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Do the pros use stainless steel pin/wet tumble or Dry Tumble?

mjwilcox38

mjwilcox38

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I have not seen to many wet tumblers in youtube videos of pro load development. I used dry tumble but it took way to long to get the brass clean and you could tap the case and black residue would still come out. I like wet tumbling. Does anyone thinK I am losing any thing wet tumbling that I would gain over dry tumbling>
 
Are you annealing every reload? Because pins and ceramic media work harden brass like sizing it.
 
Wet tumbling all the way. I use pins for a short quick clean and brass looks amazing. Then amp annealer, I then lube and size and rerun with no pins looks brand new. Then finish case prep and done. I say wet tumble is the ticket but I’m sure some feel the other way.
 
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www.snipershide.com

How to clean sooty ar-10 brass? Running suppressed

So i usually dry tumble and yes I know I need a wet tumbler but try to work with what I have. Running a suppressed ar10 with an adjustable gas block. Im not sure if it is the powder (imr4064) or just the blow back from the can. Right now I have been wiping the carbon off the brass with a paper...
www.snipershide.com www.snipershide.com
 
Simonsza1 said:
Wet tumbling all the way. I use pins for a short quick clean and brass looks amazing. Then amp annealer, I then lube and size and rerun with no pins looks brand new. Then finish case prep and done. I say wet tumble is the ticket but I’m sure some feel the other way.
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What is a short quick clean, how many mins? What are you using to clean?

Your process is similar to mine, except I have an ugly annealer that uses a torch. And I use pins for last clean also, may try with out pins to remove lube.
 
I tried wet and ran into incredibly sticky necks bc of friction, especially after annealing. And I never liked having to dry brass or wait until it was dry. After fighting with lubing necks and trying to figure out if they were lubed enough or too much or all the same or not I stopped and asked what I was getting out of wet tumbling. The answer- I was getting brass that was a little bit shinier but also brass that came with variables and issues I didn’t need to deal with before. I now love the look and feel of dusty brass dropping out of walnut media lol. Seating bullets into carbon covered necks never felt better.
 
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acourvil said:
Complete BS. There are some disadvantages to wet tumbling with pins, but that’s not one of them.
Click to expand...

Personally I think everything about wet tumbling is a disadvantage, extra work hardening of the brass being the least of them. I absolutely hate wet tumbling, and only do it begrudgingly for black powder cartridges.

(No dust is an upside. But it doesn’t outweigh the hassles IMO)
 
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bought them used them spend a while picking them up after spilling bucket have not used since will never go back to using them again . I get the same cleaning with just lemie shine and dish soap or an easier faster better clean by not using any of it .
 
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mjwilcox38 said:
What are the disadvantages?
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From my perspective, the disadvantages are that it is more work than some other methods, the brass needs to be rinsed and dried, sometimes pins get stuck in the case necks (depends on caliber) and the necks need to be lubed because they are too sticky because they are so clean. Having said that, it’s the method I use because I get good, consistent results..

Some people also complain about the case mouths getting peened, but IMHO if that is happening they are not doing it right.
 
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I started using pins and wet tumbling when I got an M2 but I'm probably doing it a bit differently... When I do load it's in the thousands and BMG. So a large cement mixer with 60lbs of pins and detergent and lemishine does do the trick but it takes pretty hot water to get it done right. Military BMG brass is nasty as shit!

Otherwise I prefer a sonic cleaner for smaller calibers but it only holds so much.

Dry tumble all the way for smaller runs. Fast and easy. Maybe not as shiny but who cares?
 
mjwilcox38 said:
What is a short quick clean, how many mins? What are you using to clean?

Your process is similar to mine, except I have an ugly annealer that uses a torch. And I use pins for last clean also, may try with out pins to remove lube.
Click to expand...
I do dawn and Lenishine with pins first clean maybe 45 minutes at the most. There extremely clean at this point. Second time no pins and just a little dawn. I have absolutely zero issues with the sticky necks described above. I find the way i do it couldn’t be easier but like I said earlier clearly someone will disagree.
 
