Rotary Tumbler Recipe

[fstdraw]

I received a new Frankford Arsenal rotary tumbler for my birthday and wondered what you guys put in it with the brass to achieve that perfect clean shiny brass. Shinny brass is like a beautiful sexy woman, a joy to behold!

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[DizzyJ]

Congrats! I use a thimble full (9mm case full) of Lemishine and either one ounce of turtle wax car wash with carnuba wax, or a small squirt of Dawn dish soap.

 

[fstdraw]

Do you use the SS pins I read about? Are they a necessity? Thank you.

 

[Tilos]

Here's a few recent threads on wet tumbling:

Search results for query: wet tumbling

www.northwestfirearms.com

Tumbling threads typically run many posts as reloaders believe their process is somewhat unique but it's really not.
For me the chemical combination ranks 2nd in importance, with the understanding that the mix is dependent your water conditions.
Over time I have come to realize that pin containment is my #1 concern.

Most posts you will get here are just repeats of posts in those other threads with variations of the chemical mix that is dependent on THEIR water condition, not YOURS.
jmo,

.

 

[Papercidal]

Try brass juice, you will have cleaner brass after 45min than with any other solution for several hours.

 

[JuglansRegia]

For best results, dump your water with the lemishine and soap, fill with fresh water and tumble for another hour, l have found that the added detergent and citric acid will give you a nice initial shine but will quickly tarnish.

 

[BAJ475]

I received a new Frankford Arsenal rotary tumbler for my birthday and wondered what you guys put in it with the brass to achieve that perfect clean shiny brass. Shinny brass is like a beautiful sexy woman, a joy to behold!

My process is based on using BiggDawg tumblers that hold 3+ gallons. I use 25lbs of SS pins and enough brass to achieve a 70 - 75% fill (1.5 to 1.75 gals of brass). Fill with water to 95% of capacity and add two table spoons of Dawn and two tea spoons of Lemi Shine. Tumble for 2.5 - 3 hours. After rinsing out the dirty water, I add a 1.5 table spoons of Car Wash & Wax (Some cheep Walmart brand) and mix for about 5 to 6 minutes. Rinse, which separates the pins, and then dry in a food dehydrator. The Car Wash & Wax seems to leave a slight film or residue that prevents the brass from tarnishing. It did not have enough cleaning ability compared to Dawn if used as a substitute. I also deprime and swage, where necessary, before the wet tumble. If you would like to come to N. Idaho to see the process and help out, I still have three 5 gallon buckets of .223 brass to process and load.

 

[BAJ475]

For best results, dump your water with the lemishine and soap, fill with fresh water and tumble for another hour, l have found that the added detergent and citric acid will give you a nice initial shine but will quickly tarnish.

I fully agree. Freshly cleaned brass that was cleaned with Dawn and Lemi Shine has a tendency to tarnish when exposed to air. That is why, after the initial rinse, I added a Car Wash & Wax stage.

 

[41mag]

I prefer RCBS Mix#1. IIRC it combo walnut shells & ceramic powder.

 

[HighlandLofts]

I have two of the Frankford Rotary tumblers, one I use with the pind and one without the pins.
The one without the pins I use for dirty range brass to get all of the crude off of them.
Some range brass can be nasty.

The one with the pins is to get the brass better looking then new brass.
I fill the tumbler up to about three inches to the top with brass.
Fill with HOT tap water.
Add a 1/2 teaspoon of Lemi-shine Booster.
Add a cap full of ArmorAll Wash &Wax.
Add a small squirt of Dawn Dish Soap.
I have been adding a cap full of Finnish Jet Dry.
Run for 45 minutes to an hour.

Drain the black waste water in to a bucket while to hold the brass in the tumbler.

Dump the tainted water, and watch for pins that slipped through your fingers.

Fill the tumbler up with fresh water, shake & dump this water in to the bucket.

Fill back up with warn or hot tap water again, add 1/2 a cap of the ArmorAll Wash n Wax,

Tumble for 15 minutes and drain the water.

I hang my brass on drying racks that I made up. The brass gets 100% DRY.
I get an accurate case count.
And I handle each & every piece so I can check for any damaged cases.

