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polishing compounds


usmc90

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I see alot here using corncob media and then putting in NU-FINISH car wax.. Here is the question ,Does it have to be NU-FINISH or will others work?..

Such as liquid turtle wax etc...????? anyone use anything else other than mineral spirits?

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I've always been told to avoid anything with wax in it. A bottle of NuFinish will last for ten's of thousands of polished cases as a little goes a long way.

The rule of thumb I use is that ground walnut for "cleaning" as it is more abrasive than corn cob. Ground cob is more for polishing. The NuFinsh helps to keep your cases shiny for a bit longer without adding a heavy wax coating to the cases. I clean cases in ground nut first and then polish them with ground corn cob with NuFinish added. I've considered trying a 50/50 mix but I'm pretty set in my ways at this point.

Remember to run the media with NuFinish added for five or ten minutes to avoid any clumps. Any clumps of NuFinish/Corn Cob will get inside your cases and create a real mess.

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Just tried some walnut and I have to say I was less than impressed. Nothing wrong with the product, it was RCBS ground walnut if you want to know.

I use a Lortone Tumbler that has two 6lb buckets. I loaded one with walnut and one with my usual plain old pet litter corncob. Turned it on and ran it for an hour. This is all it takes with my tumbler and no I don't add anything to the media, just use it right out of the bag.

Dumped the results out side by side on a towel on my bench. My non reloading spouse and I both agreed that the cases ran in the Walnut appeared shinier while the corncob had more of a satin sheen to them. But closer inspection showed that the corncob actually were a bit cleaner, less staining and grime on the cases. Interior of the cases seemed to be the same in both after cleaning.

The other thing that bothered me about the Walnut was the amount of cases that had a chunk of walnut stuck in the flash holes, it came out with some aggressive tapping but I don't have the same problem with corncob.

I also ran a batch in a combo of both, nothing spectacular cases looked pretty much just like straight corncob.

Nothing scientific about this just my observations of the results...

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Personally, I use the Harbor Freight fine grade walnut hull, seems to polish better than the larger grained stuff and is small enough that it doesn't stick in flash holes. I also use NuFinish in/on it. The walnut hull @ HF is about a buck a pound and seems to last very well.

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I once tried some very fine walnut labeled as "lizard bedding" from the local pet store. I have a pair or Frankford Arsenal vibratory tumblers and with the extremely fine walnut, the brass simply went round and round. With a regular grade of media (Lyman, Frankford Arsenal, etc.) I get a "cyclonic" action.

Could just be the design of my tumblers, but I now avoid the extremely fine ground media.

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Fine walnut (lizard bedding) does a better job of cleaning for me, although i have noticed that i have to run more brass with a walnut run that i would need to with corn to get the brass clean. Brass cleaned with walnut will never get as shiny as brass cleaned with corn. People tend to associate shiny and clean as the same thing, but cleany is clean and shiny means polished.

Edited by leewongfei
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The other thing that bothered me about the Walnut was the amount of cases that had a chunk of walnut stuck in the flash holes, it came out with some aggressive tapping but I don't have the same problem with corncob.

I don't worry about walnut in the flash hole, I figure the decapping pin will knock it out anyway ... just my 2 cents

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