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Post by American Deagle on Jan 21, 2017 12:42:22 GMT
Ive always been tempted by tumbler idea. I once shot on a muddy day I rinsed off brass in sink and put all the cases in an old sock tied it off and put it in the dryer, surprisingly it worked well. I have heard of people sending their brass through the washing machine as well. But I was leary about getting lead residue from the fresh shot cases in there. Not so much in dryer after thoroughly rinsed( still probably some, but has to be moderately better.
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Post by glenr on Jan 21, 2017 12:46:04 GMT
Ive always been tempted by tumbler idea. I once shot on a muddy day I rinsed off brass in sink and put all the cases in an old sock tied it off and put it in the dryer, surprisingly it worked well. I have heard of people sending their brass through the washing machine as well. But I was leary about getting lead residue from the fresh shot cases in there. Not so much in dryer after thoroughly rinsed( still probably some, but has to be moderately better. Yes either of those options will work but if you have a wife you may be in deep deep do! one guy used the kitchen oven for setting the plastic powder coating I guess it cost him a new stove as they never got the smell out! :-) |
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Post by glenr on Jan 22, 2017 11:38:52 GMT
Part two After you dry media tumble the brass you have to separate the brass from media. Now Now you can get one of the fancy brand separators form the suppliers. But the jury seems to be out on most brands, It seems to be split on ease of use and how much of a PIA they are to use. I was in the Great Lakes version of Wally World. They had these on clearance.   I bought two of them  You can hold them closed or use a couple of small spring clamps.  Or as I have started doing just use one move it around in side of an old dish pan, I than use my hand to stir the brass so it comes out of the brass  Here is another version of it in the pan. After you empty the brass from the media If you haven't deprimed the brass that is the next step. I deprime the brass first if I'm going to ultrasonic clean it as it does save time and PIA with wet primer pockets. I have a hand depriming tool as I never liked the idea of depriming in a die with dirty brass.  Here is the Harvey deprimer with extra pin and wrench Here is the link to the page www.harveydeprimer.com/ I will suggest that you get at least one extra pin, since the mil crimped primers or the sealed primers can be tight when removing.  Here are two styles of primer crimps.  This is a sealed primer, the colors can vary from red,blue,green and clear It is used when they don't crimp the primer and to water proof the joint. The crimp is to keep the primer from coming out during full auto  This is doing 5.56mm brass I do it over a cafeteria type tray and and arko bin to catch the spent primers. While wathing TV and I can inspect each casing and head stamp sort if I want too.   It is fast once you get the hang of it, along with you know when you will have a problem with real tight primers. I don't force the issue and I will show you what I do with them in a another post  Here is the arko bin with spent primers. end of part two |
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Post by glenr on Feb 1, 2017 11:30:17 GMT
Part 2.2 I modified my Harvey deprimer tool so I could remove the really tight or some of the mil crimped ones.  I drilled two holes in the side of the tool. It is made out of aluminum, one hole goes all the way through and the second is the dia. of the largest cal I load. I have a number of small end mils so i got a flat bottom hole.  But a regular drill bit will work.  You place the case in the hole  I use a small hammer and either a small drift pin that fits the flash hole or a dull awl to pound out the primer.  Now once you have the primer out, you still have to deal with the crimp around the pocket. There are a number of ways to deal with it. From Simply using a small pocket knife to shave the crimp off the edge of the pocket. From hand tools, 1/4" drill bit and press, to the motorized brass prep centers and the manual swagger by Dillon.  This is over kill with a pocket knife, I found this in some once fired brass I bought.  one of the hand tools  Close up of the remover bit  This is the power prep center for brass, a number of companies make versions of these including every companies with presses  The Dillon 600 swagger, it comes with both large and small primer pocket bits. You simply place the brass over the holding rod Push and hold the rod down in place then pull the handle, it reforms the crimp edge of the pocket. I have modified mine so it self unloads the brass into a container. You can use a spring like I did or people use heavy rubber bands. It does speed up the process.  Location of the spring  My catching device there is a piece of foam rubber behind the towel Now if you rather deprime on the press Here are two depriming dies the one on the left is a universal depriming die, it is used for any caliber that will fit in the hole. The one on the right is a carbide .45 caliber die. you can see the carbide ring that sizes the brass back to the correct size. You use the universal for depriming dirty brass since it doesn't resize the brass, just punches the primer out. And whether you believe it or not crud on the brass can damage the carbide ring.  The die on the left is the depriming die  A Lee .45 carbide depriming die, in a Lee single stage breech lock press |
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Post by glenr on Feb 2, 2017 11:20:23 GMT
Part 3 Resizing straight or bottleneck cases  When you are using a depriming die with or with out it being carbide, You may need some type of lubrication . Yes I know that they say you don't need lube with carbide dies to prevent stuck cases, but even with the carbide a little lubrication helps out in all things. More so if you are doing large caliber or bottlenecks. I also have heard from people on other forums claim they never have had a stuck case. in 40 years of reloading. It is the conclusion of most that they don't reload any brass that isn't fired from their own guns. If you buy once fired range brass, were any number of guns. you will find that stuck cases even with lube and carbide die happens. On the .50 AE and the other large calibers I load I use a small amount of Renaissance wax  This another one of those things like Nascar drivers,beer,trucks hair color on women that will depend on personal preference  Here are a couple of the more popular. One shot sizing wax, an alcohol/lanolin based lube and home made alcohol/lanolin lube there is another wax called Imperial wax, I believe that its is the about the same as one shot. The renaissance wax is a noncrystalline type wax have used it for other stuff and it does last when applied to about every 4/5 casing.  The one shot is a lot stickier of a wax  I now make my own spray lube I have found that it is easier to find the alcohol and Lanolin on Amazon. Mainly for two reasons they have it and it is cheaper than the health food stores. The alcohol is 99% which means there is little H2O in it compared to what is available at my local drug store 92%,97% again this is preference since less water the alcohol will evaporate faster. The formu;a I use is in a larger bottle I use one 16 ounce of alcohol to 4 ounces of lanolin. Then you have to mix it well and shake before each use and spray as it does tend to separate the commercial version also has to be shaken to. I use it on the bottle neck cases 5.56mm You put the cases in a zip lock baggie give a couple of shoots of lube and then spread the casing out to dry on an old cookie sheet. You have to clean your resizing dies when using lube because it will collect in the dies and can cause denting in bottle neck cases. Part 4 will be a home made stuck case remover tools |
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