-
If you enjoy the forum please consider supporting it by signing up for a NES Membership The benefits pay for the membership many times over.
Starter kits missing brass cleaners?
- Thread starter PigPknHeat
- Start date
FrugalFannie
NES Member
never seen a starter kit WITH a brass cleaner. Yes, you MUST clean your brass.
This a brass cleaning kit I bought from Berrys. Has everything you need: tumbler, media, media separator, and brass polish/cleaner. $102 shipped. Been using it for a few years now with great results.
http://www.berrysmfg.com/product-i14545-c47-g8-b0-p0-Rotary_Brass_Cleaning_Kit.aspx
http://www.berrysmfg.com/product-i14545-c47-g8-b0-p0-Rotary_Brass_Cleaning_Kit.aspx
xtry51
NES Member
I'd add a caveat to this. You can pretty much reload any straight wall case without cleaning it if you wanted to, assuming the brass was relatively clean when you picked it up (not covered in mud, or corroded). If you shot a box of WWB 9mm and picked up the cases, I doubt you'd notice any difference between reloading them and full tumbled brass.
I'm not saying you should do this, I'm just saying you can and you're not going to disrupt the time continuum or blow up a gun.
xtry51
NES Member
Get a small quality tumbler and a enclosed media separator like this one:
http://ads.midwayusa.com/product/17...RzhdLifcUUimrF8Io9_ypTluojLUZdilNcaAm7o8P8HAQ
If you plan on reloading 1,000s of rounds, not 100s, splurge and get the biggest quality tumbler you can afford.
http://ads.midwayusa.com/product/17...RzhdLifcUUimrF8Io9_ypTluojLUZdilNcaAm7o8P8HAQ
If you plan on reloading 1,000s of rounds, not 100s, splurge and get the biggest quality tumbler you can afford.
greencobra
NES Member
- Joined
- Jul 2, 2011
- Messages
- 27,226
- Likes
- 26,726
in 40+ years of reloading and having accumulated thousands and thousands of dollars in equipment one thing I never had was a media separator.
Brass cleaning is the most over-rated, over-talked-about, over-thought reloading-related activity.
I can separate 1000+ cases from tumbling media in under a minute using a media separator.
If you can give me a more efficient way to separate media from cases, I'm all ears.
I think it's an OCD/anal retentive thing for some reloaders
![[laugh]](/xen/styles/default/xenforo/smilies.vb/012.gif "Laugh [laugh]")
. Some want super shiny, spotless brass and some just want brass clean enough to reload and not damage their dies? I consider myself in the middle of that range of cleanliness.I think it's an OCD/anal retentive thing for some reloaders
funny im that guy that wants dies that can handle dirty cases with out a issue! I have a lyman 2800 or some shit, and the rcbs media seperator.
when doing small batches i have a small habor frieght one that holds about 200 9mm and just use a spaghetti strainer to seperate the media
Which cracks me up because I know what the brass is going to look like after a month in an ammo can.
xtry51
NES Member
ToddDubya
NES Member
If you guys aren't hand polishing your cases and swabbing the interiors with q-tips after they come out of the tumbler, you're doing it wrong.
Seriously though, get a tumbler, use media intended for reptile tanks, add whatever floats your boat to get the brass to your satisfactory level of shininess (or not) and be done with it. Don't buy special (read: expensive) "brass tumbling media" and special (read: expensive) "tumbling media conditioners".
I just treated myself to a media separator after finally having enough of manually dumping the media out of each god damned .223 case. I look forward to the next time I have to clean brass so I can experience the joy of not dumping all the cases out by hand.
Seriously though, get a tumbler, use media intended for reptile tanks, add whatever floats your boat to get the brass to your satisfactory level of shininess (or not) and be done with it. Don't buy special (read: expensive) "brass tumbling media" and special (read: expensive) "tumbling media conditioners".
I just treated myself to a media separator after finally having enough of manually dumping the media out of each god damned .223 case. I look forward to the next time I have to clean brass so I can experience the joy of not dumping all the cases out by hand.
xtry51
NES Member
On man, single case one-by-one media dumping? I'd kill myself.
I really like the enclosed separators as they keep the mess, and more importantly noise, way down. I had one of the open ones you put on top of a 5gal pail and it sucked.
Harbor Freight is a good place to get bulk boxes of media.
I really like the enclosed separators as they keep the mess, and more importantly noise, way down. I had one of the open ones you put on top of a 5gal pail and it sucked.
Harbor Freight is a good place to get bulk boxes of media.
I think it's an OCD/anal retentive thing for some reloaders
That's me .
But i'm easily distracted by shiny objects
![[banana]](/xen/styles/default/xenforo/smilies.vb/029.GIF "Banana [banana]")
I don't think that brass cleaning is overrated as long as it is not over done. Almost all of my shooting is done with semi auto firearms which means that the brass lands on the ground. A quick trip through the tumbler using corn cob grit and a little polish yields clean brass for very little effort. Clean brass is easier to work with and won't contaminate your dies with grit from the range.
By "over rated" I didn't mean you shouldn't do it, I mean that for some it becomes an obsession - the hobby within the hobby.
Brass has to be clean enough to inspect, and not damage the dies. That's it. Anything more has no positive effect on accuracy, reliability, or anything else.
Beats me! I don't polish the innards of any of my brass and my gun still shoots better than me.
I would think the ideal situation is to have perfectly shiny brass, ie.absolute consistency, case to case. I haven't seen any technical studies regarding internally polished brass versus dull brass.
You don't want interiors filled with range dirt, spiders,webbing and other foreign matter. Varying case capacities will obviously vary shot consistency.
Beyond assuring that all debris is removed and flash holes are unobstructed, I'd think you'd never notice much difference.
Not that I've been able to measure. Maybe it's true if your cases are so crudded up that the residue causes a significant decrease in case volume, but if that's your problem, you probably have more important issues to tackle than case cleanliness.
I haven't seen any studies either, but my experience leads me to believe the opposite is true.
I'm not disagreeing that absolute consistency is ideal, it's just that I think brass that is "perfectly shiny" on the inside is less consistent than brass that isn't.
I base this on shooting hundreds of groups with rifle ammo using brass that was wet-tumbled with stainless pins - as perfectly shiny as you're going to get on the inside - versus brass that was dry-tumbled and consistently clean, but not as perfectly shiny inside as the wet tumbled brass.
The dry tumbled brass shoots slightly better groups.
My guess is that the small but consistent amount of residual soot inside the necks of the dry tumbled cases acts as a sort of solid "lube" between the bullet and the case, resulting in a more consistent release of the bullet upon firing.
I agree. I also use a media separator. Not essential, but for sure faster.
Way too many people really over think the process. I've tried various things, but the goal was easier, not cleaner. Clean enough is good enough, and spotless isn't essential.
I've yet to see a benchrest competitor clean the insides, and we (yes, I'm one of them) would clean the inside, if it made the groups smaller. It doesn't.
