Wet Tumbling Without Pins

[Trackmaster]

I have used Tide pods with no pins with good results.

[PPGMD]

I wet tumble without pins.

 

I put a 5 gallon of caliber sorted brass in a cement mixer. Fill with water, put a squirt of dish soap, and some lemishine. Run for 30 minutes. Dump water, add more water put some lemishine, and armor all wash & wax, run for another hour. Dump water, rinse brass until there is no bubbles. Air dry in the sun for a couple of hours, and then put it in a 5 gallon bucket with an eva dry. While it is air drying I pick out stuff like wrong caliber and non-reloadable brass.

[BoyGlock]

Can it be done satisfactorily with water only no additves whatsoever? It will lessen one more step of rinsing. 

[MikeyScuba]

I just cleaned a new batch yesterday.  I used less brass.  I store my sorted brass in 2lb protein containers and it's ~10lbs of 9mm.

 

I first cleaned the batch with no pins, a bit of lemishine and dawn for 30mins in warm/hot water (I dump a boiling kettle full in).  And all the water I use is out of a reverse osmosis system -overkill for sure.

 

I then dry in a towel and take over to the 650 set up with a single lee decapping die and decap the whole bunch.

 

Back to the tumbler with a kettle full plus a pot of boiling water.  Added are lemishine, car wash'n'wax and stainless pins.  1hr later dump the lot in a Frankford media separator and rinsed.  Dump on a towel, rubbed a bit and left to air dry.

 

Worked like a charm.  And you should see how black the water is from the dirty primer pockets!!!

[StratRider]

If you don't care about the inside of the case, then don' t use pins. 

I always wet tumble though for just one hour and got these results:

With pins - 99% were shiney inside / / without pins - about 35% were clean inside.

As previously mentioned though - it really only takes an extra 3 minutes to remove the pins if you have a system and a good magnet.  I'll keep using my pins.

Rifle brass is another story for me - I deprime them and run them through the stations on the Lyman Case Prep station.

The 5 stations for me are brush the interior, bevel the primer pocket on the inside, clean the pocket, ream then hit the pocket uniformer.

Lube them up and resize, trim, chammpher/debur then wet tumble with NO pins since the pockets are swaged and clean already.

I did start using that shelf insert for the laundry dryer that is meant for drying shoes - can run up to 1k 9mm on that for about 20 min. = nice. 

[SingingShooter]

I need to try wet tumbling without the pins...I seriously hate those elusive little bastards (pins)! I only reload pistol ammo, and don't deprime before tumbling...not interested in handling the filthy buggers any more than necessary. I love the way my FART cleans even the groatiest looking range like brand new, but will be curious to see how much loss of cleanliness there is if going without pins.

[slavex]

really the pins only clean the inside of the case. The exterior is mostly done by the other cases in the tumbler. Yes of course the pins will do some, but removing them won't make a detectable difference (or didn't with me at least)

[HI5-O]

How does nickel plated brass handle wet tumbling with and without pins?

Edited March 11, 2018 by HI5-O

[Doublehelix]

I have always used the pins, and actually have never tried without. I suppose I need to do a batch with and without pins next time I process dirty brass.

 

I used to de-cap before tumbling to get nice clean primer pockets, but realized how much extra work it was, and I stopped doing that now, and just tumble them as-is and de-cap as part of the loading process.

 

Removing the pins is not *that* big of a deal, but anything that I can do to speed up the process is worth a try.

 

Like @StratRider says, rifle brass is another story altogether. Always de-cap before cleaning, and will always use pins since I really want them clean inside and out. Pistol brass... meh. Not so much. Especially as I processed about 16,000 pistol rounds last year, and expect to do closer to 20,000 rounds this year.

[BaggerJoe]

For anyone considering wet tumbling, Midsouth Shooters Supply has a great deal on the FART right now.

 

https://www.midsouthshooterssupply.com/item/00122909544/frankford-arsenal-platinum-series-rotary-tumbler-(stainless-steel-media-tumbler)

[OPENB]

I used the pins the first time, then stopped. PITA. I'm happy at the cleanliness I get w/o.

[Sarge]

1 minute ago, OPENB said:

I used the pins the first time, then stopped. PITA. I'm happy at the cleanliness I get w/o.

Bob, you still deprime first?

[OPENB]

Nope, lazy. Wet tumble, air dry with a fan, into a bucket. Load on a 650, shoot, repeat. I use the usual recipe of Lemishine and Armorall.

[Sarge]

[racerba]

for those that use the Frankford brass dryer, how high and how long do you guys keep the brass in there? 

[SGC]

for those that use the Frankford brass dryer, how high and how long do you guys keep the brass in there? 

