How to Prepare Brass Cases for Reloading (1st in a series)

Removing dirt and powder residue will make your empty cartridge cases look like new, and preserve your reloading dies.

Difficulty: Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• empty cartridge cases
• tumbler w/ media
• sifting pan
• empty plastic tub
• a soft rag
• rubbing alcohol & cotton swabs (optional)

1. Gather your brass cases (this includes nickel plated, too) from your last few shooting sessions at the range. I like to separate by caliber so that only one size is processed at a time. This avoids the smaller cases from nesting inside the larger ones.

2. Select a spot in the house away from everyone else to set up your tumbler. The basement works well for me - it's out of the way and the noise of the vibrating drum doesn't disturb anyone else in the household.

3. 
    
   typical tumbler w/ media

   Plug in and start the tumbler. I am assuming here that you have already filled it with your media of choice. I use untreated corn cob - it's kind of soft and will gently polish cases to a bright luster. Some folks like to mix in one part crushed walnut to 3-5 parts corn cob to help speed up the process. If you decide to use walnut, a very inexpensive source is your local pet shop - it can be found packaged as lizard bedding and is much cheaper than what you'll find in your neighborhood gun shop.

4. Pour in to the tumbler between 100 to 300 cases, depending on caliber and the size of your tumbler. Be careful not to overfill as the cases may tend to bunch together and scratch each other instead of being polished by the media.

5. Run the tumbler for 2-8 hours. The length of time required is dependent on several factors:
   a) How shiny you want the cases to be,
   b) how many cases in the tub,
   c) how dirty they are,
   d) the media type, and
   e) just how worn the media is.
   
   The media will last a good long time, but like any other abrasive it will wear out due to the constant friction breaking down the tiny edges of the individual kernel surfaces. It will also tend to get dirty after a few thousand cases have been processed.

6. When the cases are clean and shiny enough to meet your requirements, dump them out of the tumbler into a sifting pan, with a plastic tub beneath it. This can be a molded plastic pan with slots in the bottom to let the media fall through while keeping the cases on top (available at Cabelas or your local reloading shop), or you can use a pasta drainer as long as the holes are big enough. The object is to save the media for the next set of cases to be tumbled.

7. As an optional step, you may consider rinsing the cases in a zip-lock bag filled with 3-4 oz. of rubbing alcohol. This tends to break up and remove a lot of the burned powder residue and junk that builds up inside the cases which the tumbling media generally doesn't get out, especially on smaller calibers. Agitate the bag to thoroughly soak the inner surfaces of the cases, then swab out with either a cotton swab or a soft rag (a small wooden dowel is handy for getting the cloth segment all the way to the bottom of the case). Be sure to let the alcohol fully evaporate before storing the cases for any length of time. Doing this before tumbling can also keep the media from getting real dirty real fast.

8. 
    

   You are now ready to move on to the next stage of the reloading process - resizing the cases and removing the spent primers.

Tips & Warnings

• To extend the useful life of your media there are several products available that act as "revitalizers" - one of these that I have used is called "Flitz". It is bio-degradable, and contains no ammonia which could damage the brass.
• This is one sequence that works well for me. Your situation may dictate that you change the process and that's OK
• A major advantage to polishing your brass is that it removes the majority of powder residue and dirt that can damage an expensive die set.
• Static electricity build-up can be controlled by wiping the strainer pan, tub, and inside walls of the tumbler with a used dryer sheet.
• Do NOT use products that contain ammonia such as common polishes, Brasso, etc., because the ammonia in them will react with the brass and weaken the cases - this may lead to an unsafe condition where reloaded ammunition cases fail when fired.
• NEVER tumble cases that contain live primers
• NEVER tumble fully assembled ammunition