New Rotary Tumbler for Wet-Cleaning Cartridge Brass
More and more shooters are “wet-tumbling” their brass (in liquid) with reusable polishing media, rather than using dry media in a vibratory tumbler. The “wet-cleaning” method works best with a rotary tumbler fitted with a water-tight, horizontal drum to hold your brass, cleaning solution, and stainless, pin-type media. The rotary tumbler of choice has been the Thumler’s Tumbler Model B Heavy-Duty. That is a great, sturdy machine, but now you have a more affordable option.
Frankford Arsenal has introduced a “Platinum Series” rotary tumbler designed to clean cartridge brass with liquid and stainless media.The watertight, polymer drum rides on four rollers which rotate the drum around its horizontal axis. Two filters are provided so you can quickly separate your brass and media. A built-in timer allows you to set tumbling sessions up to three hours. Frankford Arsenal says its new product will clean up to 1000 cases of .223 Rem brass. That’s impressive capacity.
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The Frankford Arsenal rotary tumbler is sold by major retailers including Grafs.com and Cabelas. You’ll find the best prices online. Amazon Deal |
How to Wet-Clean Your Brass in a Rotary Tumbler
On our main Accurateshooter.com website, you’ll find a comprehensive review of the STM system for cleaning cartridge brass with stainless media. To clean brass with stainless media, start with five pounds of small stainless pins sold by StainlessTumblingMedia.com. Place these along with a gallon of water, a little liquid cleaner, and two pounds of cartridge brass in a rotary tumbler, and run the machine for one to four hours. CLICK HERE for Brass Cleaning System Review
Forum Member Tests STM System
Our reviewer, Forum member Jason Koplin, purchased the STM media and a new Thumler’s Tumbler. He then tested the STM cleaning procedure on his own brass, including some extremely dirty and tarnished “range pick-up” brass. Jason was thoroughly impressed with how well the STM process worked — as you can see from the “before and after” photos below. Brass which looked like it was ready for the scrap heap was restored to “like-new” appearance. The process works equally well on both rifle brass and pistol brass. Jason observed that one surprise benefit of the STM cleaning procedure is a big reduction in noise. Jason said the water-filled rotary tumbler was much quieter than his vibratory tumblers.
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Tags: Frankford Arsenal, Liquid Polishing, Platinum Series, Stainless Media, STM, Thumler's Tumbler
Just curious: I wonder how this review by Mr. Jason Koplin would have been if half of the brass cleaned up was done in one of these sonic cleaners in a side-by-side investigation. Nothing wrong with the review at all. In fact I much appreciate the information. I just haven’t done much cleaning while here in Afghanistan and the new stuff look pretty good. Anybody done a test pitting the “systems” against each other? with 9 kids (just one wife!) I hate to spend money twice when once would have worked. Thanks
Jimmie,
I can’t supply any answers to your question, but I can report on the STM method in two Thumbler’s tumblers, one with 5 pounds of STM, and one with 1 pound of STM for smaller jobs. After cleaning 10,000+ brass cases, both rifle and pistol, I say look no further. It is proven. The results are just like the pictures in the AS article. Of course, there is a learning curve as there is with every process. One observation; once you’re up to speed you’ll find you can cram the drum nearly full of brass no problem, just leave enough internal room for adequate agitation and use a light lube on the drive and driven shafts supporting the drum. The Thumbler’s will run just fine for as long as you like.
+1 on the Thumbler Model B and 5lbs of SS pins.
I’ve gone through 3 drive belts and one lid seal – it just works.
One tip I learned that was counterintuitive; use only cold water
(with Lemishine and a squirt of dishwash soap). Hot water for some reason gives the brass a weird color.
The good old treated corn cob works just fine, for me!
I use a cement mixer I bought from Lowes, has a plastic drum not steel.
I use Lizard Liter (crushed walnut) treated with nufinish car polish.
I dump a 5 gallon bucket of brass at a time with a 25 pound bag of lizard liter. run it several hours, the range brass comes out clean like new.
for smaller batches of target stuff I have a vibrating tumbler, but for pistol or 5.56 range brass, I get great results with my cement mixer.
don’t deprime first with the stainless steel, I had bad results of loose primers with military LC brass afterwards. but that was just my results, others have great results. I still have 15 pounds of it I may not ever use again.
I use a “Lortone” “wet” rock tumbler bought at e-Bay. I cover the brass with warm water, add a few drops of dish washer and 1 teaspoon of lemon juice. After 2 hours remove the dirty water, add fresh warm water and a fey drops of dish washer;tumble for another 2 hours and brass comes out shiny like new…
I told my buddy about the $159,99 deal on 6br.com on this tumbler…as advertised……no dates for expiration…..now the price is risen to $200 4 DAYS LATER….BULLSHIT…. if youre gonna screw us, at least give the dates the good deals end…..Steve
Editor: The price was valid when we released the story. That’s why we included this info for our readers. If you don’t access our Daily stories in a timely fashion, we can’t help. Prices on Amazon.com are constantly changing. We don’t have the ability to foretell the future.