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Because I do resize and chamfer/deburr the neck after the first throrough cleaning I also use pins while tumbling the second time. Sometimes the chips from deburring are inside the case and I really do not want them there, also the lube from calibrating the neck needs to be gone.
So basically my workflow is

- wet tumble with pins and dawn
- neck calibration
- size the neck
- deburr the neck
- wet tumble with pins, lemi shine and dawn
 
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cas6969 said:
Are you annealing every reload? Because pins and ceramic media work harden brass like sizing it.
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Tumbling with pins or ceramic media does NOT "work harden brass like sizing it". Rotary tumbling does do some hardening on the surface of the cases, but it's only maybe a few nanometers of that surface, not enough to be anywhere near what sizing will do.
 
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cas6969 said:
Are you annealing every reload? Because pins and ceramic media work harden brass like sizing it.
Click to expand...
This guy, who actually tested with a hardness tester would disagree with you.



Some where in either this video or some of Amps information they mention that it will not work harden the brass. You actually have to work the brass for that to happen.

Again, I can’t remember exactly where or if it’s even this video but somewhere ithis guy actually testedot and I don’t feel like spending the time to go and looking for.
 
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mjwilcox38 said:
I have not seen to many wet tumblers in youtube videos of pro load development. I used dry tumble but it took way to long to get the brass clean and you could tap the case and black residue would still come out. I like wet tumbling. Does anyone thinK I am losing any thing wet tumbling that I would gain over dry tumbling>
Click to expand...
It all really depends on just how clean you want your brass. Some want the brass to be sparkly clean inside and out, including primer pockets. The best way to get this sparkly clean is wet tumbling with SS pins or SS chips. And if one has really dirty brass that's been picked up out of the dirt and mud, this wet tumbling does best on cleaning the inside of the case. Some other people, as long as the inside have dirt or mud inside the cases, are happy with just wiping off the outside of the, particularly the powder residue on the necks, with a rag with some cleaning solution; not caring about cleaning the interior of the case. Then, there's all kinds of things in-between these two approaches where one is not really any "better" than another in terms of what might be achieved on paper. . . depending on what level of shooting one is trying to do.

With regards to "losing anything wet tumbling that I would gain over dry tumbling", the answer is no in terms of what you might get on paper. The differences are what's involved with either of the two processes to get the results you expect on paper.

I use both methods, depending on what I'm trying to accomplish with my loads. I don't clean larger batches of brass (usually from 100 - 150 pieces or so), so several dry cleaning methods are more appealing to me. And I've experimented with both methods to see how they can be used for the best use of my time. I do wet tumble sometimes, just not often because my dry tumbling method takes less time than wet tumbling and I like leaving some carbon residue on the inside of the necks. My brass doesn't get very dirt when I fire them as they never touch the ground upon ejection from my bolt guns. Sparkly clean brass just isn't important to me. :giggle: This is good enough for me:

6.5 PRC Lapua Brass.JPG
 
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cas6969 said:
Are you annealing every reload? Because pins and ceramic media work harden brass like sizing it.
Click to expand...

No, they won’t.

Even firing brass doesn’t do anywhere near as much as a sizing for.

Pins and ceramic media actually provide padding between cases. Most all the issues people see with peening and such comes from brass on brass contact between cases. Not tiny pieces of media. If you were to use even more pins or media, you would alleviate that problem.

Now, would wet tumbling brass without media for long amounts of time work harden the brass? Likely not, but would be an interesting test.

But, most everything perpetuated about work hardening and/or peening and wet tumbling is just anecdotal observations that are given the wrong explanation and just continually repeated on the internet.
 
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Wet tumble for sure. 2 hours in the tumbler. 30min in the toaster oven at 220°F. Anneal, and go to town with the rest of the brass prep. Never had an issue doing it. However I will get a dry tumbler for after sizing to get lube off at some point as it wears out my hands after wiping down 200 pieces of brass.
 
You ask if the "pro's" are using this method.

What do we consider a "pro" in this context? Last I checked, this is a hobby and no one is making a living off of shooting precision rifles.

I'm not a "pro" (just like everyone else on here and involved in this hobby), but tumbling with pins seems like a major PITA. I dry tumble only, but don't care if my brass comes out looking new or not.
 
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cas6969 said:
Are you annealing every reload? Because pins and ceramic media work harden brass like sizing it.
Click to expand...
While there may be some work hardening present, I doubt if it could be measured. So effectively, it doesn't work harden the brass to make any difference to a reloader IME.
 
I dry tumble with rice. No dust, silky smooth bullet seating,and tight groups.