I turn it up all the way (160 F if I remember correctly) and run it for about an hour. I shake it after 20 - 30 min to agitate the brass to make sure no moisture gets trapped.

It will also depend on how much brass you're drying at once. It's not complicated run it for awhile and check, if it's dry great, if not run it longer.

Sent from my Nexus 5X using Tapatalk

[racerba]

41 minutes ago, SGC said:

I turn it up all the way (160 F if I remember correctly) and run it for about an hour. I shake it after 20 - 30 min to agitate the brass to make sure no moisture gets trapped.

It will also depend on how much brass you're drying at once. It's not complicated run it for awhile and check, if it's dry great, if not run it longer.

Sent from my Nexus 5X using Tapatalk
 

well, i let it run for about 3 hours but noticed that my brass isn't bright and shiny as everybody else's.  i was thinking i am leaving it too long in the dryer and it's discoloring the brass.

[SGC]

well, i let it run for about 3 hours but noticed that my brass isn't bright and shiny as everybody else's.  i was thinking i am leaving it too long in the dryer and it's discoloring the brass.

From my limited experience wet tumbling, brass discoloration has more to do with what you're adding to the water than the drying process.

I'm using a couple squirts of armorall wash and wax and a teaspoon of lemishine. My cases come out shiny and have had no issues with discoloration.

Everyone's water is different though so you may want to experiment with different amounts of lemishine or try a different soap and see what works for you.

Sent from my Nexus 5X using Tapatalk

[racerba]

25 minutes ago, SGC said:

From my limited experience wet tumbling, brass discoloration has more to do with what you're adding to the water than the drying process.

I'm using a couple squirts of armorall wash and wax and a teaspoon of lemishine. My cases come out shiny and have had no issues with discoloration.

Everyone's water is different though so you may want to experiment with different amounts of lemishine or try a different soap and see what works for you.

Sent from my Nexus 5X using Tapatalk
 

thanks

 

[chevrofreak]

8 hours ago, racerba said:

well, i let it run for about 3 hours but noticed that my brass isn't bright and shiny as everybody else's.  i was thinking i am leaving it too long in the dryer and it's discoloring the brass.

When I first started wet tumbling I apparently didn't rinse the brass well enough, and baking it in a 200F oven on a perforated pizza pan caused that remaining residue to make my brass look very tarnished.   I have since started rinsing better, and I now air dry rather than baking and the brass comes out very shiny.

[MikeyScuba]

I use ovens here at my shop and once I put the wet brass in there and forgot about it.  378f degrees later the brass got really dark, oops.

 

Nothing gets finished rounds as shiny as a final tumble in a dry tumbler using a mix from a local shooting store that I inpregnated with NuFinish.

[Tom S.]

On 3/27/2018 at 2:04 PM, racerba said:

well, i let it run for about 3 hours but noticed that my brass isn't bright and shiny as everybody else's.  i was thinking i am leaving it too long in the dryer and it's discoloring the brass.

 

It's more likely you aren't rinsing the brass well enough.

[Moloch38]

I am wet tumbling with SS pins, but am new to rifle loading. Lubing cases, but if I don't lube the heck out of them I seem to start with stuck cases until dies are nice and lubed. What is the best way to get lube off the cases once the rounds are loaded so they don't get sticky?

[BL9778]

On 2/15/2018 at 8:06 AM, BoyGlock said:

Can it be done satisfactorily with water only no additves whatsoever? It will lessen one more step of rinsing. 

 

I am not an expert chemist, or waterologist..........but,............

 

I have an acquaintance who designed a water purification methodology and has made a lot of money out of the hardware he sell's.  To design the method and put together the components he had to learn about water......which was a learning curve as he was an Air Force aircraft spanner monkey.  Anyway:  He asked me if I would like a seat on one of his user courses - always willing to learn something I attended.

 

The system he builds and sell's  produces water which has it's contaminant level measured in parts per billion - this is a step further than the original systems where the contamination was measured in parts per million.  Moving on:  The cleaner water is the more it looks for 'dirt' to stabilise itself.  If you look at ultrapure water under a super-microscope it will look like boiling nitric acid trying to burn through water is holding it.  Dirt/contamination settles it down.  Pure water will attract dirt.

 

So to answer you original question:  Invest in a super water purification system and you will not need detergent.  The closest you will get to a system like my acquaintance produces is a fish tank water purification system unless you want to spend around $20K.

[bishop414]

6 hours ago, Moloch38 said:

I am wet tumbling with SS pins, but am new to rifle loading. Lubing cases, but if I don't lube the heck out of them I seem to start with stuck cases until dies are nice and lubed. What is the best way to get lube off the cases once the rounds are loaded so they don't get sticky?

 

Toss them into a dry tumbler for 20-30 mins.