I now this has been beat to death but here I go again. My old media tumbler is dying a slow death and going to need replaced before long. I've pieced it together so many times I'm out of parts. Many of you still use the old vibrator and media tumblers, me included, and some are using the SS pin cleaner. I know they work good or so I'm told. What about the ultra sonic cleaners? I watched a video and the guy was impressed with the way it worked. We all know everything works great when you see it on the internet. Any hands on and what's your opinions???

I run without pins. Hot water, jungle Jake cleaner and some lemon juice. Hr and clean, no pins to check for. Brass stays shiny. That's for dirty range brass(from ground). Sometimes just water, I really don't want the inside case necks clean. They are with the cleaner used.

A guy I know son uses SS but instead of soap he uses some type of acid and gets his water almost boiling before starting to clean. Sounds dangerous. Says it takes about 2 hours. The ultra sonic only took about 30 minutes. Sounds to good to be true.

I inherited a Hornady sonic cleaner from my dad after he passed. I paid up and bought the Hornady solution and all. Yet.... I have still not used it.

I was thinking it would be handy for cleaning brass that was shot suppressed through an AR.

I have been putting a couple caps of mineral spirits, and a couple used laundry sheets/fabric softeners into the corn/walnut in my vibratory tumbler lately. I really have been liking life with no dust!!

Well, I managed one more repair on my media tumbler and now its working fine. Other than having to dump media from the polished hulls its never been an issue and the hulls look like a new penny. I know the stainless is a lot faster but I just wonder if this is the direction I want to go. The ultra sonic looked like it might be a little easier but still uses water. Just having a hard time with the thought that water and gun powder and primers aren't a good mix. My media is dry but takes longer. But again, one thing I do have is plenty of time.

Why bother, I haven't ever put a hull in a cleaner even though I've had a number of rock polishers here at the house that could double as a shell polisher. When the black on the neck doesn't come off with my thumb a green scrubby works. They may not be pretty but they are trimmed, inside of the necks brushed every loading, and annealed as needed. They shoot little groups and kill things.

I've been told more than once that I'm to anal about my brass but I do like shiny things. LOL

Pardon for the hijack...

AWS,

How do you anneal? With a torch and a spinning platform, or a machine?

I anneal using torch/drill. Not every firing. Brass I neck down for 20p and range brass gets done in small batches,50 and less usually. My brass for my custom barreled 17 Rem and 22-250 every other firing. Will probably go thru last summer's pd brass this winter. Bushing and mandrel is helping reduce work hardening.

You and me both.
Anymore I anneal every other time. Buddy bought an an Annealeze, I have done several K on it.
Clean brass = happy dies. There is way more going on pressure wise inside die than most imagine.
I still have two thumbless tumbler vibe type polishers. I got a deal on 50lb bag of corncob a few years ago. I use a squirt of Nu Finish every once in a while. A couple of caps full of mineral spirits every time, gets the carbon off.

I size and seat by as much feel as anything.

The mineral spirits volatize off and nothing left. Never had an issue ever in past 30 years

Two torches and a deep socket of the appropriate size and drop on to d damp towel to suck the heat out

I use Mother's wheel polish in mine. Shiny shiny!!

Frankfor Arsenal SS wet tumbler is what I use. It does take a little longer to go through the whole process so I wait until I have a good amount of brass before doing it. Results are great and I would not go back to dry media tumbling.

If you want ultra clean brass, inside, outside, and even in the primer pockets, that makes your brass look so good about the only way you can tell it from new brass is it's actually shinier than new, SS pins and wet tumbling is the way to go.

Like WyoBull said, wet tumbling with SS pins is a little more time consuming but certainly no big deal and once you're all set up to wet tumble it's about the most simple process you can imagine.

I bought a Thumler Tumbler and a bag of SS pins from a guy that was selling them and promoting the idea of wet tumbling w/SS pins back I think it was 2008 and I'm still using the same bag of SS pins and the same Thumler Tumbler. I got setup to do wet tumbling w/SS pins a little before they came out with the kits like they have now. The all in one kits like Frankford Arsenal sells is the way to go if you're wanting to get in to wet tumbling. Nothing against the Thumler Tumbler's like I have but unless you're doing really large amounts of brass on a regular basis those other all in one kits are a lot more cost affective.

Not sure about others but I use distilled water in mine with a squirt of Dawn and just a very tiny amount of Lemi Shine. The Lemi Shine will make the brass really shiny but it's weird stuff and less definitely works better than using more. If you use to much your brass won't be shiny at all and instead will come out very dull. This is something I learned the hard way. Our tap water has a lot of minerals in it and was leaving water spots on my brass. Switched to using distilled water to wash as well as rinse and no more water spots. Distilled water is cheap and easy to get at any grocery store so it's an easy choice for me.

like b23.. i was an early adopter of wet tumbling with ss pins. well before any of the kits hit the market. picked up my thumblers in the bargain cave as shipping box damaged (but new and flawless).

i'm glad i switched and i've never looked back. the results are spectacular - especially inside the case and primer pockets. i *hate* cleaning primer pockets so double win there lololol

0.5cc (lee powder) scoop of lemi shine, 2 quarts of water and a healthy squirt of Dawn and you'll be stunned at the color of the sludge you pour off your cases when theyre done. yuck!

i just use my (softened) well water. which is still pretty darn hard and iron-ish, but the lemishine does quite fine.

word to note about lemi-shine - less is more! you'll have to test out for how much you need for your water conditions .. but you'll be surprised how little you can use. i used to use about 1tsp (it was the going amount in the early days for a thumbler sized batch) but kept getting water spotting even after a heavy rinse. i started reducing by half until my results got poor, and then just went back to the last successful measurement. 0.5cc = 1/10th of a tsp. or roughly a little more than a half full 380 case.