Dillon tumbler died... what next.

To cut down on the dust, I put a 50/50 mixture of NU-Finish car polish and mineral spirits, about a shot glass worth in my media, tumble empty for 20 minutes to mix, very little dust.

At my work place we have a Thumblers vibratory model, the large one. It runs 6 hours a day, 5 days a week for over 15 years. We tumble small ceramic electrical insulators.

I have 2 FA vibratory tumblers. I use them both to keep up the supply of 9mm brass. Quiet and inexpensive but not sure how long they will last. I've had 1 for 2 years the other for 1 year. Previously I got 2 years out of 2 ea RCBS tumblers they are noisy.

Do with this information what you see fit.

Wet tumbling with pins does a much better job on the cases, they pretty much come out looking like new. I'm pleased with the Lyman. It offers a large drum and comes with separation trays that work pretty well.

Switching to wet tumbling will change your workflow.

• I de-prime cases before tumbling now since it does a great job cleaning up pockets.
• Following tumbling, the cases need to be rinsed thoroughly. I use a water hose on the driveway for this
• The cases also need to be dried. Lots of discussion on ways to do this, but I use a dehydrator with stacking trays.
• You will need magnets to pick up pins. The FA transfer magnet does a good job for picking up the pins when you get cases out of the separation trays. I've found that one of these with a much stronger magnet is also pretty handy to have around.

I use hot water, a Tide pod, and 1/4 tsp of Lemishine Booster. I typically run the cases for 3 hours. Once the cycle completes remove and rinse the cases immediately so that the citric acid does not discolor the brass.

As you can see there is a lot of work involved with this method. For me it's worthwhile because I like the results. For the same reason, it seems like a tumbler with a large drum is the way to go.

I can typically get the following in a load:

• 250 .308 cases
• 300 .223 cases
• 500 .45 cases

Hope this helps with your decision.

.40

I have a gas heater that looks like a wood stove. It has a built in fan. It broke. The factory wanted over $200 for another. I took it apart and found the part numbers on the fan. Found one for $57. Exact fit. Maybe your Dillon is the same way. They have to get their motors from somewhere. Somewhere that might be cheaper. On the other hand, your Dillon lasted how many years? Sometimes you have to pay the price of doing business by rewarding quality.

"Buy once, Cry once" Sorry but someone had to say it.
Post all kinds of negative reviews about Dillon.

Sometimes you can find a replacement motor, go through the hassle of fixing something or just buy a new one. Buy a Thumblers

https://rocktumbler.com/

https://www.walmart.com/ip/Century-...mer-with-Grounded-Pin-Energy-Saving/720210403

The price for the motor sounds a little high, coming from Dillion (Dillon Tax)? Pull the info off of the motor and do some searching. Should be able to find one for <$30.

Wet is the only way to go if you want spotless brass inside and out. It's not that much more work, once you learn how to handle the pins. Drying only takes a hour or less depending on the temp used and weather you use a fan to circulate the air.

Many have posted that wet tumbling w/o the pins cleans the outside of the cases just as well as a vibratory tumbler. Insides will be about the same as a dry tumbler. If you are considering wet, I would try with no pins first. It would cut down on time spent and completely eliminate a step. Something to consider.

However, if you want "jewelry clean" primer pockets, you will need to decap and use pins in a wet tumbler.
I'm still using a Berry's vibratory tumbler w/ walnut shells. Works well enough for me.

I normally clean using a Thumlers Tumbler Mod B with SS pins. It works great and cleans necks and primer pockets spotless.

I also still have a Dillon FL2000 that I primarily use to take the case lube of of rifle brass after sizing. My FL2000's been going strong since 1989 or so. I finally had to replace the bowl spindle this week as it had stripped out. Had a local machinist fabricate a new one since Dillon no longer supports the FL2000.

I'd take Blue68f100's advice and pull the data off the motor, google the part number.

Some years back the washing machine went rogue and flooded the Skunk Works. The Dillon tumbler did not take this well. At that time when the tumbler was returned the repair was also an update. Might be worthwhile to have a talk with Dillon customer service.

For a timer I use one of these.

https://www.walmart.com/ip/Woods-3-...MI96KV2Kmv4gIVy8DACh2eYgfZEAQYCiABEgLsNfD_BwE

Just have the pegs flipped up for the time I want.

I have been using a Midway (pre-FA branding) vibratory for years and it soldiers on. Thing is, the bowl is molded with the Thumler's two pulley trademark, just not wiped with paint to bring it out. Hey, they had to get it somewhere, ol Larry wasn't building them.
So if it quit tomorrow, I would get a Thumler Ultra Vibe.

Call Dillon. The older ones were warranted for life while the newer ones are, I think, 2 years. I don't know exactly when it changed but yours may be covered. Either way, they can fix it. Finding a suitable box was a challenge for me and I ended up buying another tumbler and then using that box to ship the broken one in. Was an expensive way to get a box for sure but having 2 tumblers is nice at times.

