Wet tumblers..which one?

[usmc90]

Looking to maybe switch from dry to wet tumbling. Anyone with real user experience & which ones? Pros? Cons? I would be using for no bigger than 223 in rifle caliber and all pistol calibers

[Steve RA]

Frankford Arsenal is pretty popular and reasonably priced.

[slavex]

yup Frankford Arsenal. I don't see any others out there that have the volume for anywhere near the price. Phenomenal tumbler

[RDA]

I agree with the above, it seems well built, good volume, built in timer with a reasonable price. I only wish they include the 0.047" sized pins

http://www.brianenos.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=222321

[usmc90]

THanks for the reply guys. I've been on the fence about switching to wet . Is it worth it ?

[Boxerglocker]

THanks for the reply guys. I've been on the fence about switching to wet . Is it worth it ?

It's worth it if you want super clean brass.... Drying however can be an issue. I tumble all my brass in the warm summer months, where I can lay a couple loads out on a old beach towel on the driveway in the sun for a few hours. I do all my 9mm and .223 brass this way, try to get is all done for the entire next USPSA / 3GUN season in a couple of weeks.

[slavex]

I thought I was going to hate drying but find it's really not a big deal, in the summer they go in the sun, in the winter they go in front of the fireplace. Regardless of time of year, if either of those two don't work they go in the oven.

[oteroman]

I made my tumbling much easier as some others have done, by NOT using pins. If you you are not removing the primers no need to use pins.

[Steve RA]

I think you get a better job with depriming and the pins, everyone's requirements and expectations differ. Try every variation you see (read) on here and pick the one you like.

[safeactionjackson]

FA here also, I've probably done 50k worth of pistol brass without issue, us a food dehydrator that I picked up at Cabelas to dry brass. Wouldn't do it any other way.

~g

Sent from my iPhone

[usmc90]

Sounds like I should at least give it a shot

[The Donald]

I use the FA tumbler with just soap and Lemishine, no pins. Does a great job cleaning wether dirty range brass or prepped brass. I just lay my rinsed brass out a towel in the garage. Shake it three fours time to knock off most of the water and they lay out for a day. In the winter will throw it in the oven at 170 for a few hours.

[formernuke]

I made one using the plans bigdawd posted a while back cheaper than buying one and larger volume.

[NFLcavediver]

I bought the Harbor freight duel tumbler it's very easy to outgrow. I have a tank tumbler to tumble my scuba tanks, some are around 80 lbs. I think I can make that work.

Jack

[Tom S.]

Funny this topic came up as I bought the FA unit and did my first batch yesterday. I had around 800 9mm cases that I had derprimed. Pulled out the bag of pins. Here's warning #1: Put the bag (they are actually wrapped in three bags) into a container and then start opening the bags. First bag was OK. Second bag was OK, but the third bag had a hole in it and pins went everywhere! Hence doing this operation in a container. OK. put the brass in the drum, dumped in the pins, poured in distilled water, added a tablespoon of Dawn and a tablespoon of Lemi-shine. Capped it up and put the drum on the roller. First thing I noticed was a few drops. Instructions said this is normal if there is water on the thread when you put the caps on. It did stop after a couple minutes. So far, so good.

Ran this for a bit over 3 hours. Removed the drum from the roller, removed one end cap and put on the open grilled piece. I drained the water into a bucket through a strainer. The pins are so small, a few of them made it through the strainer, but no big deal. Man, was that water dirty! Imagine washing 3 or 4 dirty cars with the same water and you'll have a good idea how dirty it was. I put the strained pins in a separate container and put the cases in my Dillon media separator. It did a great job separating the pins from the cases, but it's not a one or two turn operation. I cranked and cranked until nothing else came out. I read that some people put the cases in the oven for drying. Living in Michigan, where the current temps were low 40's and cloudy, air drying wasn't an option, so I put the cases in a couple glass cooking dishes, set the oven on warm and stuck them in for 20 minutes. Took them out, still wet in the primer pockets. Stuck them back in for another 20 minutes. At the end of this 20 minutes, I turned the oven off and went to work out. Came back an hour an a half later and pulled out the cases. They looked like crap. They were discolored. I don't think it was from the heat, but because I didn't rinse them enough to get all the soap off. I ran them in my vibrating tumbler and they came out looking much better. Here's warning #2: Those &*%#% pins are so small, they will go everywhere, given half a chance. I found a few in the glass dishes, and lots of them stuck to the inside of the drum and end caps, only to 'relocate' themselves to the floor given any kind of chance. Lesson here: buy the magnet. If you don't, you'll be sorry. I eventually rounded up all the pins (I think) and put them on a towel to dry. Removing both ends of the drum, I put a fan at one end to dry it out.

Bottom line: If you want the primer pockets and inside of the brass clean, this will do it, no doubt. But it is messy and requires a lot more steps than just tumbling. I can't honestly say it cleans the outside of the brass any cleaner than my crushed walnut shells and polish do. I still have 500 45acp's to do, but I'm debating which method to use.

[TheGodfather]

I've used a model B for the last 20 years...with regular use the last 5. Works good although it would be nice to have bearings instead of plastic bushings.

[slavex]

I run my dirtiest cases, the ones that sat in a bucket half full of water for a year, stained and growing green moss, for 3hrs. The rest 30 minutes to 1hr with pins. The entire sorting and rinsing process is maybe 10 minutes all told. About the same as I would do separating dry media.

[Tom S.]

FA wet tumbler part 2.

