When to change polishing media?

[edfardos]

I've noticed my last few batches of cleaned brass had a lot of dust/dirt/grime on them, so much so, I let them sit in the polisher an extra hour, only to discover later, that a quick wipe with a paper towel made them look shiney factory new.

So there's some kinda dust sticking to every case. My nickel cases actually look dirtier after I run them through the polisher. I tear a fabric/dryer sheet into thirds and put it in with every batch, but they still come out dusty and dingy.

Is my media too old? It has maybe 50 hours on it and i throw a cup of new stuff in every 10 hours or so. Crushed walnut with that red jewelers rouge in it (the latter of which is really stuck to the polisher).

thanks for your experiences,

-edfardos

 

[Iron Mike Golf]

Try putting some pieces of used dryer sheets in the media. Or paper towels, if you don't use dryer sheets. I use 2 inch squares. These will catch a lot of fine powder residue.

You can do this while tumbling your brass. If your media is really dirty, do this several times, like 15-20 min ata a time, then change out the sheets.

Examine your media and check to see if it's all impacted with dirt. If so and the sheets don't clean it, dump and replace with fresh. I am thinking your media is still scrubbing OK, but you have a bunch of powder residue floating around.

 

[Jimbo357mag]

Can you sift or separate the media by shaking it? When I pour the media out of the bowl I will wipe-out the bowl with a damp rag and throw the rag away. Keeping it a little moist will keep the dust down. Media will break-down into dust over time. 8)

...Jimbo

 

[edfardos]

I think you guys are correct on all counts. One other coincidence is the introduction of a new gunpowder, specifically H4350, once I started cleaning brass with that powder, it got bad. In any event, I'll dump the media and clean the bowl. I think in the future I'll use the walnut/rouge media for those tough-to-clean stains, and use corncob perhaps for routine cleaning. I'm really not happy running dusty jewler's rouge (abrassive) down my barrels.

thanks again,

-edfardos

 

[eric conrad]

Try some Dillon meda polish. I use Dillon media also and change when it gets dirty. Takes a long time to clean with dirty media.
Eric

 

[DGW1949]

There's a difference in cleaning cases and polishing cases. I understand the desire to produce shiney/pretty ammo but I no longer strive for that because it seemed to me that no matter what brand of polishing compound I added, it wasn't long before I had to start hand-wiping black residue off of each case. And yeah, that same black stuff also coats the inside of the vibrator-bowl. Then there's this...Getting that crap out of the inside of the brass-cases is even a bigger pain. I aint sure that that last part is nessesary, but I'm not sure that it aint. My thought there has allways been....If left in there, will that crap effect the burn rate of the powder?....I dunno.

Way back when, I usualy loaded no more than 100 cases at a time so all that hand work wasn't too much of a pain. These days though, reloading has become more of a chore than fun, so I tend to put it off untill I need to load 1000's at a time. That's a lot of hand-wiping and gets to be quite time consuming, so I've all but quit with the polish-thing.
If any of you guys knows of a better way to skin that cat, I'm all ears.

DGW

 

[wallask]

Lyman sells a liquid that you soak the brass in for 2 to 3 minutes, drain, rinse with cold water and let dry or use oven. Pour the drained cleaner back into the bottle for the next time. It really does a good job of cleaning the brass. If I have a large batch of real dirty brass, I'll use this method first, dry, and then tumble.

 

[slippingaway]

Try using more used dryer sheets than before, what's happening is the dust/grime produced by the cleaning is more than the dryer sheets can capture, so it builds up in the media. Running the tumbler full of only media and some dryer sheets (no cases) can help clean some of the residue out of the media. I've also had better luck using RCBS dry powder polishing compound in the media instead of using any of the liquid polishing compounds.

 

[edfardos]

I tried running mineral-oil-damp paper towels through my toughnut, but it didn't want to circulate. In any event, I picked up some rcbs corncob media and some walnut lizard bedding. I'm trying the corncob now. I also compared the lizard bedding with the untreated walnut at the gunshop, and they're absolutely identical (except for the 100% difference in price).

fyi,
-edfardos