Wet Tumbler Turned My Brass Green!

[@guns-n-coffee9944]

i had the same issue using lemishine and dawn. I'll share my recipe with you that I found on a forum that someone else shared with me. 1 teaspoon of lemishine and 1 tablespoon of armorall wash and wax. Add brass to about halfway or 3/4 of the tub then add your pins, add lemishine and armorall wash and wax then fill water to the top of the brass. I usually tumble for 2 hours both 9mm and .223. i get clean shiny brass every time. do not use extremely hot water, use lightly warm to cold.

[@jasonwilliams9663]

I've had the same issue, what I did was do a hot water rinse and Re tumble the brass. it helped quite a bit.

[@bradbiegert]

I wonder if it could of been a reaction to the nickel plated case that was in there. the lemi shine might have had a reaction to the nickel and thus this happened. could be to much lemi shine too. in my tumbler I run 3 quarts of hot water to 1 1/2 tsp of the lemi shine and then a good amount of the dawn dish soap. also any dish soap that has ammonia in it will cause problems too, that is why dawn dish soap is the recommended soap since it does not have that in it.

[@justanopinion7909]

The Nickel cases cause a chemical reaction with the brass and the brass comes out dull. Tumble the brass again by themselves and they will shine up like new. I also found this out the hard way tumbling 45 ACP brass and nickel casings together.

[@austinalbright9837]

I've had this problem too. I don't use steel pins, just dawn and lemi shine. Noticed if I lubed case with lanolin and filled tumbler too full I had this problem. Solution was to only fill tumbler about half full.

[@CountryBoyPrepper]

They did have lanolin on them and it was a full load.

[@ZhuJo99]

too much acid might be reason too. May I ask you guys from US (I'm from Slovakia, Europe) why you use such costly solutions as some Lemon Shine or lemon juice to clean up the brass? Pure citric acid or vinegar are much cheaper. Especially citric acid which can be bought in bulk from store with laboratory chemicals. You can buy isoprophyl alcohol there too and use it with lanolin for lube. I use that citric acid for everything - brass cleaning, bathtube cleaning and also into tea as lemon replacement when I'm out of lemons :). It's much cheaper than to buy it in groceries.

[@joshuascott6164]

Sure thing. We earn the money to buy a large container of Lemi-Shine in less-than half an hour, and the container-full can be used to wash many hundreds of thousands of casings. It's really splitting hairs to go for cheaper. Also it smells extra nice. .. And we have too much trust in our marketeers.

[@ZhuJo99]

well I'm just saying that pure citric acid is also much more effective as it's concentrate, not something dissolved in other solutions :) That poke about being poor is out (we are certainly not poor here), I just don't see a reason to use something build around citric acid. It's the same as chosing "contains cocoa" and "pure cocoa", you know.

[@JoeKrol]

LOVE THIS POST...The simple answer is (IMO) that we were all brought up watching commercials on TV and believe too much of what we saw. Also we generally look for the easiest solution. If watching these vids and a bunch of people say "I use Lemon Shine" then people RARELY will go the next step and see what else could do the job for less. Last we are lazy. Necessity is the mother of invention. If we have enough $$ to buy the Lemon shine there is no perceived need to try anything else. Not every American is like this though. I'm just getting into collecting brass and range scrap and will be using your suggestion. In looking for non toxic chemical cleaners for our house we have discovered that regular White Vinegar will clean just about anything and we use it that way.

[@ZhuJo99]

Joe Krol just don't overdose it, it's pretty agressive. Teaspoon for one cleaning is enough (and a bit of dishwashing solution). You are right about being lazy. Sadly, I can see the same on my collegues here. Not able to even change wheels on cars by themselfs, although they have tires already on wheels so they just have to unscrew it and put a winter/summer on. Reloading and firearms small gunsmithing is however great to work on your manual skills!

[@parrisbr915]

@@ZhuJo99 I know this is old but I appreciate your input. I try to save all I can also. Thanks for your advice.