I tried wet tumbling with pins. It works well if you have cases that are filthy. For precision rifle ammo it was not good. It was a shitload more work, the necks were sticky when seating bullets, and groups were not as good. This was actually before I had a vibratory tumbler. It was so bad I just went back to shooting dirty brass.

If you want hassle and clean brass, by all means wet tumble. It's not likely to get you any improvement on the target.
 
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I like the ultra sonic cleaner for the unitial clean, after de prime. It's nice to have a dry tumble in some rice after sizing though.
 
I wet tumble without pins or other media. I skimmed above I didn’t see much mention of wet without pins. Search here and you’ll find a lot of discussion.
I like the results with just Dawn and citric acid (lemishime). It doesn‘t scour out the necks and primer pockets like pins do and leaving a bit of carbon in the neck may have benefits. For most I tumble without pins for about 30 minutes, predry in a media separator just to drain the water and dry on trays in a low oven.
 
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Precision Underground said:
Serious question- what do you get from wet cleaning that you don’t get from dry cleaning?
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Nothing significant - Less dust and mess, no worries about media in primer pockets. I don’t think there’s a huge benefit - just a different path to the same goals. Honestly, I didn‘t dry tumble much before I received a nice wet tumbler as a gift. Used it with pins once and been tumbling wet without media ever since.
 
Semi-pro here... but hey, I was close to the cut off :ROFLMAO:

The only brass cleaning horror stories I've heard in all my year of competing in PRS and like events were from folks who wet clean... I started reloading a couple decades before wet tumbling gained popularity. Because of that, I already had my cleaning method down and never felt the need for spending more on a different method. That said I can see where it might be useful in certain situations.
 
918v said:
The reason you heard those horror stories is because most people who handload are retarded and have no business assembling cartridges.
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" handloader "....I won't say most ,but yeah there are some. Now, if ya want to talk "reloader" ......,yeah ,a lot have no business pulling the handle on a press and messing with shit that goes boom or pew pew pew.

Per cleaning brass : OOOO steel wool and a handheld drill....... I'm done before y'all get started good with the wet or dry tumble .
 
I guess I'm a weird one since I do both. I decap and wet tumble with pins, let them dry, resize and chuck them in a dry tumbler with a little brasso to take the lube off and give them a little shine. I'm working on an annealer so that will be added in to the process soon.
My wife just talked about getting an ultrasonic cleaner so I might give that a try soon.
The way I look at it, pick a method that reaches your desired level of cleanliness that fits your available time. You can get every peice of brass spotless but it's going to take time. I've also seen people shoot just as good doing a side by side test of cleaned vs uncleaned brass. In the end I feel cleaning is really about personal preference
 
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Definitely not a professional but I think I've got and tried every type of brass cleaning gear. I decap all my brass first whatever the case. The SS pin tumbler is the best clean, particularly for really dirty brass. They come out shiny and squeaky clean inside and out but with slightly dinged up case mouths, it doesn't really matter as I chamfer them but I mandrel size the necks with dry lube after cleaning the lube off and prior to seating the bullets so they're lubed a little.

The dry tumbler with walnut media leaves a nice finish but doesn't clean the primer pockets or inside the case as well and bits get stuck in the flash holes. It's completely harmless to the brass though, no damage to the case mouths and the necks aren't squeaky clean so the bullets seat easier. It's annoying blowing the flash holes out though. I mandrel size the cases before the final clean with the dry tumbler.

The ultrasonic is quick and leaves the cases really clean, I bought a big one recently and it's my go-to cleaner now. Heated to 50 degrees C it takes 30 minutes for a couple of hundred cases and they're as clean as they're going to get, it just doesn't polish them. I give them a quick rinse and blow the majority of the water off with an air blower, they dry really well in the annealer! :) I reuse the fluid until it doesn't clean as well, probably around 1000 cases. It works well to clean the lube off after sizing as well, I've got a food dehydrator I put them in to dry after that. The ultrasonic doesn't seem to clean the inside of the necks as squeaky clean as the wet tumbler so feels better seating the bullets.

To be honest, I don't think it makes any difference to the way the loaded ammo shoots whichever one you do. All 3 end up with single digit SD's and dirty cases with a brush through the neck do the same. Clean cases don't dirty up the dies though and are much nicer to work with, it's also a good way to notice issues with the brass which you might not see if they weren't clean.
 
