If you are a gun owner, you are quite familiar with how expensive it has become to purchase ammunition. Even target bullets are up around $0.50 per bullet for 9mm. For higher caliber ammunition, it has become almost impossible to practice without going broke. Now, if you have ever been to the range, you know there are empty brass casings all over the place. For a small fraction of the cost of buying ammunition from a supplier, you make your own reloads. However, you will want to make sure you clean the casings before reloading them to avoid any unnecessary problems.
Cleaning Fired Brass
The object of reusing brass is to make sure it is indistinguishable from brand-new bullets. Reloaders use a variety of techniques to clean the brass, such as soaking the casings in dish soap and citric acid. However, some have found that using these products weakens the brass. Using an ultrasonic cleaner is more effective in terms of time, cleanliness, and protecting the integrity of the casing.
To clean fired brass, the cartridges will need to be decapped and washed. This will remove all the loose impediments from the brass for inspection. Be sure to look for cracks, deformations, and dents in the casings. Remember, we want a bullet that will look just as good as it did the first time it was fired, so all defective casings must be discarded for safety reasons.
We recommend you talk to one of our team members to ensure you have the proper equipment for this task. Ideally, the casings are placed with the projectile opening face down in the basket. This will allow the cleaning solution to work its way inside the shell since you have removed the primer cap. The basket is then put into a beaker with the cleaning solution, then added to the tank filled with water.
If you do not have the basket and beaker set up, you can add the cleaning solution to the tank and clean the casings by putting them into a basket, then submerging the basket into the tank. However, the former will allow you to save significant money over the long haul on cleaning solutions, not to mention that I believe it is more effective in cleaning the brass.
The cleaning cycle for this is about 15 minutes, then the casings can be removed and rinsed with water. The casings can then be placed into a case dryer for the final prep before reloading.
If you are interested in using an Omegasonics ultrasonic cleaner to clean your used brass to reload, give us a call at 888-989-5560. A team member will be more than happy to discuss the proper machine, settings, and cleaning solution to get the job done right!
