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Do you wet tumble your pistol brass?


nikdanja

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Thinking about wet tumbling my pistol brass that I use for matches.. I'm talking about going the extra mile and popping out primers before, the whole 9 yards. I figure it couldn't hurt to give the brass a little more "slick" feeling for feeding along with consistent primer depths because all the garbage is out before hand. 

 

Does anyone do this? 

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I wet tumble but don't take the primers out, to me it adds an extra step that I don't need. I've loaded (and shot) around 100K in the last few years and haven't had any problems with primer depth (or anything else, they all go bang). I do squirt a small amount of Dillon case lube on the clean and dried brass. My drying method is to lay the brass on a towel in my heated shop for about a week before lubing and putting them in the bucket by the press. I always go for the simplest method that works.

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I would think that wet tumbling would result in more resistance rather than less.  I only tumble in walnut (with primers) and the dust that tends to stay on the case seems to provide a little lubrication by itself.  Never had an issue with primer seating or stuck cases.  The only time I lube my cases is when I push 40S&W through a "bulge buster".  Except for this, I've not seen a need for lube in a progressive, although it couldn't hurt I guess.

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I just got a wet tumbler, and tumbled my first batch. To me it is not much of an extra step as I already punched primers out before tumbling in walnut.

I loaded some of the batch I tumbled, and had no complaints.

Sent from my LG-H900 using Tapatalk

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KISS. I do not need additional steps in my brass preparation. Tumble in walnut hull, with spent primers in, and reload. 

Dirt from de-capping on my press? Not after I'm finished, and apply a bit of compressed air.

Edited by Reshoot
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I wet tumble all my brass.  I've changed up my process a little bit to be a bit more efficient.  My first few batches, I decapped prior to tumbling on a single stage.  I then tumbled with Dawn and Lemishine.  The last few batches, I've left the primers in and threw in the dehydrator to dry completely.  After they were dried, I ran them through a universal decapper on my 650.  I know that part is an extra step, but I don't mind.  I also changed from Dawn and Lemishine to Armor All Wash and Wax and Lemishine.  With the Dawn, I had to use One Shot to lube the brass to run smoothly through the sizing die.  With the Armor All, it leaves enough wax residue on the case that lubing isn't necessary.  Work for me.  

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My dry tumbler died so I figured I'd try a wet tumbler.  Bought a Frankford Arsenal wet tumbler off of Amazon.  Love how clean the cases get, especially the inside.  Just have to squirt some case lube now when I load, where before with the dry tumbler I never bothered lubing the cases.

Even though wet tumbling is a bit more of a pain in the ass, there's no dry media to replace.  I'll never go back to dry tumbling.

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I have a wet tumbler and never use it.

I shoot, dry tumble in corn cob, reload, and shoot.

I have found absolutely no difference in performance between de-capped spotlessly shiny wet tumbled cases using SS pins, and cases dry tumbled with the primers in that are dark inside.

The difference is that it takes far less of my time to just dry tumble and load. 

I load ammo to shoot, not to put on display!

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I wet tumble everything, using the Armor All - Lemishine mixture with NO stainless pins. No decapping. Let it dry for weeks on a towel. If I need it sooner, I throw it in the oven for 20 min on 150.

Also, my lead level went from 16 to 1 in one year, after I started wet tumbling.

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i used to get my brass from a indoor range and just dry tumbling was enough. that source went away and now i get mine from a outdoor range thats muddy often. the brass is often tarnished and dirty inside.  at first i tried washing it before dry tumbling but that did not seem effective.  bought a FART and started wet tumbling the brass. it gets all the dirt and tarnish off easily.   i still keep my dry tumbler for removing lube from finished rounds, but will never go back to it for brass cleaning 

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Bought a Lyman wet tumbler and ran my first batch of nickel brass. Definitely was not impressed, I got much better results with walnut. I used the sample solution of cleaner and pins that came with the tumbler. Haven't given up yet, I'll try armor all and lemeshine next.

 

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On 12/18/2016 at 0:21 PM, Erick85 said:

I wet tumble all my brass.  I've changed up my process a little bit to be a bit more efficient.  My first few batches, I decapped prior to tumbling on a single stage.  I then tumbled with Dawn and Lemishine.  The last few batches, I've left the primers in and threw in the dehydrator to dry completely.  After they were dried, I ran them through a universal decapper on my 650.  I know that part is an extra step, but I don't mind.  I also changed from Dawn and Lemishine to Armor All Wash and Wax and Lemishine.  With the Dawn, I had to use One Shot to lube the brass to run smoothly through the sizing die.  With the Armor All, it leaves enough wax residue on the case that lubing isn't necessary.  Work for me.  

Good to know.  I was just over at a friends house showing him how to reload.  He bought a wet tumbler and cleaned some of his once-fired.  It was a bear trying to get the expander out of the case.  We switched to once-fired I had dry tumbled for him previously and there were no issues.  I'll pass this info on to him.

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I do all the extra steps that many hate.

Range brass by the tons. Separate calibers (I load most pistol stuff). I run short sessions (20 minutes) with primers to remove dirt. Dry. Dedicated press for primer removal. Tumble for 2 hours. Dry.

Reload.

I don't mind the extra steps. My sons also help out so it's time for us to bond.

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  • 2 weeks later...

I wet tumble, but don't deprime first.  I also stopped using pins...getting the brass too clean seems to make it stick in the press more and makes me need to use  case lube.  I just use hot water, lemishine and some Costco laundry detergent for about an hour and it works fine.

Used to do all of the extra steps, but TBH, it didn't seem to gain me much and just caused extra headaches with having to lube the cases and stuff...

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I wet tumble, but don't deprime first.  I also stopped using pins...getting the brass too clean seems to make it stick in the press more and makes me need to use  case lube.  I just use hot water, lemishine and some Costco laundry detergent for about an hour and it works fine.

Used to do all of the extra steps, but TBH, it didn't seem to gain me much and just caused extra headaches with having to lube the cases and stuff...



Well, you could size, deprime and neck expansion before cleaning and that way you could avoid lubing the cases for loading. Am I wrong?
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14 hours ago, NicoR said:

 


Well, you could size, deprime and neck expansion before cleaning and that way you could avoid lubing the cases for loading. Am I wrong?

No, I definitely wouldn't call you wrong.  Full disclosure; My work hours are unpredictable and sometimes long, so when it comes to loading for pistols I do cut what corners I can time-wise without sacrificing "too much" on the end product.  I haven't noticed such a huge difference between the two ways that I think it's worth the extra time to take the longer route.  Some other people may find the extra time justifiable, and that's fine too!
 

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