Stained Ammo brass

hobo9650

I have about 800 lbs of ammo brass (various cals) that is stained very bad. Could brass like this be properly cleaned enough (especially the inside) for resale as quality brass?

charliemeyer007

Stained is one thing, corroded with pits maybe not so much. If it really old brass with corrosive primers I'd pass.

Hawk Carse

Wet tumbling with stainless steel pins will clean up some very ugly brass. I am now looking at using it for black powder cases instead of ceramic. The ceramic does a very nice job but tends to get hung up in case mouths and primer pockets.

It is pretty labor intensive and would take a very large tumbler - cement mixer, maybe - and a lot of media to clean 800 lbs of brass quickly. Or many loads in a Thumblers Tumbler like mine.

BGHillbilly

It would take a LARGE cement mixer, truck size nearly. IIRC a 5 gallon bucket of mixed brass only weighed 40-50 lbs or so. Guess you might make it into 10 or so batches in one of the larger pull behind portable mixers.

Tailgunner1954

Cleaned / de-stained brass is NOT the same a QUALITY brass. IOW you can't turn crusty old PMC/military/Rem/Win/Fed brass into new Lapua/Norma/Nosler brass no matter how you process it.

Now, the fastest way for you to accomplish what your after is to mix 1 gal of vinegar with 3 gallons of water in a 5gal bucket.
Add brass to mix, let soak for 15 minutes while stirring occasionally.
Remove brass, rinse in warm/hot water (2nd bucket), than lay out in the sun to dry.
you'll have to work in batches, obviously, but that will give you the chance to sort by calibers (nobody want's mixed calibers) and possibly even by maker (better price with matching headstamps)

jonk

I would sort it by caliber first, preferably using a commercial machine or seive designed for that, then inspect headstamps for military cases and toss any berdan ones or steel or whatever. Then either use the liquid method described above or invest in stainless tumbling media and do by caliber, and sell as fired brass, with the caveat that you don't know how many times it has been fired.

Totally doable, but very time consuming.

hobo9650

Your advice is priceless.

I have the time and energy to process the brass. Just don't have the knowledge to insure I am producing quality brass. Already built up a large stash and now want to start the cleaning process. I am concerned about the inside of the cases and how well it cleans up. Very stained, but no pitting noticed.

Will run some test on various stained cases and see how it cleans.

Thanks guys.

jonk

Actually if you get more than a few pounds of junk brass- cracked, berdan, whatever- sell as scrap. Last time I did that I got about a hundred bucks for 4 five gallon buckets full.

hobo9650

I've been through a portion of it and very little split, bents & dents. Some cals are 264, 348 win, 45-70, 444 new nickel, 30-06, 270, 300 win mag, 300 WSM, 300 wea, 243, 223, 308, 7mm80, 7.5x55, 257, 22-250, 8mm,, 7.62x39, 45 colt, 45 ac, 380, 40, 357, 6.5x55, 25-06, 9mm, 32, 22. I just can't remember others. Got about 300 lbs already sorted by cal and ready to sort them by headstamp. Might junk the 40, 32, 380, 22, 9mm, maybe some others to the recycler.

Have been doing some testing on cleaning in small batches using walnut media and the inside is not clean. Think I'll go with the SS.

bsdoyle

Whenst ya * done give me a shout!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

kenlguy

I once had about 300 loaded 40 S&W rounds loose packed in a cardboard box. They were in a storage unit for a long time where they somehow caught some moisture. Some had green tarnish on the brass which were discarded. Others just had dark brown spots. All the rounds with the spots split or cracked when fired.

Just sayin'

Mobuck

Considering the value of scrap brass and the plentitude of good, clean brass, logic indicates that the questionable brass go to the recycler and is replaced by better quality stuff.

5.56

Easy to fix,

3, 5 gallon buckets
dillon brass seperator screens

2 gallons of white vinager 2 gallons of warm water
let soak for 30-40 minutes, stained areas will now look pink, rinse in another bucket with a touch of baking soda, put in dillon media seperator spin untill most of the water is out, lay brass on a towel in the sun untill dry. Tumble with corncob media about 1-2 hrs, brass will look like new and shiney.

After 3 or batches it will quit cleaning and simply pour out and make another batch. I took cases that were water stained and blackened and had them looking like new.

Nick

hunter86004

Don't know if this will help you, but many years ago, I had 300 pounds of really funky brass that I wanted to clean and polish. Tried the vinegar etc and it wasn't working all that well for me. Got to poking around and discovered I had some muratic acid left over from a tile project and figured I'd give it a try.
Put a couple of ounces in a five gallon plastic bucket with a couple gallons of water and dumped in a coffee can of brass, let it sit for a minute or two, used a plastic collander to collect the brass and transfer the acid to another bucket, and dumped the brass into another bucket of clean water. I found that a second rinse totally removed all traces of the acid and, if you do this method,
I would recommend it. This has worked great for me as a prep to tumbling.
I also gave up on walnut shell and corn cob in my tumbler and have switched to white rice. Seems to work as well as walnut and a lot cheaper. Just have to make sure the cases are dry inside.
Good luck with whatever method you use.

mond

In my book.If in Doubt......DONT DO IT ![;)]

hobo9650

I have now tried several combinations on small test groups of brass. It's very heavily stained, dry, and not corroded.

First I used the vinegar and water test, worked on some of the brass.

test 1. HEATED the vinegar and water almost to a boil, added brass for several minutes, and when removed from water is is pink and Irubbed each case with cloth as I removed from container taht removes most of the "pink". Hot, yes, but using a "q tip" cleaned the inside, and heat immediately dried brass. Tumbled in Apricot pits = fine brass.

test 2. Same except I used citrus acid (powder) 2 tbls per gal water instead of vinegar. Fine brass. I like this method better than the vinegar.

Since I tumbled immediately, I did not rinse brass.

I completed at least 12 different test and the only two that worked to my satisfaction is the two listed above. Also learned to tumble the same day the cleaning is done or staining will return to some degree. The slow part is cleaning inside the case.

For me, SS works better if the primer has been removed and the vinegar or citus acid is use first.

Remember this is very heavily stained brass, but dry and not corroded/pitted.

About 200 lbs is foreign brass various cals that I am taking to the recycler. Don't have time to identify each case.

One reason I like this forum is all the experience that is readily available from the members.

Thanks guys.

Since I got involved with this batch of brass, I have since made arrangements with a shooting range to get all their brass. So guess I have now found a new hobby to celebrate my 77th birthday TODAY.

Riomouse911

Happy Birthday!

jonk

I know I'd be interested in some of the calibers you list; if you get it going and put it on gunbroker put a plug up on the general discussion side and here.

Riomouse911

I could use a few of those for my cartridge collections (one personal, one I use for work)..if you'll sell two of each, I'll buy some 264, 348 win, 444, 300 win mag, 300 WSM, 7mm-08, 7.5x55, and 6.5x55.

EB