Depending upon your water ph you might have to adjust the Lemi-shine a little.

I have bought, seperated and sold around two & a half tons of range brass so I do have plenty of experience tumbleing brass.

My two dry tumblers and retired and are sitting in a box taking up space.

 

[Member 34319]

A squeeze of both Dawn dish soap and dishwasher rinse aid.

Drain. Then shake out the pins.

Add clean water. Run again without pins in fresh water.

Drain. Shake again to get remaining pins.

Dump into a bucket of clean water for final rinse.

Remove by hand a scoop at a time and drain over colander to get any last pins out.

Dry on towel.

 

[Hueco]

and dishwasher rinse aid.

I'm curious about this part. Are you just looking for a surfactant? I wonder if some PhotoFlo would work just as well...it's a rinse aid sold for film to the tune of ~$10 per 25 gallons...A lot cheaper than Jet Dry.

 

[Member 34319]

I'm curious about this part. Are you just looking for a surfactant? I wonder if some PhotoFlo would work just as well...it's a rinse aid sold for film to the tune of ~$10 per 25 gallons...A lot cheaper than Jet Dry.

It's mostly for the citric acid. I don't usually see Lemishine in stores. Where as I see rinse aid all the time. Works as good if not better than lemishine. If the film stuff has citric acid, it might be a good substitute. Not exactly something I see at the grocery store though.

 

[Member 34319]

Here is another alternative to lemishine. I can usually find this at the store. It's usually the cheapest too.

I just bought a huge bottle of dish soap and rinse aid from costco and have been using that ever since.

 

[DizzyJ]

Do you use the SS pins I read about? Are they a necessity? Thank you.

I use the pins if I want to get the inside cleaner. I've also tumbled without and the outside of the case looks great with the inside being less so. Nice thing about tumbling without pins, you don't have to worry about separating.

 

[PiratePast40]

There are several variations of media separators out there. After putting the brass and pins in the separator, I use the hose to get a good rinse. The separator gets all the pins out and spin dries the brass. I then dump them on a towel and get most of the remaining moisture off. Put them on a cookie sheet at the lowest oven setting for about 20 minutes.

Automotive wash & wax helps keep the brass from tarnishing and is the soap, so no additional detergent needed. I use lemi-shine but any surfactant will work and it really depends on your water if you even need it.

I have found that the pins tend to get a little slimey over time so running them alone with detergent one in awhile cleans them up.

 

[kmk1012]

Very similar recipe as others have stated so nothing to add to that topic. When it comes to separating I found a trick that is super fast and gets 100% of the pins out. I take an old media separator, fill the bottom half with water, open the cage and dump in all the brass and pins together, close it up, ten turns both ways and there's zero pins in the brass remaining. Then, the brass goes into the food dehydrator, pour water off of pins, use magnet to transfer pins into the wet tumbler of doing another batch or just leave in the separator to dry.

 

[RVTECH]

Good info from everyone but give some cheapee lemon juice a try sometime!

I use a few drops of Dawn and a 'shot' or two of Dollar Tree lemon juice in the water and get sparkling bright brass after a couple hours with PINS.

Also something else I do is I usually pre-clean my fired brass, along with any 'field' pickup I find, with Dawn, lemon juice and I use SPENT primers as my media and run them for maybe an hour.

Spent primers are free, work well and I don't get bummed if I loose any. Heck, sometimes after sizing and depriming my pre-cleaned brass I re-load it if the primer pockets aren't too bad but if they are I'll run the sized brass with pins for a really good cleaning!

 

[kbuc nw]

after adding brass and pins,
fill with cold water- read somewhere that hot water can create tarnish issues. Not sure why
1 Tbsp Dawn dish soap
1/4tsp Lemishine- more is not better
2 hr min run time for a large quantity

 

[fstdraw]

I must have done something wrong. Everything looked great until I retumbled the brass in hot water and a bit of car wash and a squirt of car wax. Now cases don't look so bright. The good news is the cases are very clean. If I did something wrong, please correct me.

I used about a pound of pins for 200 cases, a large squirt of Dawn and a pinch of Lemi-Shine powder my wife had. Tumbled for about 2 hours and drained, removed pins then tumbled again as discribed above.