Primer dust?

[Shrinkmd]

I am rethinking my brass cleaning methods, and wanted to hear people's thoughts about lead dust safety.

I currently decap in the garage before wet tumbling. I've read different opinions about this, would I be better off wet tumbling first to clear off all the lead dust, and then just reload and use my sizing die to decap and forget about the pockets? This is for my handgun ammo, not 1000 yd rifle. I was also thinking about returning to dry vibrator and getting the big Dillon ones to make this step easier, and just do it outside in the yard to shake and then sort out of the media.

 

[thomas15]

Question: Is there a talking points memo out there instructing us to discuss lead in primers, lead in tumbling operations, as the topic of the day?

 

[Zaydok Allen]

I dry tumble with a Thumler's Model B. It's sealed up so there is no dust being thrown about. Then I use a Cabela's brand media separator that eliminates dust from flying about and limits me sticking my hands in dirty media.

I vacuum my reloading area every few days also to pick up contaminants. I do not see media dust in my loading area though. I'm pretty sure my procedure is plenty safe, but I'm still going to have my lead levels checked next time I'm at the doctor.

 

[VAReloader]

For pistol and most rifle, I decap and then wet clean. Rifle is decapped into a sealed container (Co-ax)
223 - I size /decap (into a container, not sealed but close) then wet clean

I had a dry tumbler years ago and will never go back.

 

[Shrinkmd]

Question: Is there a talking points memo out there instructing us to discuss lead in primers, lead in tumbling operations, as the topic of the day?

Lol no, not that I'm aware of. I was unable to get out to my outdoor club, so I recently shot at the local indoor range with my new coated bullet loads. Smelling the weird, "you just fried your motherboard" smell got me thinking about lead and contamination again, so just perusing some threads and trying to get the latest wisdom.

 

[mdi]

If you are worried about "safely" decapping cases, get someone else to do it for you. Yep, sorta snide, but I am reading a lot of "Chicken Little" type post about lead poisoning and reloading. I believe most is way over thought and unnecessary. I can give examples of men who have reloaded and cast bullets way longer than I have (nearing 40 years) and are as health as most, and someone can cite PPM of lead in specific places, existing "laws" against lead and other toxic materials theory. A lot of published "facts" are generated by politicians pushing legislation to "protect" their constituents, and gather votes (CA condor protection is a good example). But I personally think much is misinformation spread by repeating a "good sounding" theory read on a forum. Good forum topic, but mostly fear and "panic" thinking...

Rant over...

 

[doubleh]

I've already posted about switching to a soak in lemon juice and water for a few hours to clean my brass. I do this first to remove any grit, then do my reloading. I'm not really worried about lead contamination from reloading. I do like to preserve my dies from wear and tear from grit. When I dry tumbled I did that first for the same reason.

 

[rsrocket1]

Dry tumble in crushed walnut and a couple of cut up used dryer sheets. Don't add anything to the walnut media or the soot and lead styphnate dust will cling to the media. Sift the stuff outdoors and throw away the sheets. Then wash your hands. One batch will not be a problem but careless handling of the soot several times a month over many years will eventually accumulate around your cleaning area and in your body.

 

[George P]

I dry tumble with a Thumler's Model B. It's sealed up so there is no dust being thrown about. Then I use a Cabela's brand media separator that eliminates dust from flying about and limits me sticking my hands in dirty media.

I vacuum my reloading area every few days also to pick up contaminants. I do not see media dust in my loading area though. I'm pretty sure my procedure is plenty safe, but I'm still going to have my lead levels checked next time I'm at the doctor.

I use the Thumbler's Tumbler and it works well. I wear the blue nitrile gloves after shaking the brass in a colander over a small bucket to get the last of it out of there. Seems to work great. The tumbler used to be in my garage (when I had a garage); now it is in a small out building that is a work area and gun cleaning area.

 

[ATLDave]

I dry tumble with my tumbler in the garage, then separate media in the driveway. Then I decap on the press (either turret or progressive). I figure most of the primer residue is in the primer and primer pocket. About 99+% of my cases only have that pocket exposed for 1-2 seconds in between being decapped and re-primed on the downstroke.

