Henry Rifle Forums

Hey y’all. I’m looking for ideas to clean the corrosion off of loaded rounds. These 38s have been in a bandolier too long.

I’m leaning toward using my pin tumbler. Risk of water contamination?

I have a couple hundred, so hand polishing is not going to happen. Unless you know of a miracle wipe.

What do you think?

If you have a dry media tumbler (i.e. corn cob or walnut media), I have used that in the past. Some people fear tumbling for too long will break down the gun powder kernels. I usually always use flake or ball pistol powders. YMMV!

Muddy Waters68

You haven't mentioned how difficult it is to wipe or rub it off with some polish. I'd avoid tumbling if you used an extruded powder; which gets broken down by tumbling and exposing uncoated surfaces of the powder. It maybe won't matter though. Also want to avoid immersion with liquid in a pin tumbler.
Safest bet is to get some Brasso brass polish or similar polish or make a slurry of Comet cleanser and watch the ballgame while you clean them up by hand.
You should be done by the third inning! Seriously, hope you find a way to clean them up safely.

No tumbler. Thanks NHshtr. That may have to work.

If they are not too rough to the touch, put them in that which they are chambered for, shoot them and then tumble or ultrasonic clean the brass.

I'm with Travlin, just shoot 'em then clean and reload.

RP

They were too sticky to load. I went ahead and ran them through my tumbler. No water, just wet pins. After I was done, it took a good pass with dawn. That cleaned my pins. About 30 minutes per 15 rounds on the cleaning. Not bad results. After shooting, revolver only, they will get a real clean and polish.

Do not use the Brasso version that has ammonia. It causes corrosion stress cracking in hard brass. I would have dry vibrated them in walnut media, I never put loaded ammo in a liquid.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Season_cracking

Nickel cases don’t look “cowboy” but OTH they won’t turn nasty in a leather gun belt or butt pad.

John Davies
Spokane WA

Used only pins in minimal water. Was really quite effective. Will see when shooting if water was an issue. Actually, quite hopeful.

its been decades since I had to deal with residue from leather belt loops but I vividly recall having to remove it .... hopefully, what you are doing will take care of it .... one thing I do remember is needing to keep a close eye on the cases as time goes on .... a larger than normal percentage of them developed pinhole leaks

JEBar wrote: ↑

Wed Aug 03, 2022 9:30 am

its been decades since I had to deal with residue from leather belt loops but I vividly recall having to remove it .... hopefully, what you are doing will take care of it .... one thing I do remember is needing to keep a close eye on the cases as time goes on .... a larger than normal percentage of them developed pinhole leaks

That is a real possiblity.