Thread: New Idea??? Experimentation....

Three questions for the group here. I hope they are repeats.

1. I know a "true" tumbler (rotary) has been brought up a few times but I never saw a clear answer on whether or not they would work? I think the best I ran across was the theory that they may take longer.

Which begs the question...
2. "How much" longer...10% more time or 100% more time? (This assumes someone has tried it.)

3. Anybody used rice or grits for a media? Ran across that little hint (a very cheap one btw) in some of my "cross-referencing" research. Supposedly does great with brass. HC steel may be different, but this whole idea/thread is a practice in using "brass equipment" for steel.


Like always,
Thanks.

P.S. I tried to report some spam earlier tonight on a different thread. Hats off to the mods....by the time I wrote a two line explaination the link was dead and the post was gone.

I have a Thumbler Tumbler Model B that I use for wet washing rifle brass. It has a thick rubber liner. Since my Dillon died, I filled it half full of walnut media and half a tub of blue wonder. I started my w&b wedge in it last night, so I'll know in 3 days how well it works.

If I may add my two cents:

I use the lymans walnut shell with a bottle of turtle wax rubbing compound. I have 4 pounds of walnut shells then I added 1 cup of fine sandblasting sand (Silica warning). This does a great job in removing scratches and staining.

Instead of going to the corncob after, I just hit it on the buffing wheel through 4 different progressions of paste.

Osoosi, definitely let us know how it goes.


However, I've had tumbler inside my head going for awhile now on the issue and I really don't think making a DIY vibratory tumbler would be much harder than a "rotary" tumbler. A plus side being that I don't have to figure out how to gear down the motor.

Don't worry, there WILL be picture if I go the DIY route. I think you boys might get a kick out of my redneck-engineering.

Kilowatt, where do you get your pastes? I bought some locally and it was dried out , just crap. you use a large buffer or a dremel? I have a 1/3hp 1750rpm motor out there origially intended for buffing but never have got it remounted to do it anymore. it's almost a competition wth my uncle who can free up free space faster, he just came home with a bead roller.

I'm sure it is probably negligible, but did anybody figure out what it costs to run your tumbler for 3 days straight?

Red

Originally Posted by Big Red

I'm sure it is probably negligible, but did anybody figure out what it costs to run your tumbler for 3 days straight?

Costs the same as running a 60 watt light bulb for 72 hrs (4.32 KWH).

Big Red,
I just bought some sticks from Lowes. I use a 6" felt pad (one for each compund) on my Shopsmith.

Rotary tumbler with walnut loaded with blue wonder did practically nothing. I'm guessing it's about 25 - 50 percent slower for this purpose.

Has anybody tried this with a razor that has gold plating on it?

Well as Glen mentioned earlier I've been messing with the normal walnut media, with turtle wax but also 7 grams of 20 micron diamond paste... I wish I had more to put in. Top picture is a razor hand sanded to 220 grit and then the next is after 24 hrs. You can see a notable difference. The normal TW/Walnut combo would take forever to make a dent in 220.