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mjwilcox38 said:
I have not seen to many wet tumblers in youtube videos of pro load development. I used dry tumble but it took way to long to get the brass clean and you could tap the case and black residue would still come out. I like wet tumbling. Does anyone thinK I am losing any thing wet tumbling that I would gain over dry tumbling>
Click to expand...

pros doesnt clean their brass. only retarded consumers clean their brass, because they think that more brass prep and shiny brass score more points.
 
Do what makes you happy, as others have said.

I like clean brass, so I wet tumble with pins for 30 minutes after I decap. And acetone is the answer to quick drying of wet brass.

For several years I put graphite in the necks and thought I saw benefit to having silky smooth bullet seating. I retested that hypothesis the other day by not putting graphite in some bullet necks and shooting them at 100, 500, and 850 over the chonograph. The SD was basically the same and it shot the same, so I am scrapping that time suck. I don't know how much having carbon/lube inside the necks really matters if you are doing good brass prep. Graphite/lube does make a difference when you take brand new brass out of the box, prime, charge, and seat the bullet.
 
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I'll be another outlier here...

I've loaded now for 41 years. Started as a poor boiling cases in Corningware (and getting my ass handed to me by my mother.)

Tried everything.

Wet pin tumbling of de-primed cases is the best thing I've used. A bit of lemony stuff in it. Then hot water rinse dry and load.

I have never annealed a single case except 25mm Artillery cases. I shoot, neck size, neck size, neck size, trim, FL resize, Neck Size... repeat. After about 10 loadings, throw the case out if it's hi-power rifle or if a "Batch" starts neck splitting. If it's pistol, FL resize every time and shoot until it splits.

Never had issues with work-hardened cases. Never head a case head separation. Lots of neck splits... they are my bellwether.

Nothing against annealing... just never bothered. I am sure it is good. But it is not game-changing, either. That said, now that I am shooting more .338 and those cases are spendy... I might do some annealing there to get the most life out of those cases. I'll do it the old fashioned way... torch in a pan of water and tip them over.

But nothing wrong with pin tumbling. Way better than that nasty corncob and walnut shell crap... you have to pin tumble to get the walnut shell dust out.. Yuck.

Sirhr
 
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I have a wet tumbler with pins and SS chips. I have a couple of dry tumblers too. I primarily dry tumble in corncob. Good corncob is the difference, and I throw it away sooner rather than later. I only wet tumble pistol brass anymore. If my fired brass went from the gun back into the ammo box then I don't clean it before reloading.
 
Cascade Hemi said:
I have a wet tumbler with pins and SS chips. I have a couple of dry tumblers too. I primarily dry tumble in corncob. Good corncob is the difference, and I throw it away sooner rather than later. I only wet tumble pistol brass anymore. If my fired brass went from the gun back into the ammo box then I don't clean it before reloading.
Click to expand...

I shoot suppressed always, so my brass is pretty dirty but I would think even without a Suppressor, the brass would be dirty enough to build up in your dies? You haven't had an issue with that sizing dirty brass? Or maybe you clean your die out every so often and that takes care of it? Just curious
 
BuildingConceptsllc said:
I shoot suppressed always, so my brass is pretty dirty but I would think even without a Suppressor, the brass would be dirty enough to build up in your dies? You haven't had an issue with that sizing dirty brass? Or maybe you clean your die out every so often and that takes care of it? Just curious
Click to expand...

I can't recall the last time I shot a rifle unsuppressed. How does your bolt action chamber get dirtier with a suppressor? Automatic rifles begin unlocking with positive chamber pressure, bolt actions do not. To answer your question directly though, no, I don't have any of those issues.

3rd firing, never cleaned, always suppressed

20230212_091226.jpg
 
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Cascade Hemi said:
I can't recall the last time I shot a rifle unsuppressed. How does your bolt action chamber get dirtier with a suppressor? Automatic rifles begin unlocking with positive chamber pressure, bolt actions do not. To answer your question directly though, no, I don't have any of those issues.

3rd firing, never cleaned, always suppressed

View attachment 8073554
Click to expand...

Just the necks is all in the bolt gun, of course the AR brass is pretty nasty all over almost. Just seems like it would build up in your die like it does on my fingers but I'm not all about getting the brass perfectly clean either which is why I am asking about it. I use an ultra sonic which is pretty dang easy and good but I am limited in the sizes of the batches to get it really clean.

I guess you haven't had any issues with primer pockets /flash holes either doing that?
 
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