Ultrasonic Cleaner for brass

I had a Hornady one and didn't like it. I went back to dry tumbling with corn cob media or walnut shells just putting in a few drops of brass polish. I just throw in a dryer sheet with my brass to catch dust.

I am sure there is a place for an ultrasonic cleaner in prepping brass for some ultra accuracy competition shooting. For the average shooter though, a dry tumbler will work great. I use a rock tumbler from HFT. It will only do small batches, but for me it is perfect and it works great. Price is right too!

I use one when my boy brings me a 5 gallon of 223 brass. Does a dang good job. But for everday reloading I use a dry tumbler.

Pins and water with a little dawn for me.

My ultrasonic was a small one for doing jewelry and rapidograph drafting pens, so I can't say how good one would do for brass... it did pretty good for cleaning the tiny pens.
For years, I used the vibrator with a mix of corn and walnut with a couple cut dryer sheets to catch dust... it was good enough, but I did envy the bright shiny pics I saw on the inet... so when someone posted a good sale on one of the water based tumblers, about 80 bucks, I grabbed one and now do a gallon at a time - no pins, just dawn and lemi-shine for an hour, and they come out bright and shiny...

it really depends on how much brass your cleaning at one time, if you’re only doing 50 or so rifle or 100 to 200 pistol cases I would probably just opt to dry tumble with corn cob media, it’s budget friendly to boot.
What I’ve heard from a few reloading buddies, they do not use their ultrasonic cleaners for brass. Many use it for cleaning the slides on their semi automatic handguns and bolt carrier groups for evil black rifles.

I bought sonic cleaner. I figured I could use it for other things like tools and parts if it doesn’t work well for brass. But I’m going to try it for some brass and see how it works. I don’t do a lot of brass at one time. And right now I’m only doing a couple large rifle calibers so I can’t imagine having more than 50 to 75 pieces that I’m working with. I’ll post a couple pictures of my results.

You may find that it’ll work great for your needs.
Good luck.
I clean about 400 .223/556 cases and 1k 9mm each time in my FA wet tumbler.
We all have different options.

Caveman jim said:

You may find that it’ll work great for your needs.
Good luck.
I clean about 400 .223/556 cases and 1k 9mm each time in my FA wet tumbler.
We all have different options.

Click to expand...

So that FA wet tumbler is still on the list to get.

You won’t regret it. There are two sizes, I got the largest one because I’m all about high capacity.

The one feature i like is the timed shutoff... the smaller one may not have that, so check carefully before you order...

Ultrasonic is great for cleaning parts, but wet tumble your brass. I don’t use pins and it works plenty good and makes for an easy process.

Another wet tumbler fan here. I use a small amount of citric acid and armor-all car wash along with the pins.

The wax keeps the brass shiny longer.

Just a LITTLE citric acid/Lemishine is fine too much and you will have pink brass. I don’t think it hurts it and it will shine back the next time.

How much lemi-shine are you using? Too much will turn brass pink so that’s probably the reason. What do the instructions say to use for cleaning parts?
I use about a dime size poured in my palm, it measured out to a 9mm case so that’s what I use for a full load of brass.

HD Simple Green

Weak acids like acetic (citric... aka lemishine) and vinegar dissolve the zinc in the copper alloy. Too much acetic acid turns your brass pink because it is eating away at the zinc & copper...
very little is usually OK for cleaning... very little. If it's pink, then stop using the cleaner and find another way.
pink don't sound good to me...

Caveman jim said:

How much lemi-shine are you using? Too much will turn brass pink so that’s probably the reason. What do the instructions say to use for cleaning parts?
I use about a dime size poured in my palm, it measured out to a 9mm case so that’s what I use for a full load of brass.

Click to expand...

I’ve ran several loads of brass through it without a problem but prob didn’t add that much. I’m still going to get a Frankfort Rotary Tumbler (FART) bc I know it will do better.

I’m thinking now that I put “several” shakes in the BCG. Definitely more than a dime size. Prob way too much.. lol

The brass looks fine and it’s just a coloration issue with the BCG. There is no affect to the surface and it’s still slick to the touch as a fail zero BCG should be. I’ll examine the gas rings closely before I run it.