Wet tumbling question

so I started cleaning brass to lower lead dust at home. It works to clean brass, but after drying, they tarnish to a darker color. Only a cosmetic issue, but does anyone have a trick to keep the brass shinny after wet tumbling?

Hot water 
3 squirts of dawn
Tea spoon or less of lemi shine

Now these will be very shiny and won’t turn over time but you might want to use some Hornady One Shot when reloading because it will make your press operate smoother!

James Hensler wrote:Hot water 
3 squirts of dawn
Tea spoon or less of lemi shine

Thats pretty much what I do... comes out beautiful... next day, less beautiful...

10sandxs wrote:

James Hensler wrote:Hot water 
3 squirts of dawn
Tea spoon or less of lemi shine

Thats pretty much what I do... comes out beautiful... next day, less beautiful...

Man I don’t know then? My stuff says like new for months maybe try alittle less Limi Shine


I forgot to mention I use a dehumidifier dryer

Do you Use cold water to rinse off?

Armor All Ultra Shine Wash & Wax - @ 1/2 oz. per gallon (because that's what was in the garage)
Lemishine - Amount will depend on size of tank. I use 1 teaspoon in a gallon tank
Dry in food dehydrator on high

Cut down big time on the lemishine. I use a 1/4 teaspoon and it works fabulous. And that’s in a frankford arsenal large wet tumbler full of brass.

Thanks for the thoughts, im cleaning brass this weekend so ill try a few things.

Yes I rinse heavily in cold water, leave in hot garrage to dry.

10sandxs wrote:Thanks for the thoughts, im cleaning brass this weekend so ill try a few things.

Yes I rinse heavily in cold water, leave in hot garrage to dry.

There’s your problem I bet your garage has high humidity

lablover wrote:Cut down big time on the lemishine. I use a 1/4 teaspoon and it works fabulous. And that’s in a frankford arsenal large wet tumbler full of brass.

Exactly. I used to use too much lemshine. Never got bright. Don't use a lot soap either. When done tumbling strain and dry. Do not leave your brass in solution over night. I also use a dehydrator.

Bill

James Hensler wrote:

10sandxs wrote:Thanks for the thoughts, im cleaning brass this weekend so ill try a few things.

Yes I rinse heavily in cold water, leave in hot garrage to dry.

There’s your problem I bet your garage has high humidity

Not a lot of humidity in ND... i have tried toaster over on low temp as well... same result...

I've got the same issues. I think I was using too much Lemishine for a while but even after totally cutting it out I have issues occasionally with brass coming out dark. Also seems to get worse the more times you clean brass, if it's 1x fired brass I almost always seem to get nice shiny brass.

FWIW I clean both my 9x19 and 45 ACP in exactly the same way.  9 always dries shiny and 45 dries dull to tarnished.  Since cosmetic I have never tried to figure out why.  Ain't no big deal to me.  bob

Too much Lemishine will cause the brass to turn a pink color because the acid leaches out the zinc.  That's not your problem.

Use a car wash soap with wax (I use Armor All Ultrashine Car Wash Soap with Carnuba wax).  This will leave behind a light wax coat to keep the brass from tarnishing and it keeps the cases from sticking in the dies.  Remember to rinse in cold water.

I have 3000 pieces of 45acp brass and tumble about 3 times a year; the brass never tarnishes and stays shiny.

Try cleaning your pins. After a while the pins get coated with carbon and do not clean as effectively as when clean. Mix several ounces of Simple Green in a gallon of water and turn on the tumbler for an hour or so with just the pins. Rinse well and I'll bet you see a difference. I clean mine after every 10 to 15 loads. It does make a difference.

Paul

I was wonder why some of my 5.56 brass had a pinkish color around the neck . Will that weaken he brass?

Caster3845 wrote:Try cleaning your pins. After a while the pins get coated with carbon and do not clean as effectively as when clean. Mix several ounces of Simple Green in a gallon of water and turn on the tumbler for an hour or so with just the pins. Rinse well and I'll bet you see a difference. I clean mine after every 10 to 15 loads. It does make a difference.

Paul

I dont use pins... not concerned about inside, just want to get the outside clean and the loose stuff out of the inside.

LongSlide wrote:Too much Lemishine will cause the brass to turn a pink color because the acid leaches out the zinc.  That's not your problem.

Use a car wash soap with wax (I use Armor All Ultrashine Car Wash Soap with Carnuba wax).  This will leave behind a light wax coat to keep the brass from tarnishing and it keeps the cases from sticking in the dies.  Remember to rinse in cold water.

I have 3000 pieces of 45acp brass and tumble about 3 times a year; the brass never tarnishes and stays shiny.

+1.....forget all that other stuff. Turtle wax makes a similar product also with carnauba wax. The wax will keep the brass from tarnishing and also act as a lubricant when sizing bulge-busting etc. De-cap first and use steel pins. Either air dry or at very low temperatures, preferably in a food dehydrator type of dryer.

Thanks, I am still learning. 
I switched to wet a couple years ago.   One of my better decisions.

Lead levels were too high. Now I tumble wet and pour that black water down the drain.  

I tumble with a tsp of lemeshine, pins, and a table spoon of commercial car wash soap.  I quick rinse and add a table spoon of carnauba car wash wax with hot water.  I have been getting a little tarnishing after drying, so I will try to turn the dehydrator on low instead of high.


