toppkatt wrote on Mar 24^th, 2025 at 1:02pm:


It isn’t an exact science.  My tumbler is homemade.  It uses either a 4” diameter PVC pipe or a 6” diameter PVC pipe depending on how much brass I’m cleaning.  Both tubes are about 2 foot long.  I treat both the same.  About 5 pounds of SS pins, enough water to fill the tubes, a squirt of Dawn, and a spoonful of citric acid.  Run for an hour.  90% of the time that’s enough.

Been using a Thumblers B for a long time. Started out using ceramic and just a bit of dawn for my BPCR that I used with mostly Black Powder.  I actually like the Stainless pins a bit better, The ceramic I had was angle cut cylinders and would sometimes bridge in a 45 -70 case and jam up.  No problem with the pins down to .38 special.  Never have seen any damage to the cases.
I think wet tumbling is very over analyzed .. I put a  little bit of Dawn in the water. Ive used Simple Green also. And sometimes have added some concentrated lemon juice. IMO most of the cleaning is mechanical in nature.  Tumbling for much over an hour or seems over kill to me.  I dont need it to look like jewelry. But it usually is very bright and new looking.  I actually use the same tumbler with corn cob media sometimes just because its easier.  Experiment with your time and what level of clean you can live with.

I have been using SS chips to clean BP cases for a few months now.  Yesterday I tumbled 91 40-65 cases using 5 lbs of chips, 1tsp of Shooter 2 cleaner and 40 ounces of hot water (that's just enough to cover the cases).  Ran for 30 minutes, drained off the dirty solution, flushed with clean water and then added 1 tsp of cleaner to the barrel with the water level just covering the cases by an inch.  Ran for 1 hour and rinsed the clean cases.  I have never used pins, but this is definitely faster than the ceramic media I have been using.

Cheers,
Steve

msdh wrote on Mar 25^th, 2025 at 5:49pm:

From what I have read and experienced, peening of the case mouths happens due to too much water in the barrel.  Having about 1" above the cases is all that is needed.   

FWIW, 
Steve

I have 2 tumblers that I use. The small one is a Thumbler AR6, the big one is a Rebel, same size as the large Thumbler. I like the small diameter angle cut ceramic. The problem for me is when I purchased it I only got a half order due to the small tumbler. However even that smaller amount does a nice job at cleaning the cases. In the smaller tumbler I just cleande 45 44-40 cases that were pretty nasty in the inside. For that I used the 3mm balls and they came out pretty nice other than a bit of crud in the corners of the primer pockets. 
I saw where Buffalo Arms had angle cut so I ordered a pound and a half. Sadly it is larger diameter than what I had been using, I asked and was advised to not mix the 2 as it may cause them to stick/stack in cases.  I will set the balls aside for really small cases and use the larger ceramic in the small tumbler for pistol cases. 
As a bit of an up side, I did find out that my AR6 barrel will set in and run just fine in the Rebel base. To me thats a big bonus.
Sam