 

[D Rock]

I believe the FART instruction manual has you doing a quick water only tumble before depriming, deprime and then water and pins. Can't find my manual but I think they had you doing that to keep your die from getting too dirty.

I just deprime with a Lee Universal die, then wet tumble with pins. One thing I do that none of my local reloaders do is to wear nitrile gloves during all operations in the reloading room, from sorting to loading. A box of gloves is under $5 at harbor freight and worth it.

Dave

 

[HDMontana]

I decap with a universal die. Wet tumble with ss pins afterward. Wearing the nitrile gloves is probably a good idea, although I do not, but should.

 

[labnoti]

Use lead-free primers like the Zeta Pi from Fiocchi. I bought a case (12,000) of pistol and a box (1500) of rifle and I find they're not only perfectly dependable (meaning I've never had a failure after thousands of shots), they're also much cleaner burning than CCI, Remington, and Federal that I've used. The difference in cleanliness when compared side-by-side with the same loading is very remarkable. For my press, bench, guns, and garage to be free of lead dust and lead residue is worth it alone.

I generally don't shoot semi-autos that throw the brass in the dirt, so I decap before any cleaning. But if I was scrounging brass from the ground, I would want to clean it before I decapped it on a progressive press. Whether it had lead residue or not, it would have sufficient grit that I wouldn't want it all over my press.

You can give brass a precursory cleaning before you decap it. A bucket of soapy water and a rinse, or a quick 30-minute wet tumble, rinse and dry. Then decap it, and wet tumble etc. from there.

If you decap and resize at the same time, you'd certainly want reasonably clean brass with a carbide die, but I think the kind of rinse and spin I described above would be good enough. You can decap fairly dirty, gritty brass with a universal decapping die, but you don't want to foul case feeders and the press etc.

Another idea if you've got dirty brass, leaded or not. Wear nitrile gloves and decap with a hand decapper like the Frankford Arsenal decapping tool. Keep all the grit, lead and mess on that tool and off your precision press equipment and out of your case feeder etc.

 

[Toprudder]

Dry tumbling is not a problem if done with care. I used a tumbler that had a lid to keep dust contained while tumbling. I separated the media outside.

I gave that up and went to wet tumbling some time ago. I just like the results. I decap using a universal decapper, and I started out doing that on a Lee Challenger press but I did not like the way the press handled spent primers. I got rid of that press and bought a Lee Classic Turret. That press drops the primer down through the ram and into a tube. 99% of the primer residue or dirt makes it into the tube and not anywhere else on the press. I dump the tube into a plastic container that will hold about 20 lbs of primers. I sometimes wear a nitrile glove for large batches, but I always wash my hands immediately after decapping. By decapping and wet tumbling the brass, my other presses stay much cleaner as a result.

 

[kmw1954]

My personal procedure.

Bring home range brass collected into ammo range bag and do a quick size sort. A few hundred at a time dose not take long. Dump sorted into plastic containers.

Ready to clean, mix into 2# square plastic peanut jar about 1 9mm shell worth of Lemi-shine, Drizzle in about a teaspoon of dish soap. Add in until about 1/2 full brass then fill with steaming hot water until brass is covered. I then take this to my TV chair or computer desk and shake/rotate while I watch a show or read the forums. On pins just tumble upon themselves. Do this for about an hour total, though during this time I do set the jar down for a rest.

Next I dump water down slop sink and rinse brass again in steaming water. Dump brass into old towel to shake out water then put into old toaster oven at 200* for 30 minutes and leave until cool enough to pick up.

Lastly I dump brass into dry tumbler with Cabela's corn cob and brass cleaner. I usually do this when extremely bored or the weather is rotten.

