Wet Tumbling What went Wrong?

[Mastershot]

Just a heads up, and I should have put in my post above. I only do wet on pistol brass. I never do wet on rifle brass.

 

[5spd]

Just use dish soap and vinager, bright shiney, never dull

 

[Rick300]

Wet tumbling doesn't have to be complicated to get great results. I use a squirt of Dawn and a .45ACP case of lemishine. Tumble for an hour or less and they come out perfect. If I'm try to just get some sizing lube off like lanolin, I'll add a squirt of wash and wax and tumble for maybe 20-30 minutes. Some people tumble for WAY too long.

 

[Kracken McGraw]

Is the purpose of the wet tumbling to get the inside of the case cleaner for some reason?

 

[Rick300]

It gets the primer pockets clean and besides, I like bling!

 

[Mike TackleBerry]

Is the purpose of the wet tumbling to get the inside of the case cleaner for some reason?

Not at all, Wet tumbling takes me an hour tops, Add another hour for drying in the oven at 180. So in a total of 2 hours, I can be resizing my brass. No dust or mess.

 

[DiRTY DOG]

Is the purpose of the wet tumbling to get the inside of the case cleaner for some reason?

Some range brass is very dirty, muddy, dried mud, partially corroded, has spiderwebs inside, etc. Many bulk 9mm/556 reloaders wet tumble to make it usable. It's the best for this. Dry media will never "fix" really bad range brass.

 

[DDRanch]

For the Bling lovers

 

[rwj]

Right now they are in the wet tumbler with Palmolive and LimeShine.

Update?

 

[mmcu]

For crying out loud.

With the problems that are associated with wet tumbling, nuke the S/S pins, ultrasonic cleaners, chemical concoctions, etc. and simply go back to walnut, or corncob, or rice to clean your brass. You're shooting the stuff, not eating off of it.

It's brass.. It doesn't need to look like a cheap hooker looking for a date on Saturday night.

 

[left360]

Dull gray definitely caused by the NuFinish. Ask me how I know....

 

[Mike TackleBerry]

For crying out loud.

With the problems that are associated with wet tumbling, nuke the S/S pins, ultrasonic cleaners, chemical concoctions, etc. and simply go back to walnut, or corncob, or rice to clean your brass. You're shooting the stuff, not eating off of it.

It's brass.. It doesn't need to look like a cheap hooker looking for a date on Saturday night.

You don't even have to clean it at all and it will work perfectly fine, But that's not the point of this thread.

 

[Oso]

NuFinish is a possibility. The other likely culprit is that a lacquered steel case ended up in the batch. It only takes one of these to turn everything a pewter grey. The water and soap bubbles are almost a oily grey/black. When this happens you have to manually wipe out the tumbler using dawn and rags/paper towel until all residue is removed. The steel pins need to be thoroughly cleaned as well. And after burning through 1-2 hour of work and a roll of paper towels then just maybe it will be back to normal operating results. PITA.

Before I tumble any brass, I run a magnet across all of my 5.56/2.23 cases and all of my pistol brass (especially 9mm) to remove any steel cases (enameled or brass washed).

 

[bozo699]

For crying out loud.

With the problems that are associated with wet tumbling, nuke the S/S pins, ultrasonic cleaners, chemical concoctions, etc. and simply go back to walnut, or corncob, or rice to clean your brass. You're shooting the stuff, not eating off of it.

It's brass.. It doesn't need to look like a cheap hooker looking for a date on Saturday night.

Spot on!…
Wayne

 

[markm87]

Dawn and Lemmyshizzle here too. Skipping the Dawn makes the pins like sticky oatmeal.

I like working with clean brass. And as I understand it, going vibratory only creates a nasty heavy metals dust hazard. My walnut is only for tumbling off case lube. But to each his own.

 

[Rick300]

Also, by using chips you don't have to worry about stuck pins.

 

[pilediver]

I experienced the gray funky cases once and attributed it to the soap mixture breaking down and not keeping the dirt in suspension, possibly because I ran it too long, 2 hours.
I walnut tumbled the cases and they came out fine.
To clean the wet tumbler and the pins of that crap I poured a half bottle of alcohol and ran it for just a few seconds and poured it out and repeated that process and it was all good.
Now when I wet tumble, Armor All car wash soap with wax, Lemi Shine and hot tap water,45 minutes.
A single rinse for 20 seconds with hot water and done.

 

[Fast14riot]

I use dawn but only as a surfactant, so just a drop or 3 does it. I also use a squeeze of whatever citrus fruit I have left over, I have a few trees so its always available. I only wet tumble brass if its used by someone else other than me, and only the first time before loading.

 

[Steve K]

Great suggestion and insight. I took the greyish brass and used my dry tumbler with crushed walnut and the brass came out shiny. One common suggestion was to keep it simple. I'll go back to my old method Dawn and Lime Shine.
Thanks

 

[jonbearman]

I run the pick up magnet from midway over the washed brass to locate any still filled with stainless pins.