I get bling results from Lemishine and WnW.  No walnut or other dry media.

Curious...are you saying you add car wax to your wet tumbler? I add car wax to the dry media once in awhile and it works well to coat the cases.

I wet tumble first, lube, size and prep, then dry tumble w/wax to keep the shine and place in sealed bags.

Tried a generic wash and wax, but it didn't work at all for me. Could be the off brand I used or didn't use enough of it. Washed twice with it too. Went back to dish soap and lemishine and it finally came out clean.

No.  The car wash with wax in it.  Specifically Armor All brand "Wash & Wax"

Meguiars wash and wax has been used successfully as well.

Just did my 3rd load using WnW & lemishine and I have to say I'm impressed.  They look better than my ajax dish washing liquid and lemishine.

I have a small homemade tumbler.  It'll do about 550 9mm or 225 556x45 cases in a load so you have some idea of the size.  It's made from 4" PVC pipe.  I've never measured the amount of water it'll hold.  My timer is set at 2 hours.

The first load I used 2 tablespoons of WnW and a little more than 1/2 teaspoon of lemishine.  Bling.

The second load I used 1 tablespoon + 1 teaspoon of WnW and 1/2 teaspoon of lemishine.  Bling.

The third load that I just put into walnut I used a little less than 1 tablespoon of WnW and a little less than 1/2 teaspoon of lemishine.  Still bling.

If the left over wax after rinsing and walnut still slows down the oxidation, I'll be a really happy camper with the product.

Try using some Calgon.

In wet tumbling, most of the cleaning is provided by the weak acid (usually Lemishine, i.e. citric acid).

Unpublished tests have shown that cases treated with an aqueous solution of citric acid for half-an-hour and then tumbled in walnut media have 80% of the reflectivity of cases tumbled in citric acid and steel pins.

Thanks, but I want to add (and thus have to deal with) petroleum distillates to my tumbling media about as much as I want another hole in my head.

You actually do want a small amount of slip in the necks. Powdered graphite is popular for it on super clean (new, wet tumbled, or ultra sonic'd) cases.

Ultra clean necks will want to marry themselves to the bullet, up to the point that it will rip it off the case and take a ride right right down the bore with it.

Tarnished brass is a metal that has lost one or two valent electrons.  An acid can be used to essentially "restore" those electrons.

Carbon is entirely different.  It has four valent electrons in its outer shell.  To remove it, you have to either pull those electrons off, or you have to come up with something will cause the carbon to share some of its electrons and thereby relax its grip on the case.  No, Lemishine will not remove carbon from cases, but there are other compounds that will.  I'll leave it up to you to do the research to discover them.  Be aware, some can damage the brass itself, so you will not learn any of this from me.

1/2 Tablespoon was NOT enough to get bling de-lubing a load of 223/224 Valkyrie/30 Carbine/308 cases.  Just not enough surfactant to suspend all oils/waxes and keep it off the cases.  EDIT: I went back to 1 tablespoon and that amount cleaned off the lube just fine.

Just so everyone knows how tough the lube is that I use, I put a pea sized dollop of STP oil treatment that I smear around on the inside of my lube bag that I then rub all over the outside of the cases.  Then I hit them with a couple of sprays of cheap bastard spray lube to get inside the necks.  STP is a challenge for any detergent.

Before anybody screams:  It does not harm the cases, I still have the ones from a year ago out in the garage and still no corrosion on them.  I have had no failures to fire with any of my reloads.  After de-lube you can't tell a case that was done with STP and one that was done with just spray lube.  The reason I use STP is I'm still getting much better shoulder set back consistency with STP on the case bodies compared to just spray lube.  Dig up my thread from sometime last summer if you're interested in STP.

Just did these .308 cases with lemishine and WnW. No media.. Attached File

I don't really know where you're going with any of this, but acids don't "restore" or donate electrons. By the Brønsted–Lowry definition, acids are proton donors; the Lewis definition is an electron pair acceptor.

In any case, why do you insist on being mysterious? Why are you so afraid that someone might learn something from you?

What are you doing here, if not to share information?

I agree with the OP and others on the Armor All W&W, I just got up and running today with a CED Brass Tornado and stainless steel 'chips'. My brass is always filthy from shooting suppressed and using Lemi Shine and W&W has produced amazing results. The thin coat of wax left on the brass will keep it tarnish free which is the cherry on top!

In regards to ingredients the MSDS states, "The specific identity and/or exact percentage (concentration) of composition has been withheld as a trade
secret."

That kind of makes me wonder about what it might do to brass in the long term. In reading an old version of the "ABC's of Reloading" the other night, it recommended both Brasso and Comet as excellent brass polishing additives.  Years later we still have reloaders that did only to discover that their hoard was irrevocably damaged.

Is it worth the risk, considering the possible outcome just for shinier brass?

Geez, you guys are really overthinking this.

It's cartridge brass, not some exotic metal alloy with a sub-micron layer of gold deposited in a vacuum to make a mirror for a space telescope.

We pick this stuff up out of the dirt where it's been laying for a couple minutes, or possibly tarnishing and corroding for a year or longer. Then we eyeball it to make sure it's not scrunched too badly, and then we wash it with some soap, water, and sometimes some Lemishine (that we also use to wash the dishes we eat off of) or car wax (that we smear on our cars to protect them from acidic bird poo, tarry road gunk, and salty sand used to de-ice roads).

There's no evidence, nor any rational reason to believe, that soap and water and wax will harm brass.

Yes, yes it is.

I plan on losing my brass after about 4-5 reloadings anyway.

Also, these chicken little posts and amateur chemists comments are just crazy.

Pro Tip, take a piece of brass, put it in a cup of Ammonia and let it sit over night, for 3 days, 10 days and 14 days. Take each one out and crush it in a vice and measure the foot pounds needed. You will see that not much happens of any consequence other than discoloration for several days.

If YOU don't want to do it, don't. I like clean brass and clean primer pockets but you do you.

I am more than willing to take on any minuscule chance that I may split a case mouth 5 years from now because I exposed some brass to a mild acidic solution.

<removed>this is the wrong forum to post popcorn gifs.

It's time to close this thread out when the GD posts begin.

Two in a row, thread over. dryflash3

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