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A couple things I have come to learn about wet tumbling. It can be a huge pita with the large tumbler and smaller batches. I much prefer my cheap dual drum Harbor freight unit for all but the biggest of batches. Don't expect that nice chamfered mouth to survive a wet tumble that completely cleans the brass. Unless brass needs trimmed and chamfered anyway, I limit the time in the wet tumbler to a out 30-40 minutes, otherwise those nice chamfered case mouths get all peened over.
 
I ruined a new Hornady lock n load press in less then two years depriming dirty range brass. The small grit, carbon and crap wore the aluminum.frame where the ram goes up & down.
Yikes! Thats one thing i LOVE about my coax is the depriming is VERY clean. I even just removed about 1300 NEW primers the other day and was very easy to brush and clean the whole system out with a little bottle brush before starting. Every thing just takes forever but its relatively quick with the auto jaw system they have. That press is a tank. I dont ever see it wearing out. I keep the guide rails nice and lubed.
Thinking about adding a indicator on it today or tomorrow to measure flex/slop and see if theres any or how much. Links are slightly in the way.. :mad:

Thanks for the instructions there. Good info.

So speaking of process, what's the best way to separate pins out? Drying in the dehydrator is fine, it's fairly fast, and will hold a lot of brass, and I'm not doing anything else with it. But those pins are a challenge, they seem to get everywhere, and it's not easy to separate them from the brass. Later, and thanks.
I dont have room for one of those fancy pin separators. I just throw all mine on old towel With some very strong neodymium magnets and shuffle them around and toss them around a bit then flatten them into a single layer and wave the magnet around. It gets 99% of them.

One of The keys is i don mix brass now. I do one caliber at a time so they dont interlock and get stuck on each other, those ones dont clean. As a somewhat perfectionist (except for grammar/punctuation frankly who cares anymore foreigners are winning that war) it pisses me off to no end when a few dont clean because they are wedged close. :s0002:
 
I use a rotary separator, and a 5 gal. bucket. The separator stores inside the bucket when not in use, and it's extremely fast and easy to separate media.
I don't use stainless steel pins though. I use ceramic media, and love the way it works. It wont damage case mouths no matter how long I tumble the brass, or how thin the cases are. And the ceramic wont ever get stuck in the flash hole of a primer pocket as some small SS pins can.
My ceramic media is cylindrical, but a bit larger than SS pins. It wont jam up inside bottleneck cases either.
 
I use a rotary separator, and a 5 gal. bucket. The separator stores inside the bucket when not in use, and it's extremely fast and easy to separate media.
I don't use stainless steel pins though. I use ceramic media, and love the way it works. It wont damage case mouths no matter how long I tumble the brass, or how thin the cases are. And the ceramic wont ever get stuck in the flash hole of a primer pocket as some small SS pins can.
My ceramic media is cylindrical, but a bit larger than SS pins. It wont jam up inside bottleneck cases either.
Got a link to the ones you use?
 
Yikes! Thats one thing i LOVE about my coax is the depriming is VERY clean. I even just removed about 1300 NEW primers the other day and was very easy to brush and clean the whole system out with a little bottle brush before starting. Every thing just takes forever but its relatively quick with the auto jaw system they have. That press is a tank. I dont ever see it wearing out. I keep the guide rails nice and lubed.
Thinking about adding a indicator on it today or tomorrow to measure flex/slop and see if theres any or how much. Links are slightly in the way.. :mad:

Thanks for the instructions there. Good info.


I dont have room for one of those fancy pin separators. I just throw all mine on old towel With some very strong neodymium magnets and shuffle them around and toss them around a bit then flatten them into a single layer and wave the magnet around. It gets 99% of them.

One of The keys is i don mix brass now. I do one caliber at a time so they dont interlock and get stuck on each other, those ones dont clean. As a somewhat perfectionist (except for grammar/punctuation frankly who cares anymore foreigners are winning that war) it pisses me off to no end when a few dont clean because they are wedged close. :s0002:
I have two of the magnetic nuts and bolt dishes that the Snap-On/Mac Tool guys have on their trucks and wave them over the stainless media and it picks up the majority of media after a couple of passes.
 
Things I bought for my wet tumbler when I reloaded that I found to be very beneficial
Separator (as many stated)
Long reach magnetic pickup tool with quick release (Harbor freight for 12 bucks)
5 gallon bucket
nylon water strainer

Change out the secure cap with the strainer cap on the tumbler into the 5 gallon bucket. Used the separator to get most of the pins out, and dehydrated the brass to finish.
Dumped what was left in the separator into the bucket, and used the small nylon water strainer to dump out all the black water and not lose my pins. Magnet available to pick up anything that dropped in the process.

Also make sure you clean the tumbler and pins by themself from time to time. Just some dish soap with the water that go around (when I used lemishine, i had a dull appearance to my brass. Seems a bit of the carbon build up stayed so I would have to tumble again).
 
I hear nothing but good things about the southern shine media. Fairly cheap to. Nice sharp points. But im also wondering if it wears out the drum and or lining faster?
(Also kinda curious if the acid degrades the lining as well)


It think the propper way to do it would be a separator and an electro magnet/coil so you can just have a primary switch to turn it on and then a secondary momentary normally on (NO) switch to tap and drop them off into a pan for when/if it fills up. Easy peazy lemon squeezy.
 
Got a link to the ones you use?

Ones I use? You mean the ceramic beads, or the separator? I got the Frankford rotary separator when I still used walnut shell, from Midway.
I've had the ceramic way too long to have a link now. Midway sells if for about $11 a pound, but their site doesn't list size of the ceramic media. Looks like what I bought off Ebay many years ago.

 
Ones I use? You mean the ceramic beads, or the separator? I got the Frankford rotary separator when I still used walnut shell, from Midway.
I've had the ceramic way too long to have a link now. Midway sells if for about $11 a pound, but their site doesn't list size of the ceramic media. Looks like what I bought off Ebay many years ago.

Thank you. The ceramic.
 

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