 

[Blue68f100]

I de-prime then wet clean. I use a universal depriming die, and where nitrile gloves while handling dirty brass. My primers go into to a sealed bottle at the end of the hose from the press. Most cases I'm using the LNL-AP with the brass feeder if I doing large volume pistol brass. I remove the priming anvil to keep it clean. Afterwards I will use a damp rag with gun solvent or use my shop vac. It has a HEPA filter in it.

 

[Dudedog]

Smelling the weird, "you just fried your motherboard" smell

Nothing like the smell of burning computer parts in the morning! (except the ones at work seem to prefer very early morning to die)

Coated bullets?

My range has nasty 60grit mud, so I do about a 30 minute pass then dry, deprime and run them again for a hour.
Lyman Cyclone <-Wash+Wax (whatever flavor)+ a dab of citric acid.

 

[Bartojc]

I honestly never thought much about it. Maybe I'm wrong. I tumble in crushed walnut with some cut up dryer sheets to catch the dust. My tumbler has a cover. When its done I sift out the brass with primers still in. All is done in my basement. I then decap on press and immediately load. I run 2-3 batches a month through the tumbler. I wash hands immediately after sifting out the media.

-Jeff

 

[Fine Figure of a Man]

Primer dust is one of a great many things that have an extremely small and remote chance of harming my health. I counter them all, as best I can, with common sense.

 

[thomas15]

Primer dust is one of a great many things that have an extremely small and remote chance of harming my health. I counter them all, as best I can, with common sense.

...and a cigar!

 

[Fine Figure of a Man]

...and a cigar!

I love them but they make me want Camel non-filters.

 

[Rule3]

The correct answer is: Never ever shoot your firearms unless you have Non Toxic lead free primers and no lead bullets.

The actual shooting of a cartridge with a lead primer is gonna expose you to more lead then whatever method of cleaning brass you do.

The whole "expose" to lead from dry tumbling is so "blown up" out of proportion bunch of nonsnense

Hold your breath or Get a Haz Mat Suit then.

There is not some great cloud of toxic dust formed when dry tumbling. Keep the damn lid on. don't tumble in the kitchen, when emptying it, do it outside and pour it gently into the sifter. Change media often, dispose of in a plastic bag to go to the landfill or incinerator,

People rave about how great the expensive Dillon media separator is but Dillon was no clever enough to put a lid on the damn thing.

When washing or wet tumbling where does the rinsate go? Down the drain in the sewer system dump it on your lawn. The lead and other nasty stuff is going somewhere, so you pollute wherever that goes.

Time to make more popcorn.(lots of hazards in the microwave stuff and GMO corn).

 

[thomas15]

I love them but they make me want Camel non-filters.

May I suggest a substitute?

Bourbon!

 

[Obturation]

I wear gloves in every reloading step except picking up the brass after firing as i dont shoot with gloves on. I wear shoes at the bench and dont walk through the house with them on. I wear work pants and an old t-shirt that stay un that area, im not paranoid, i have babies in the house and lead is worse for little ones.
Basically i deprime with universal die, soak in a bucket with tide a few hours, dry in an old toaster oven then tumble in walnut media with polish of choice. My media doesnt last long but i dont care its cheap at harbor freight.
I have a buddy with no worry about lead and handles, casts, loads everything in his kitchen . He thinks im some kind of nut for being cautious, i think hes a moron.

 

[D Rock]

I wear gloves in every reloading step except picking up the brass after firing as i dont shoot with gloves on. I wear shoes at the bench and dont walk through the house with them on. I wear work pants and an old t-shirt that stay un that area, im not paranoid, i have babies in the house and lead is worse for little ones.
Basically i deprime with universal die, soak in a bucket with tide a few hours, dry in an old toaster oven then tumble in walnut media with polish of choice. My media doesnt last long but i dont care its cheap at harbor freight.
I have a buddy with no worry about lead and handles, casts, loads everything in his kitchen . He thinks im some kind of nut for being cautious, i think hes a moron.

I think being mindful of what you bring into the house from shooting or loading is a good idea, especially with kids or even pets in the house. I first read about that with Masaad Ayoob and then later in a book he recommended "Shoot" by Julie Golob.

Dave