[@PopsQuest]

I have had batches come out do like that and I think it was because I just had too much dirty brass for the soap to do its job also I use just a very small dash of the lemon shine take some of that and run a small batch with a decent amount of Dawn and see what happens

[@yankey4]

Have had it happen a few times and I can say it was to much LS.. Do you have some Walnut or vorn cob? If some run that with some car wax and you will bring back the yellow. But not un your wet tum do it in your shaker..

[@LoadsofBacon]

I've had that happen a couple of times. I haven't verified yet, but there's two possibilities I have suspected​. 1. A little too much Lemishine. 2. I didn't get the brass rinsed off immediately after the tumbling stopped. I currently suspect it's a bit more of #2, and the allowable time period between tumbling and rinsing seems to be pretty short.

[@exploregon1720]

Hi all. I've had this problem a number of times in the past and couldn't figure out exactly why it was happening however I'm almost certain that @240fp below explains my situation exactly. Thanks for the heads up. My cure for this problem was stumbled upon by accident. I had made some 300 blackout brass this weekend where my process requires 2 separate tumblings: one to clean the brass and one to get the lanolin based lube off the cases. The first tumbling on my Thumler's Tumbler Model B came out perfectly shiny using my typical materials, about 200 - 300 dirty cases, 1/4 tsp Lemi Shine, a small squirt of Dawn, 5 pounds of SS pins and the remainder water up to an inch below the rim of the tumbler bowl. As I said, this came out beautiful however after the second round of using this time cleaned brass coated with the lube and everything else the same as the first time around all the brass had the greenish, tarnished look. Even upon touch, I could feel the thin layer of slightly greasiness to each of the cases. Ugly, and while I don't personally care, my customers do like the shininess of my results. Well I thought at this point I was sitting on about 1500 pieces of brass that I was going to have to use myself. After I sat on it for a while I started thinking "what do I have around here that would take off this coating of greasy lanolin?". Looking under the kitchen sink I found my wife's bottle of Krud Kutter. What the heck,... I squirt about 15 pumps of this stuff in the same mixture of ingredients mentioned above minus the Lemi Shine to the green cases and, VIOLA! The Krud Kutter being a very good degreaser restored the shininess of each one of these suckers, maybe even MORE bling than before! I coudn't believe it. So I went to the local store to get more of this stuff as we are down to the last few squirts an they don't carry it! What the heck :-( . I decided to try some Fantastic kitchen degreaser spray so hopefully this works as good as the KK. Will report back if it doesn't. I almost never write lengthy comments but after this experience of years with occasional green cases, I thought everybody should know. Thanks for listening.

[@funigui]

So the only time I have had this happen, was when a nickel case snuck into my brass and they came out just like that. Has it happened again?

[@jeffthompson8835]

Some others already mentioned it but I read in shooting times magazine to use wash n wax and lemi shine. No need for dawn dishwashing soap. I guess wash n wax car wash soap leaves almost a protective coating on the casings. It won't cause and problems though

[@usaflagwaver]

Stainless media too harsh? Removed the glossy finish from cases including the nickel plated ones?

[@davidlacey3468]

I find that putting it in a dry tumbler with walnut media and some brasso tends to fix any greening issues

[@masongates246]

did you by chance add more lemon shine then normal? it looks like oxidation to me. i have had that happen to me when using lemon juice if mixed a little stout and let it tumble too long. From my exp the more acidic the mixture is the shorter you should tumble.

[@CountryBoyPrepper]

That's possible. Do you know if there is any way to reverse it?

[@masongates246]

I would dry tumble it in a mix of Corn Cob and walnut. The one thing I after wet tumbling brass is wash the brass then neutralize the brass with baking soda after for a few minutes, then dry as normal

[@nickjm37fordel1]

I have had the same thing happen on one of my cleanings. That amount of brass or really any amount I find only needs about two hours at the most. Only a few drops of Dawn Detergent and a small pinch of Lemi shine goes a long way. Good luck :-) ( somebody told me once that sometimes the steel pins react with the brass ? )

[@toddnewsome5011]

Just from my experience I have had some medal cases accidentally get in the batch and had them turn the cases real dingy kinda green color so I always take out all Nickel plated copper washed or anything else to even aluminum which to me seems to be at fault for the problem. You may try to tumble again with only the brass cases

[@llee02045]

I find the answer in another KZbin video. There case lube in your brass. And the grease from the lube is causing the carbon to stick to the brass. The video said to tumble again, but with a decreaser agent and water for bout 10 minutes. Then rinse the pins and brass. Then tumble again like normal with soap and lemonshine.

