Ultrasonic brass cleaning

[kelbro]

I got lazy today and tried an experiment. Same 'clean & shiny' recipe but I just threw the 223 brass into the cups,I use a red plastic 'party cup')and went at it. 2 cups, 30 pcs of brass in each cup, all came out spotless. Necks, insides, primer pockets, perfect. I can't help but think of how much time and energy that I wasted getting them all oriented in the cups before

I do have the water level in the Branson even with the fluid level in the cups and I set the cups on the little plastic grate that's on the bottom of the US cleaner.

 

[Silverfox]

I like to keep all the casing bases down and necks up. I keep the mixture above the casing necks. I use straight-sided glass beakers to hold the casings and cleaning mixture. When it comes time to empty the liquid out of the casings, I can squeeze a couple rubber glove covered fingers down in the beakers alongside the casings and hold them in the beaker as I empty the fluid out. I also hold the casings in the beaker under a stream of fairly hot water to do a thorough rinse.

I would have a lot of difficulty emptying the fluid out and rinsing out the casings if I just dumped the casings in willy-nilly without regard to what end of the casing went in first. BUT, that's just me. If you are happy with your method, that's all that is important.

 

[kelbro]

Yes Silverfox, that's how I had always done it in the past. After the results that I observed today, I don't think that I will sweat the small stuff any more. Pull the cup out, dump it, fill it back up with hot water, slosh it around, dump it again, add the next solution, repeat.

The bottom line,for me) is that I get the same effect without all the hassle. I have seen posts where they had clean primer pockets and the necks didn't get fully cleaned. Not an issue on this batch. Both ends were equally clean. I plan to try it again soon with larger cases like 308.

As far as the plastic 'party cups', they are the result of another experiment that I performed some time back. It cut the time of the cycles in half,better transmission??) and the reduced mass,vs. a glass beaker) allowed me to clean more cases in each load.

 

[Preacher]

As long as I've cleaned my brass in a US I've never worried about orienting them in any particular pattern, I just dump em in and they get clean.. what's not to like ....
IF I was going to set them in any order it would be with the necks down so all the stuff would have a tendency to fall out, while they were cleaning

 

[bsekf]

Here are 2 elementary questions.
1. You fill the unit with water, put your de-primed brass in a plastic cup filled with your cleaning solution, run for the prescribed time, dump and rinse plastic cup and brass, add next cleaning solution to plastic cup, etc. etc. You have to keep your container,plastic cup, off the bottom. Do I have that right?
2. I have been looking for US units on e-bay,several hundred). Until you get well over $100, the units are very small, most are only 2-2 1/2 inches deep. I am also seeing different wattage. What should I be looking for?

Thanks,

Bill

 

[kelbro]

This one works well:

http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/ctaf/Displayitem.taf?itemnumber=95563

 

[greybeard]

kelbro,
Newb here on this site, have looked but can't seem to find the actual 'recipe' for the clean and shiny solution. Have the US unit at work I can use but would like to try the homemade solution.
Thanks

 

[jwv2001]

Basically the Clean & shiny recipe substitutes Birchwood Casey case cleaner for baking soda. Go to this page under Baney's best recipes. http://www.6mmbr.com/ultrasonic.html

 

[kelbro]

Yes, that's the one. If you can't find the Birchwood-Casey, the RCBS stuff works just as well.

Some guys report great results with the Lemi-shine dishwashing additive. I have a can of it but haven't been able to try it yet.

 

[greybeard]

Thanks for the links and the help, have some old 22-250 case I need to try this out on. Looks simple, so am I, maybe a touch lazy.
Thanksagain, great site here. Lots of info.