I sprang for the RCBS Sidewinder specifically for it's ease in switching back and forth between dry or wet media.

For the guys who have been using the Sidewinder for a time (they've been around forever), I'd like to ask a couple of quick questions.

First with regard to .223 for the moment, what ratio of brass to dry media do you load the tub, and how full do you load it. (How many cases, and then, fill to what level in the drum with dry media?)
A picture in the manual shows the tub with the cover off and it looks like it's been stuffed to the top with dry media, but I'm thinking that would inhibit the cleaning action.

Secondly, do you like and stay with the RCBS wet concentrate for cleaning wet, or do you gravitate toward something else?

I've found the answers to lots of other questions I have about using tumblers in general, but there doesn't seem to a consensus on the above so I'd like some individual thoughts.

As an aside, I really like the Sidewinder. It's very quiet and easy to load and unload with it's pop-off cover. Am currently using the Kaytee Walnut Bird Litter from Petsmart but will probably use the corn cob media for de-lubing.

TIA

That is one horrendously expensive tumbler.

Not really in the big scheme of things.
You get the ability to switch back and forth from wet or dry in one tumbler, and the darn thing (has been shown) to last forever. I've read too many reports of people who have been using a Sidewinder for decades without a problem.
The big plus is high quiet it is. I like that.
I look at it as you buy it once and you're done.

I looked at the Thumbler, but all those thumbscrews put me off. The Sidewinder is just one, push on cap no matter whether wet or dry.
To each his own I guess.

Really? Lemishine with SS and water and that's it? That easy?

I like it! Thanks.

Not sure it would work with the SS.
The drum is at an angle,, like a cement mixer, and we know how that worked.
Brass floated on top of the pins.

I actually don't know how that worked (with a cement mixer) so I'd like a better description and assumed causality.

Neither the SS nor the brass should "float" (water would fill the insides of the brass very quickly I would think), and what does an angle have to do with it short of it being vertical and having no tumbling action at all?
A cement mixer is at a much higher angle than the Sidewinder (I'd guess about 15 degrees for the Sidewinder with the cement mixer being about 45 to 50 degrees).
Plus, there are fins strategically placed around the inside of the Sidewinder drum so there is going to be plenty of mixing action.
I can see that maybe too much water to SS and brass ratio would lesson the contact with the SS to brass, but putting just enough water in to cover the slurry of SS and brass should work about right.
At least that's what I'll go for when I can find some SS media (gun show coming up this weekend... yea baby!)

That's my common sense take on it but if you have a bit of physics to throw in and correct me, I'd like to hear it.

I don't  think the "angle" is the problem. The problem is the smooth surface of the interior of the cement mixer bowl that doesn't mix up the brass and allows the much more dense SS pins to settle on the bottom and stay there.
The $400+ beast in question has multiple flat sides for the brass and SS pins to run into as it spins. I think they would stay mixed.

OK, try it and let us know.