I did around 500 45acp cases today with some changes in my process from the above post. First change, cut back on the amount of Dawn. One teaspoon. Same for the Lemshine. Made sure the threads on the end caps were dry which took care of the short lived leak I had the first time. Ran the tumbler for 2 hours. Drained the water through one of the grated endcaps through a siphon and into another bucket. Dumped the pins the siphon caught into a clean bucket, then ran the dirty water back through the siphon to catch the few pins that got through. Put the drum into a large 5 gallon pail, removed the other send and hosed the contents of the drum until the water level in the bucket was nearly as high as the drum. During this process, I turned the end for end a couple of times. Took the drum out and shook it up and down a few times to get more pins out. Without putting it back in the water, I swapped it end for end a couple more times to dump more pins. I then put the contents in my Dillon separator and cranked on it for a couple of minutes. Those damn pins can be pesky! I took the pins out of the Dillon bucket, took the ones out of the 5 gallon pail (drained it first then used the magnet) and the pins from the first drain and put them on a towel. Getting all the brass from the Dillon separator, I put them all on another towel and rolled them around to help dry them. No oven this time. I started to do something similar to the pins but stopped as soon I noticed the pin were getting caught in the weave of the towel. So I used some paper towels, pressing down on the pins to draw the moister up as well as force it into the towel, then using the magnet, put them all into a bucket.

The difference from last time was the brass (which is sitting in front of a fan now) stayed shiny and didn't discolor like before. I believe the discoloring was caused by not rinsing enough soap/Lemshine off the cases.

So here's my verdict on this whole operation. It works. The inside of the brass and primer pockets are as clean as the outside, which is bright and shiny, Is it worth the effort? That depends on how clean you like your brass. If primer pockets and inside the cases don't matter to you, don't waste your time. A vibratory type cleaner with crushed walnut shells and polish will do everything you want. As a side note, I stay away from corn cob stuff because it clogs up my primer pockets, but if you don't deprime before you clean, that's not an issue. I would like to see a comparison between cases cleaned with the FA method verses those done ultrasonically. If the ultrasonic gets them as clean and doesn't require those damn pins, it would become my choice.

[RDA]

You need more Dawn and less Lemishine. I use 1 tablespoon of Dawn and 1/2 teaspoon of Lemishine for a full load in the FA. The more Lemishine you use, the more rinsing is critical and you are simply wasting product and risk more discoloration.

How hot did you have the oven? I don't bother with the oven or dehydrator, I air dry in my basement. I pour as much water out of the drum as possible while keeping the cases and pins inside the drum (I hold my hand over the opening). I then spin the cases and pins to separate them. I then rinse the brass in my sink and eliminate as much water using a colander (sometimes I spin them again). I then dump out on a large towel and run a second towel over top of them moving them around and spreading them out and wiping them down. At this point, they are pretty dry but the inside of the cases and primer pockets may still have a little moisture. If I leave them lay over night, they are dry the next day and I dump them in my bins for future processing. I have no water spots or discoloration.

There are a ton of tips here on how to deal with wet tumbling, once you get the technique down that works for you, I really don't find it that burdensome. I have done at least 50 loads in my FA in the past couple months and I spend far more time processing and sorting the brass than cleaning it.

[usmc90]

I wondered about those ultra-sonic cleaners as well

[safeactionjackson]

You need more Dawn and less Lemishine. I use 1 tablespoon of Dawn and 1/2 teaspoon of Lemishine for a full load in the FA. The more Lemishine you use, the more rinsing is critical and you are simply wasting product and risk more discoloration.

I have no water spots or discoloration.

^spot on...... 100% exactly how I do it, with identical results.

9mm I'll do 1100 pieces

45acp I'll do 800 pieces

Batches are usually run for two hours, separated, rinsed, and then dried via a food dehydrator.

I wondered about those ultra-sonic cleaners as well

You will be sadly disappointed if you expect an ultra-sonic cleaner to even come close to wet tumbling with SS pins and receipt above. Far more time consuming, I've adjusted my workflow a couple of times as I've learned more, I have it down to a science now, and usually have brass wet tumbling in the background.

As RDA said, sorting and resizing/depriming consume far more time than wet tumbling.

~g

[RDA]

Agree with safeactionjackson on the ultrasonic, no comparison to wet tumbling. Only thing I use an ultrasonic for is cleaning some gun parts.

[Steve RA]

The pins are stainless, you don't need to dry them !!! Just dump them back into the tumbler for the next time.

[slavex]

yeah not sure why you are rinsing out the tumbler itself and doing all that extra work. I use a RCBS media separator (I think a few companies sell the enclosed ones of the same design), first I put the slotted cap on the tumbler and dump out all the crap and as many pins come out with a shake or two. Then dump that dirty water out of the separator and use the magnet to transfer the pins to a plastic jar (old peanut butter one). Then I put the bottom tray of back in the separator and pour in about half the cases. Fill the separator up until about half way with hot hot water, put the top half on, put the lid on and spin. As I use laundry detergent I get little foam and only have to rinse twice (pouring out the water and replacing). Then I do a bunch of dry spins to get as much water out of the cases as possible. Dump them in a bucket, transfer the pins, and do the last half of the contents. I then throw all the pins back in the tumbler and let them sit submerged until the next time I use it.

[Tom S.]

RDA, oven was set for warm. I don't know the exact temp but I was able to handle the containers w/o gloves, so I would guess around 100 degrees, or a tad more.