Does anyone use stainless steel media in their tumbler for cleaning brass. The walnut media is getting more and more expensive. If you do use it, how long does it last?
It lasts as long as ou don’t lose pieces of the media. So far mine has lasted 8 years.
Thanks for the info. Does it damage the brass?
It does not. For precision rifle I anneal after each shooting.
I noticed on the web it says for use in rotary tumblers. Can you use it in a regular vibration type?
Not very well, as it needs water to work, and the water dampens the vibration. Try pet stores for cheaper walnut shells.
Thanks. I’ll do that.
A couple of used dryer sheets will take most of the dirt out of walnut media.
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Thank you for that information. I will give it a try. I have found that at the pet stores, the lizard media is crushed walnut and it works great in tumblers. It also costs about half what is on line or in gun shops.
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I’m old school, corn cob for me. Water just seems like such a mess. Dry media is messy too but what do you do.
I’m with you on not using water. I got away from that with rifle brass as well. Most of the spray lubricants work so well you don’t have to wash it.
Do you add brass polish to the walnut media?
No I do not use polish, the tumbling seems to be enough for my brass. It comes out really shiny and clean. The media from the lizard bedding is so fine it cleans the inside as well. It is also too small to get stuck in the primer flash hole.
try buying walnut hull from hammons products in stockton,mo.65785 i live here an its really cheap in a bigbag. hunter 58. i prefer water an stainless pins. that cleans primer pockets an inside. clean inside affects volume instead of all that build up.
Thanks for the information. I’m going to stick with crushed walnut. It works for me and cleaning the media with used dryer sheets worked very well. Lots of ways to go, same as everything in loading and shooting. I guess whatever works for you is best. Keep at it.
I used walnut and corn cobb for decades before switching to wet.
I shoot a couple hundred rounds of 45acp a week, plus about 100 rounds of some kind of bottlenecked rifle (30Br is this years flavor for me).
I de-prime, clean then inspect, after which I load my pistol ammo of a progressive, and everything else on a single stage.
What I like about dry tumbling is that I can just dump my brass into the tumbler when I get home, which means I am always handling clean brass.
What sucks about dry tumbling is the dust is a pain, and getting all the media out of the cases can be a problem, especially with bottle necked cases. For this reason, I do not like Walnut even though is polishes better. I have bent decapping pins on walnut shells. Corn cobb gets stuck more often, but the decapper will usually punch right through it with no problem.
A while ago, I invested in the Frankford Arsenal tumbler, separator and dryer. A while after that, I stopped using stainless pins on pistol brass. I de-cap on a Lee APP (I highly recommend it, use it with the universal decapping die and Express shell holder), so handling dirty brass is minimal. A heaping teaspoon of Lemishine and a small squirt of Ajax gets the brass plenty clean and it painless to rinse). I still use the pins on precision brass though.
Handling dirty brass, then dirty ammo is not pleasant.
Dealing with dry media sucks.
Separating pins can be a pain even with a separator.
Wet tumbling brass with no pins does a good enough job and does not suck.
Buying a brass dryer feels foolish, but it is the best way to ensure your primer pockets are dry. Even with my best efforts, I get 1 or 2 cases that did not get de-primed, so it is important to make sure the brass is dry and de-capping die is in my press.
My suggestion is to get a wet tumbler and dryer next time they are on sale and never look back.
YMMV