What polishing compound for Media

[Steve E]

As I have said I previous posts, washing machine, washing macnine, washing machine. Brass comes out like new and no faffing about.

[ColinR]

I guess from the various opinions that this is a subject to revisit practically and do my own evaluation as to what works best. It seems that there is a possibility to damage brass, ammonia, citric acid, bicarbonate, so maybe I'll just try ultrasonic with plain water until primer pockets are clean, then dry and follow up with tumbling in walnut media with T Cut additive. Seems that is the route with least possibility of damage to the integrity of the brass. Despite cleaning brass for decades I probably still have more questions than answers with so many different takes on how to get best results. I never found that tumbling in walnut media cleaned the primer pockets particularly well so why I progressed to using an ultrasonic cleaner - I just replaced my old JPL 3000m with their newer 3M which has degas and sweep functions and is a considerable improvement on the older model. Maybe I need to investigate stainless steel pin cleaning as well. Thanks for all the info.

[1066]

I use stuff called "Rinse aid" from Aldi after I have tumbled my brass with SS media, I seems to help reduce water spotting.

One of the arguments I hear against SS tumbling is that you need to dry the cases after and if's a lot of faffing about. It sounds to me if you are going to US clean your cases then dry media tumble you have the worst of both worlds.

I've tried US cleaning and usually find that primer pockets need finishing by hand or you need repeated cycles just for the pockets.

Switch to SS and you won't look back.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bcyAkj-LzA8

[ColinR]

1066 - I guess different ultrasonic (US) units work more efficiently than others. I have used James Products Limited (JPL) for several years and have just changed to their new 3MX. I can only say that with these units primer pocket cleaning is a breeze as is internal cleaning - the 3MX has a setting specifically for cleaning tubes. I prefer cleaning primer pockets with US as there is no scraping or abrasion that can cause enlargement. I will certainly look into stainless steel cleaning but this always seems a means to wear away the brass - stainless being harder than brass. Whatever I will stick with US cleaning as I find it the most efficient way of cleaning powder and primer residue from brass without subjecting it to abrasive cleaning, such as stainless pins. US cleans the cases perfectly for reloading, it just leaves them a little tarnished, but I will work on this.