? on tumbled brass.

[badbcatha7]

I'm fairly new to reloading. I wet tumble my brass with stainless steel pins and a little dawn dish soap. I then rinse the brass and dry it. My cases always have tiny flakes of brass all over them. Am I doing something wrong or is this normal???

[.22lr]

I clean my brass in the same way and have not seen brass flakes.

Where did you get the stainless steel media?

What is the headstamp of the brass?

How long are you tumbling for?

[badbcatha7]

I believe I ordered the media from Midway. The .45 brass seems to be the worst and most of it is PMC (but I have an assortment). I usually tumble it 4-6 hours.

[green_MTman]

I use a sand like abrasive medium available at most gun stores.then after I rinse the medium soap and water.dry as much as possible with towel right away to avoid rusting

[lamarw]

I de-prime and use an ultrasonic. I get nice clean brass inside and out and can forgo the step of cleaning primer pockets. It takes a lot less time since the brass is in the ultrasonic for less than ten minutes, rinse with water and take about five minutes to dry with a blow dryer.

It is probably miniscule but I suspect it saves on the electric bill. I have to use an ultrasonic on my antique clock work anyway.

[oldpapps]

"tiny flakes of brass all over them"

I wouldn't think that is even close to being normal.

I put brass, most of the time de-primed, in a rubber tub, Harbor Freight double barrel tumbler, followed with SS pins, a health squirt of Dawn and fill to 3/4 to 1/2 an inch from the lip with water. I try to tumble 6 or more hours but have gone several days. I seldom put anything acid in the mix and end up with a bronze color, smooth and clean inside and out.
I dump the nasty black mix into a steel pan, flood it with clean water to get the yuck out. Them pick each case out, shaking it mouth down under water, all pins stay in the water. Drop the brass on a towel. Depending upon if I'm in an hurry or not, they air dry or go into a preheated oven at 250 to 300 degrees and the oven is turned off. The oven cools down and the brass is dry.
Some cases will try to hold pins inside (the .223 family) or in the flash hole, but not that often.

I have never seen "tiny flakes of brass" and don't want to.

Load with care,

OSOK

[T. O'Heir]

SS is far harder than brass. You're seeing bits of case.
"...to avoid rusting..." Brass doesn't rust. It will oxidize to that non-shiney colour, but it doesn't rust. Anyway, to dry 'em fast and completely, put your cases on a cookie sheet then into your oven set on warm for 15 minutes. Allow another15 minutes to cool.
Buy small pet bedding in a pet supply shop. It's ground walnut shells or corn cobs. Runs less than $20 for a great big bag. About 40 or 50 pounds. Dish soap is not required.

[Shootest]

I believe I ordered the media from Midway. The .45 brass seems to be the worst and most of it is PMC (but I have an assortment). I usually tumble it 4-6 hours.

I never wet tumble more than 2 hours. It looks like new and I see no reason to tumble longer.

[jepp2]

I then rinse the brass and dry it. My cases always have tiny flakes of brass all over them.

A better rinse should take any brass flakes off the cases.

[Nick_C_S]

I separate my brass from the pins in one of those RCBS tumble separater thingies. After the pins dry, I see a fair amount of "brass dust" (for lack of a better term) left behind.

I don't see any on the brass after drying, however. I also thoroughly rinse before drying.

BTW, I tumble for 1 hour, 45 minutes. Seems to be plenty.

[badbcatha7]

Thanks for the info everyone.

[serf 'rett]

Got some questions:

1. What tumbler are you using?
2. What mix of brass/water/pins/dishsoap/Lemishine? How much of each?
3. Do you rinse the brass? (You state you rinse, but how much and how long?)
4. How dark is the water after tumbling?
5. How long are you running the tumbler? Four to six hours is much more than my 75 to 90 minutes.
6. Will the brass flakes rub off the brass?
7. Have you viewed the flakes under magnification?

I've tumbled over thirty thousand cases and haven't seen brass flakes. It's a mystery why you would have brass flakes after you have rinsed the brass.

[six 4 sure]

Normally my procedure is

Lee universal decapper
drop in Thumbler tumbler with a good squirt of Dawn and a shake of Lemonshine
Tumble 4 hours
remove by hand into plastic sieve shaking out media
rinse well
drop in cheap dehydrator for a few hours
lube and size
tumble, rinse and dry again to remove lube
prime and load

The only time I've ever seen specks of brass is with "new" brass. I see it in the second tumble after I chamfer, debur, trim and uniform primer pockets. It's never very much. I assume it's tiny bits being washed out from the prepping. Maybe you're seeing something similar?

[G_P]

I tumble my brass wet with SS pins in a home made tumbler made from an electric wheelchair right angle drive and some 4" PVC pipe. It has plastic "angle iron" screwed to the inside to agitate everything. I use a bit of lemishine and some dollar store orange magic spray cleaner.

I usually run the tumbler for an hour or so and the brass comes out shiny new looking with dark black water. I once forgot it was running and left the tumbler full of about 250 .45acp cases for well over 8 hours. The cases came out looking great with no ill effects from the full day cycle.

I have never found brass flakes/shavings in the tumbler or in the waste water. Only once found a few flakes of nickle that I tracked down to a cracked .357 case that had flaking nickle plating.

Check your pins. If the ends are very sharp they could be cutting into the brass and causing the shavings. If that is the case I would try running the tumbler for a day or two straight with just the pins and water in it to try and eliminate the sharp ends.

[burninghXcsoul]

I tumble for an 1.5 hours at the most and they come out looking like new. I load each HF drum up to 3 pounds. Just an idea, are you trimming the cases before you tumble them? Could the brass be residue from that operation?

[condor bravo]

I'm surprised about the mumber of hours that some are tumbling, but no doubt many of your results are better than mine. Motors do wear out but my Thumlers Ultra Vibe 18 lasted 20 some years before replacing the motor. For tumbling media I use Lizard Litter obtained from pet supply stores and mix in some Nu-Car auto polish (replinish after several tumbles) and tumble for 90 minutes or so. Had never heard of the steel pin method so something new comes along almost daily

[Jim243]

Had never heard of the steel pin method so something new comes along almost daily

Condo, this is just the current fad for tumbling right now. I too tried the rotor tumbler, but with with aquarium gravel, the results come out the same as the SS pins. Any abrasive media will give similar results. My issue was the disposal of the blackish wash that comes out of the tumbler.

So I still use the rotor tumbler, but with a 50/50 mix corn cob and Zilla walnut with a little case polish. It takes about 25 to 50 % longer to tumble this way (1 1/5 hours instead of 1 hour). But I find it more convent since I often have small quantities of cases that I want to do at a time and using the double tumblers I can run two calibers at a time without mixing cases. Larger jobs are still run on my Lyman tumbler with the same mix of media for a shorter period of time. I do like the results that the stainless steel pins give making the cases shiny inside and out (but that is more a function of Lemon shine than the media), but that is not necessary for good reloads, it would be nice however if you were going to be selling cases to other reloaders.

Jim