Dust----- I put a cap full of mineral spirits in my corncob media along with a few cap full of automotive polish. The mineral spirits helps with the dust. A used dryer sheet will collect a lot of it too. Emptying it outside and staying upwind is a good idea.

Tumblers----- Kind of like arguing about brands of reloading equipment. I like my Dillons but if I didn't have Dillon I would look hard at the Thumbler's UltraVibe. I run my Dillons in 10 hour shifts when I use them. Put a load in at night and take it out in the morning, put another load in and empty it at night. 2 hours of wet tumbling will get my brass cleaner than 10-12 hours in dry media. Even with car polish added.

Timers---- I would go with one of the plug in types. Look around at Lowes or Home Depot. Woods is a good brand and have been manufacturing electrical equipment for a long time. Extension cords, plug ends, timers, ect. My "Big Dawg" tumbler has a Woods timer mounted on the make up box on the motor. Probably not a good idea on a vibratory tumbler though.

Wet tumbling---- I wet tumble but I still have my dry tumblers for removing case lube or tumbling small batches of cases when I just don't want to mess with water. There are tons of info on stainless media and several old threads on here. The results are amazing!

The ONLY time I wet tumble is when I have brass with sand sticking to it. Other than that I have a pair of FA vibratory tumblers.

I don't want or need shiny brass. I like having a bit of carbon inside the case to help lube the powder funnel.

Just a thought, but you could always take your motor to a local motor shop and see if it is worth repairing. When my table saw motor took a dump I brought it in and it was $40 to repair vs $200 for a new one.

I agree with Jbird45, take the motor to a local motor repair shop and get quote on cost to repair.

Most fractional HP motors are not repairable. The table saw was probably a 1hp or better depending on size of saw.

At a min take it apart and look, you may have just broke a wire from vibration.

I highly recommend wet tumbling for better results and avoiding lead-contaminated dust. But dry tumbling uncontaminated shells afterward is still a good process which assures dry cases and seems to add some lubricity to the brass even without additives to corn cob media.

For dry, vibratory tumblers, the Thumlers UV-45. That's the dry tumbler that will compare favorably to the Dillon. There are others like the Lyman Pro Magnum that are almost as large (as the Dillon) and only $80. Hey, you could probably buy three to seven of them for the price of the better ones.

For wet tumblers, I use a STM-17 which is an imported copy of the Thumler's B. It has ball-bearing pillow blocks instead of the nylon bushings. The motor has been reliable but is suspiciously weak and runs hot. I suppose if it was cheap, it will be cheap to replace. I'd just buy a generic replacement from Grainger or whatever if I need to. While that is what I use, I cannot recommend it or the Thumlers B because the capacity is too low. It really needs 50 to 100% more capacity and if you're accustomed to running large batches in the Dillon, it will be too much intervention to run multiple batches in the small rotary.

What's needed is a 30 or 40 pound wet rotary. Lortone C40? Covington? Diamond Pacific maybe? Some people use electric cement mixers.

Grainger.com has a LOT of different size motors. I'm sure you could find one that meets your needs.

Blue68f100 said:

Most fractional HP motors are not repairable. The table saw was probably a 1hp or better depending on size of saw.

At a min take it apart and look, you may have just broke a wire from vibration.

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I'm not trying to disagree, but most AC motors can be repaired regardless of horsepower. Wether it's worth it or not is a different story, but why not get a quote and see? It could be something as simple as a blown capacitor or maybe the entire motor is fried. But it never hurts to exhaust all your options.

Most vibrator tumblers use a bathroom fan motor with a bolt-on off center weight. After 10 years and 10's of thousands of cases cleaned, my $50 Harbor Freight tumbler motor died. It was probably the bearings because for another year, I was able to kick start it by using my drill pressed against the motor shaft to get it started. I finally broke down and bought another one during one of their high % off coupon weekends.

Most fractional HP motors are not repairable.

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Actually most of the time it’s just the bushing on the counter balance end of the shaft. An oil impregnated bronze bushing is cheap compared to an new tumbler.

I had the same issue with my Dillon CV-500. Dillon wouldn't replace it free (it was over 15 years old) but did offer to upgrade it if I sent it in for less than a new tumbler. I declined and bought a cheap tumbler at Bass Pro on sale.

I did replace the motor in the CV-500 as an experiment with one I found pretty cheap online, but I need a start-up cap. I kind of forgot about that project until this post.

Its been a while so I"m going by memory. I ask Dillon if they could just send me the motor and they said that it would take quite a bit of work. Like I said, its been a few years and memory being what it is............... I was trying to avoid shipping the whole tumbler to them. Seems like it was close to $20 for shipping.

Can’t tell a lot from that photo but it looks like the end of the case is crimped.



Might be able to straighten the dimples out, replace bushing and re stake.