me a picture?

Jim this view is from the top.

[Michael Carlin]

Jim this one from the front on a Star loader:

[Michael Carlin]

This is the side view of it lying on the bench horizontally.

One of these under the skewed roller sorter drop for 9mm. Then allow the overflow from it to of cases too long to tip down the hole to the tube to escape (due to agitation). That they "fall out" a notch in the outer edge of the bowl to the next bowl which would feed it to a differnt tube.

Tubes can then pass cases through their respective decapping operations and then resize using a "push through die" to return the base on the feed ramps.

Edited November 29, 2007 by Michael Carlin

[GentlemanJim]

Hi guys

Just for giggles..I took a 4 foot piece of plastic conduit..about a foot from the top(the flaired end) I cut a 4" slot with a 7/16 end mill

Down 10 more inches I cut a slot about .440 wide by about 6 inches long.

If you hold it up at an angle ...and feed hand fulls of brass into the flaired end...9mm fall out the first slot...40 falls out of the second slot and 45 runs out the end.

I am sure you can build a very simple and very cheap sorter this way.

Jim

[lynn jones]

This is the side view of it lying on the bench horizontally.

One of these under the skewed roller sorter drop for 9mm. Then allow the overflow from it to of cases too long to tip down the hole to the tube to escape (due to agitation). That they "fall out" a notch in the outer edge of the bowl to the next bowl which would feed it to a differnt tube.

Tubes can then pass cases through their respective decapping operations and then resize using a "push through die" to return the base on the feed ramps.

fyi..noticed the gun scrubber in the pic. try brake parts cleaner, much cheaper.

lynn

[Heavy Metal Only]

I am a little embarrassed to post my po boy approach to brass sorting but here it is....

Hey, Merlin, except for the fact that I have four or five old cardboard boxes instead of pails, no sorting table w/ holes, and sit on my basement steps instead of a cushioned chair, that looks exactly like my sorter!

What's a basement?

Actually my house is on a pretty steep hillside, so my "basement" is actually above grade.

Hey heres an idea, Could it be possible to rip a 4x8 piece of plywood in 2 and have a 2x8 piece with 2x4s on the sides. Next cut with a drill about 50 or 100 holes of 9mm 2 foot from the end. right after the 9mm holes drill 50 or 100 .40 cal holes and then 50 or 100 .45 holes of course the holes you drill would be just a hair bigger so the case could fall through. Staple gun some kind of material in a funnel shape around the section of holes and a bucket under each of the three sections. Lift up the side where the 9s would fall first as if you raise the other end everything would fall through the .45 holes. I would drill lots of small holes all over the board so dirt would fall through. I hope this idea is usefull to someone.When I get time I'll try to make one of these, I think it will work. The idea was based on my lee 1000 case feeder. the rounds fall through this tube base down.

I'm not quite visualizing this, HMO. Are you talking about round holes? Since all the cases we're talking about are longer than their diameter, I'm thinking not many cases are going to fall through unless the funnels you're talking about are for each hole, to guide the case to the hole upright, and if so, then I'd think the larger cases would jam up the works .

Yes with a drill to drill round holes straight down like a peg board, also tilt the plywood at like a 10 or 20 degree slope so the brass rolls down. the funnel shaped material is just for guiding the brass to the bucket.When I make one I'll get some pics to show you.

[jonblack]

I am sorry if I offend anyone for bumping a 5 year old thread. I joined this site to learn more about jmorris's case sorting machine and I had a few questions I wanted to ask him, if I may.

1. I know your 4130 tubes have an OD of 2" but do you know what the wall thickness is? Here are a few sizes I saw online.

OD - WALL - ID

2 - 0.049 - 1.902

2 - 0.065 - 1.870

2 - 0.095 - 1.810

2 - 0.120 - 1.760

2 - 0.188 - 1.625

2. Can you tell us more about how you attached the 4130 tubes to the "shafts" that drive them? How is the name of the clamps that hold the "shafts" to the framework?

3. Regarding the gears you used to make the tubes counter-rotate, did you select them specifically to match the finally "tube taper" dimension or were the gears just something you had laying around? Can you give us ideas about alternate counter-rotate mechanisms?

I would love to build one of these machines, so any information you can provide would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you

jonblack

Edited April 10, 2012 by jonblack