[@jamessween]

Try Hornady One Shot Sonic Clean Solution, Put about 1 cap full into the drum. Along with lemi shine and Dawn.You will see it bubble, that tells you it is working. And if that don't work, then it can't be brass. Did they have a green tint to them before you tried to clean them? Because I have done thousands of 223 and never had that problem. But I have a problem with some will have more yellow tint to them then the others, but they all shine very nice. So just give that Sonic Clean a try. And keep the videos coming, I really like your channel, You have taught me allot. And thanks so much. I'm thinking of trying making lead ingots myself, after I retire this year. It will give me something to do.See Ya!

[@erict6582]

thank you for sharing your experience and help me learn hope someone will know what happen :O

[@tiboveuchelen6112]

hey CBP i really enjoy your videos . can you maybe do a video on reloading 12 gauge next keep doing what you doing

[@altumpaul]

This happens to me when I use too much lemi shine. Just run them again with dawn and stainless media.

[@Sasquatch47Productions]

Use more Dawn and no Lemi Shine. It tarnishes the brass. I stopped using it awhile back because of this.

[@towelie1709]

you think .300 blackout is more effective than 5.56?

[@CountryBoyPrepper]

What...???

[@towelie1709]

CountryBoyPrepper which round do you think is better?

[@CountryBoyPrepper]

That's like asking which is better; a spoon or a fork? Two different tools with different strengths, weaknesses, and purposes. If I could only have one, it would be 5.56.

[@towelie1709]

CountryBoyPrepper That makes sense... I'm new to firearms lol... Love your videos. Thanks for the reply.

[@CountryBoyPrepper]

No problem! 5.56 is what you want if you are buying your first AR. 300 blackout doesn't really make sense unless you are gonna have a silencer and a short barreled gun like a pistol or SBR. It was specifically designed to be suppressed and shot out of a 8 to 10 inch barrel. Welcome to the gun world!

[@TxStang]

looks like the lemishine might have caused an acid etch effect on it

[@paintballplayer700]

This is caused by too much Lemi-Shine, it leaches the copper out of the surface layer of the brass. They are safe to use but take on a green hue. I’ve done it too by accident.

[@reaperteamgaming393]

traces of lead or copper can cause the watter to be infected with rust or something like that and if it keeps tumbling through that water it infects the brass its a complete harmless chemical reaction

[@KD0LRG]

Too long in the water. Add some abrasive media from the Harbor freight and I bet they shine back up. They sell the small stone like media and the ones that look like triangles.

[@josephhomen]

I have had the same thing. Too much lemmi shine or lemon juice.

[@harrisonfreeman1038]

Hydrogen Peroxide should polish the brass You oxidized the brass so maybe the water used had some very high mineral content.

[@rjstewart]

I've had this happen too!!!!!

[@yankey4]

O and have seen it happen when a peace of lead end up in the wash..

[@papasplace2]

Yep, too much time in the tumbler with the lemishine.

[@lfconley]

Too much acid. Tumble them in walnut shells to get shine back. Just cosmetic.

[@kreader50]

Lee Conley I agree and have done this . It is just cosmetic .

[@r1dv]

That's from the case lube. I had the same thing happened

[@66blacksunshine]

Dissimilar metal reaction?

[@cmfuss1]

need more soap. This happens to me from time to time. more soap.

[@T.A.B.Videos]

That's sucks, shouldn't hurt

[@saltcreekammo]

either too much lemi or you left it in too long.

[@Youngdippen]

run it thru again with mr clean magic erasers and water. your stainless steel pins are dirty and need to be cleaned.

[@hhvazquez]

Too much lemi shine! Here's the easy way to use the wet tumbler, use car wash soap (not dishwasher soap) use a dash (less is more) of lemi shine and tumble. Done.

[@christopherfrawley2560]

filter your water

[@Hickamfield]

to long and too much lemi shine