I have used Zip wash and wax, but my wife owns a car wash, so soap and wax are easy to get.

Using the pins and the method above, If I dump the 45 brass in a cardboard box, it looks like it just came from Midway. 

David

Steve K wrote:I was wonder why some of my 5.56 brass had a pinkish color around the neck .  Will that weaken he brass?  

Not appreciably.  The only zinc that gets removed is that which is on the surface, and then not much of it.

In my FART I’ve found that a typical tumbler load(750 45ACP) all I need is about 1/4 teaspoon of lemishine.  So my mix is 1/4 tsp lemishine, 1 tsp Dawn and the rest hot water.  I just cover the cases plus an inch or so.  Tumble for 2-2.5 hours.  Rinse after dumping the wash water by refilling the drum to over flowing three times and pouring out the rinse water after each fill.  Dry.

Wobbley wrote:

Steve K wrote:I was wonder why some of my 5.56 brass had a pinkish color around the neck .  Will that weaken he brass?  

Not appreciably.  The only zinc that gets removed is that which is on the surface, and then not much of it.

In my FART I’ve found that a typical tumbler load(750 45ACP) all I need is about 1/4 teaspoon of lemishine.  So my mix is 1/4 tsp lemishine, 1 tsp Dawn and the rest hot water.  I just cover the cases plus an inch or so.  Tumble for 2-2.5 hours.  Rinse after dumping the wash water by refilling the drum to over flowing three times and pouring out the rinse water after each fill.  Dry.

I agree on the brass strength, not a lot of difference.

I use a large Frankford tumber and SS media pins, holds 1000 45acp, 2 tbs of Armor All Ultra-Shine, 1/4 tsp lemishine, 1 gallon of hot water. Tumble for 1.25 hours, concurrently tumbling a batch while drying a batch using a dehydrator to speed things along.  I like to tumble all 3000 rounds each time, so having batches of 1000 running in parallel, I can tumble and dry all 3000 in just under 5 hours, then I'm done for 4 months.

Lemishine contains citric acid, it attacks the zinc in the brass. Use a lot less of it.

I too use the Armor All Ultra Shine with Carnuba wax. Seemed to work better then Dawn plus with the Armor All's wax it appeared to help protect the case finish once dried.  I also found Lemi Shine is best used in small quantities; too much and you'll have pink cases which you'll need to resumable again. 

I also rinse the cases in tap water (warm or cold doesn't seem to matter) with a little Jet Dry added. The Jet dry softens my hard as heck tap water and reduces spotting.

Lastly if I dry them outside in the sun, spreading the case out so they are not piled up helps speed up the drying process. Will try a large used food dehydrator when the weather gets colder.

Some other tips: tried blowing off cases with compressed air-waste of time and too noisy.  Also to separate pins out from the brass-use a MEC case separator over a 5 gallon plastic bucked with a paint strainer attached to the bucket to catch the pins. Use an A clamp from the hardware store to clamp the MEC separator open when pouring the cases and pins in-if you don't secure the separator it may fill up, auto-rotate and dump everything in the bucket.  Vigorously rinse cases and pins with hose and sprayer to flush out pins.  Rotate separator and rinse again to shake and wash out pins.  Lastly use a magnetic wand (amazon) to pick up pins still not separated after rinsing and spinning/rotating in MEC device.  The wand works good to on pins dropped on the floor and ground, picks them up without having to curse. I do 2- 40 lb batches of cases/pins at a time, so it's messy and a lot of work. 

On a related note: Not an issue so much with pistol cases, but with rifle, beware of pins stuck inside cases. This is especially true of large bottle neck cases like the 30-06, 300 Win Mag, etc. Small bottle necks like the 6.5x47 seem to hide a pin internally too if you are not paying attention. You can find the case with the pins with the magnetic wand or visual inspection.  Beware, If you are so unlucky to actually load a pin inside your case and actually shoot it down your barrel, it probably won't help your $700 Krieger or Bartlein barrel shoot any better. 

Good luck.  Any one try ultrasonic cleaning their cases? Seems easier with no pins, just not as pretty.

Excellent advice, everyone. I had similar tarnishing issues when drying the casings, even though they were beautiful and bright when coming out of the water. 
I just cleaned about 1000 rounds of .45 brass. 1/4 teaspoon of Lemishine, 3 squirts of Dawn liquid, 2 teaspoons of Carnuba car wax in hot water.  After 2 1/2 hrs of tumbling  rinsed a few times in cold water. 
What I did differently now was I filled the tumbler one more time with cold water and tumbled for another 1/2 hour. Rinsed a couple of times. Dried in Franklin Arsenal drier at 120 degrees for 2 hrs. The brass came out absolutely beautifully bright. Looks brand new. Zero tarnish, spotting or blemishes. The brass was reloaded 8 times previously.

2 1/2 hours seems excessive!

I tried the stainless pins a time or two (went back to vibratory) and the cases came out like new after a 1/2 hour. Tumbler style and speed may be a factor.

DA/SA wrote:2 1/2 hours seems excessive!

It is. 1 1/2 hours is all you need. 1 hour in the dehydrator is plenty.

Bill