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Primer Pocket cleaning tips
Posted: Sun Jul 29, 2018 4:54 pm
by Gh0st
Just going through depriming a thousand .44 brass.
Some are fine but some need the primer pockets cleaned.
Does anyone have any tips or tools for doing this ? Preferably something that can be done quickly.
Re: Primer Pocket cleaning tips
Posted: Sun Jul 29, 2018 5:25 pm
by BooBoo
Deprime using Universal Decap Die, then Stainless Tumble...
Ta Da - perfectly clean brass and primer pockets!
Re: Primer Pocket cleaning tips
Posted: Sun Jul 29, 2018 5:27 pm
by Gh0st
Are they more effective than corn cob then?
Re: Primer Pocket cleaning tips
Posted: Sun Jul 29, 2018 6:53 pm
by phaedra1106
Much
Re: Primer Pocket cleaning tips
Posted: Sun Jul 29, 2018 7:23 pm
by Dark Skies
I have a little bronze brush mounted in an electric drill for small batches of a hundred or so.
For large volumes, I place cases in old plastic ammo cartons and give the pockets a very quick blast in my sandblaster. I use crushed glass powder. Then I bung them in a tumbler of corn cob.
Re: Primer Pocket cleaning tips
Posted: Mon Jul 30, 2018 6:44 am
by Blackstuff
I do it manually with a Lee primer pocket cleaner and small screwdriver to get any stuck material out of the flash hole. But i'm a masochist and i'm trying to put a claim in at work for RSI!

Re: Primer Pocket cleaning tips
Posted: Mon Jul 30, 2018 6:56 am
by Gh0st
Lol,
Ok so from my limited experience on this. Assume the stainless media requires a rotary tumbler to allow it to be used with liquid cleaner rather than corn cob in the old vibrator tumbler?
If so does anyone have any recommendations for one?
Re: Primer Pocket cleaning tips
Posted: Mon Jul 30, 2018 7:02 am
by dromia
your primer pockets do not need to be spotlessly clean.
I have dry tumbled my cases for decades and that has cleaned them more than sufficiently primer pockets included, when I trim my cases which is perhaps every eight firings or so depending on loads there is a wire brush on my Lyman electric case trimmer which brings primer pockets back to the bare metal in short order but even if I omitted this step I doubt the primer pockets would make difference on the target.
There is blingy show of clean and the clean enough for the needs.
Re: Primer Pocket cleaning tips
Posted: Mon Jul 30, 2018 7:33 am
by Pete
I bought one of these a year ago, and despite it's origin, it's still going strong.
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/5KG-ROTARY-T ... OSwPTVbKK1
Changes direction every 10 or 15 secs, and works brilliantly on cases with 0.5kg of Spuds stainless steel pins (
https://www.1967spud.com/shop/stm-tumblers/pins/) + warm water + 1 tsp Citric acid + a dollop of washing machine detergent.
(I've found this is better than washing up liquid.)
When done (45-50 mins), rinse well a couple of times (I use rain water), and blow dry with hair dryer or hot air gun.
Pete
Re: Primer Pocket cleaning tips
Posted: Mon Jul 30, 2018 7:40 am
by Daryll
I've loaded 10's of thousands of .38 over the last 30 years on my trusty Lee Pro 1000, and none of them have ever their primer pockets cleaned.
After firing the primed cases just get chucked in a tumbler with corncob or similar.
The still primed cases then go in the press, the first stage of the press sizes and deprimes the case, then the next stage primes them again...