Tumbling media

[imaguy3]

The more I read this thread, the more I like the idea. I'm toying with mixing rice and walnut and absolutely slathering it all in nufinish and letting it run with no cases for a few hours, then storing it sealed. The rice would absorb the polish to an extent better than the walnut does, and would impart the benefits of a sealed case on the tumble. I'd use it to final tumble loaded rounds, which I do now with walnut alone.

I don't know if I'd introduce a liquid, even polish, into it... You might turn the rice to mush...

I've got about 600 rds tumbled through that same batch of rice now... I think it's beginning to loose it's touch some. It's not getting quite as shiny as it did before. It still gets clean, just not super shiny. I'm gonna run it until it doesn't even clean anymore and see how many rounds it takes.


My guess is the fine imperfections on the rice are finally getting full of crud and smoothing out.

[Kswhitetails]

Alas, you are correct. The rice is quite soft after some polish and the walnut mix and tumble. It's definitely a no-go. So, there's 5 lbs of good walnut down the tube. And I can't even throw it out in the grass, needs trashed.

Maybe some synthetic poly beads?

wait, WHY? Wet is so much better, and 100% walnut and NUfinish to final tumble is the ticket.

[DDRanch]

Back in late 90's it was Walnut and NuFinish, than CornCob and NuFinish. Finally started using Stainless Pins, Dawn and just a touch of citric acid, topped off by a final tumble with corn cob, NuFinish and cut up anti static dryer sheets. That's "The Cats Meow" in my book. Just may have to try some rice out though?

[Mad Charlie]

Trust me fellows, I like Shine, the shinier the better! However, over the last 5 or so years, I don't tumble as much as I used to. Since I started using brass catchers I mostly just wipe the soot off of the case with a rag with denatured alcohol. After a while though my brass starts getting kinda cruddy looking. That is when it gets pin tumbled, with the citric acid/wash 'n wax method. By then the primer pockets need cleaning anyway. Prior to that method I used the walnut media with nu-finish, which works very well also, except primer pockets. The main purpose is to get the cases clean before going through my dies.

A number of years ago I tried rice, with the same results shown and the same lack of useful life. Somebody suggested sprinkling a little bon-ami in with the rice, I wouldn't suggest that anyone do that . It left the cases with a bead blasted looking finish, and I had to wash them to be sure all of the bon-ami was out of the inside. I also had issues with making sure all of the rice was out of the cases with 5.56 cases.

I have always used a rotary tumbler.

[Kswhitetails]

Back in late 90's it was Walnut and NuFinish, than CornCob and NuFinish. Finally started using Stainless Pins, Dawn and just a touch of citric acid, topped off by a final tumble with corn cob, NuFinish and cut up anti static dryer sheets. That's "The Cats Meow" in my book. Just may have to try some rice out though?

Funny how folks find what works, and surprise! its the same story. You and I think alike.

[Javman]

Tried the rice method way before but didn't like how the rice would get packed in some of the cases! So back to the old walnut shells and some polishing compound.

[Popeye212]

I skipped all that an went straight to the tumbler and steel pins. Can't see do anything else now it works so well.

[Javman]

Just tried some stainless steel jewelry cleaning chips that I saw on Etsy and it cleaned up my brass darn quick with only water in the tumbler! Very impressed so far.

https://www.etsy.com/listing/501537520/stainless-steel-polishing-micro-chips?ga_order=most_relevant&ga_search_type=all&ga_view_type=gallery&ga_search_query=stainless+steel+cleaning+chips&ref=sr_gallery-1-3&organic_search_click=1