case cleaning

[Vanilla Gorilla]

ok so i have been using birchwood casey liquid brass case cleaner for about a month now, and it works alright, but not as good as i had hoped for. now with that said i am looking into buying a vibratory tumbler. any advice on what brand to get and what to stay away from? also where can i get one cheep? i have looked in the for sale section with no luck, seems like all the ones in my price range are sold. any advice would be great
thanks

[tujungatoes]

I'd recommend grafs, midway, or maybe cabelas. You also might check craigslist. I scored mine for cheap on the list a few years back.

[21SF]

Midway has the franford arsenal kit:
Tumbler
media
polish
sifter
65.00 bucks

[rsrocket1]

The Harbor Freight 5 lb tumbler works fine for me and it sells for $45 when it goes on sale (like now). If you are on their spam email list or get the NRA magazines, you can use the 20% off coupon to bring it down to about $40 out the door. You might be able to find crushed walnut media for about $13/50 lbs at a local feed store or simply get a bag of "lizard bedding" at Petsmart.

You also need a way to sift out the media from the shells. A "prospector pan" or pasta collander style sifter works, but the shells tend to align themselves heavy side down (open side up) which is not good. A rotary style sifter that flips the shells works best and would be well worth the typical $30 that they sell for. I made mine from a raffle ticket cage that I picked up at a thrift store for $2 so I can buy more reloading components

It really helps to add a cut-up used dryer sheet to cut down or eliminate the dust. A capfull of Nu Finish car polish once in a while is also something that some folks add to make the shells more shiny.

[Vanilla Gorilla]

The Harbor Freight 5 lb tumbler works fine for me and it sells for $45 when it goes on sale (like now). If you are on their spam email list or get the NRA magazines, you can use the 20% off coupon to bring it down to about $40 out the door. You might be able to find crushed walnut media for about $13/50 lbs at a local feed store or simply get a bag of "lizard bedding" at Petsmart.

You also need a way to sift out the media from the shells. A "prospector pan" or pasta collander style sifter works, but the shells tend to align themselves heavy side down (open side up) which is not good. A rotary style sifter that flips the shells works best and would be well worth the typical $30 that they sell for. I made mine from a raffle ticket cage that I picked up at a thrift store for $2 so I can buy more reloading components

It really helps to add a cut-up used dryer sheet to cut down or eliminate the dust. A capfull of Nu Finish car polish once in a while is also something that some folks add to make the shells more shiny.

cool i got all the walnut shells one could ever need i own a small walnut shelling operation we shell about 20-25 tons of nuts every season so i got a bunch of shells i will just need to crush them up real fine and they should be good to go i will have to check out harbor freight
thanks

[Munk]

cool i got all the walnut shells one could ever need i own a small walnut shelling operation we shell about 20-25 tons of nuts every season so i got a bunch of shells i will just need to crush them up real fine and they should be good to go i will have to check out harbor freight
thanks

What do you do with your crushed shells? You could start selling them to your fellow calgunners, or just offload them in bulk to the companies that repackage and sell them to reloaders.

[Stryfe76]

What do you do with your crushed shells? You could start selling them to your fellow calgunners, or just offload them in bulk to the companies that repackage and sell them to reloaders.

Trade walnut media for reloading components!

[Vanilla Gorilla]

What do you do with your crushed shells? You could start selling them to your fellow calgunners, or just offload them in bulk to the companies that repackage and sell them to reloaders.

Right now we just dump the shells out back and let them decompose they aren't finely crushed and would have to be crushed again and washed to get the small pieces of walnut out of them and to get the oil off too

[LexLuther]

Skip the vibrator and get a rotary tumbler and use stainless tumbling media. Brass comes out like new.

[wc12]

For a sifter, get an old plastic candy jar, bore a bunch of holes at the bottom and you got yourself a nice sifter.