Roger Bartsche sent the pics he took of his 4350 reloads he tumbled. Take a look at them, here they are!
This is how the powder looked coming out of a previously loaded case. Apparently the powder removed some of the accumulated carbon from the inside of the case.


Here's the virgin brass powder along with the loaded brass powder. There's apparently no degradation of the powder itself.



I ran these pics through my adobe 5.0 photoshop to sharpen and color correct them. Roger was apparently using incandesant lighting as the white paper turned yellow by the lighting.

What conclusion do I make? I dunno! LOL! Some may say the stuff removed from the interior of the brass burns like a fine powder, but how could it, it's remnants of burned powder. How could it burn again? I'll file this in the "for what it's worth department".

I'll still do my test, but right now I have to go make a living!

from Hodgdon:

Completed ammo should not be tumbled. The powder will degrade and increase
in burn speed.


Mike Daly
Customer Satisfaction Manager
Hodgdon Powder Company/ IMR Powder Company

quote:

Originally posted by grizz:
I lean strongly toward the NO DIFFERENCE side, but this test could change my mind. If it yields a no difference, some will still argue it does. Let the test begin!

Like your style. Take pictures roger

Griz:
David Goucher was using one of Mid-Ways vibratory cleaners with walnut media. These particular cases had been forgotten and tumbled for 3 days. Personally I think he is lucky he didn't burn his house down leaving an unattended vibrator run for 3 days.

quote:

Originally posted by one-holer:
Personally I think he is lucky he didn't burn his house down leaving an unattended vibrator run for 3 days.

quote:

Originally posted by Doc:
from Hodgdon:

Completed ammo should not be tumbled. The powder will degrade and increase
in burn speed.


Mike Daly
Customer Satisfaction Manager
Hodgdon Powder Company/ IMR Powder Company

Oh good gosh, what do they know? They just have multiple thousands(millions?) of hours of combined men's, Hands-On Experience with actually handling Powder.

Surely the 3-day(72 hour) Test is much more relevant and accurate.

quote:

Originally posted by Doc:
from Hodgdon:

Completed ammo should not be tumbled. The powder will degrade and increase
in burn speed.


Mike Daly
Customer Satisfaction Manager
Hodgdon Powder Company/ IMR Powder Company

And what did you expect them to say? Their lawyers would raise holy hell if they didn't respond this way.

I got the response I expected.

One thing that seems to be getting lost in this discussion is why should it be necessary anyway? If there is any question at all why not just tumble the brass before you load it?
I tumble my brass before sizing to clean off range dirt etc. After lubing and sizing they go back into the tumbler to clean off the sizing lube the easy way. After loading my brass is just as shiny as anybody elses. Some say that the polishing lube wears out your dies, but I would counter with I'd rather have a worn die than a scratched one, and dies are cheaper than barrels.
The only legitimate reason I can come up with for wanting to tumble loaded rounds is for rifle rounds loaded on a progressive press that were batch lubed. For Progressive loaded rounds it's fortunate that the lube I use for those comes off easily with a towel.
So for most reloading tumbling rounds is a possible danger that can be completely avoided by just changing the reloading step when you tumble your brass. Why risk even the slightest danger when it's completely unnecessary?............DJ

I've re-tumbled a few rounds here and there,with no illeffects,I have more concern now adays at the actual tempurature of the ammo,when fired,,,,,,I touched off one round of .308 in my m-14 one day,It was pretty hot to the touch,,,damn near blew my head off,,,,,,,,I now keep test rounds in a cooler,,,Clay

DJ, you're correct. There is no real reason to do it. That is why I was puzzled when I brought it up from what I witnessed at the range.

IMO, there's no reason to do it at all.

quote:

Originally posted by djpaintles:

quote:

Originally posted by jeffeosso:
again,
EVERY round in ALL Military rounds (except the painted eastern bloc stuff) are tumbled...

period

Jeffe, sorry but I can't yet accept that as fact. If Military rounds are all tumbled why can you still see the neck anneal on military rounds? If they were tumbled after final loading this anneal mark would be polished off. Maybe they go through some sort of mild cleaning but not a full polish tumble like is being discussed here.
I'm open to further proof, but the obvious evidence -the anneal mark- is to the contrary of your claim.................DJ

Sometimes it take MANY hours of tumbling to remove annealing color. I have tumbled shells that I've annealed. Even after 36 hours, some of then still had anneal marks on them. But the rest of the brass was shiny.

Kory

Kory, I've tumbled thousands of rounds with the anneal marks. If it takes that long you need to change your media or add more polishing solution.
Using corn cob with Midway polishing media a couple hours should do it...........DJ

grizz/bartche

How are you so certain the dust you see in your (post tumbled) picture is carbon from the cases and not flakes of the powder? I tend to believe you, that a reasonable tumbling time will have minimal effect, but to be sure you should do the test with virgin cases...that way ANY loose dust is known to be from the powder.

FWIW.

quote:

Originally posted by CDH:
grizz/bartche

How are you so certain the dust you see in your (post tumbled) picture is carbon from the cases and not flakes of the powder? I tend to believe you, that a reasonable tumbling time will have minimal effect, but to be sure you should do the test with virgin cases...that way ANY loose dust is known to be from the powder.

FWIW.

I'll copy Roger's post to this thread in an anser to your question;

"I did last night. 06 filled to shoulder neck junction with 4350 and caped of with a crimped 150 gr FP. Tumbled for 4 1/2 hours.The individual powder cylinders look good. There was , however a substantial amount of powdery dark gray material that came out of the case.

Unfortunatly I did this with a fired case and the particulate matter could have been residue from the last shooting. Frowner

I'll redo the test with a virgin case today :Roll Eyes: roger"

Which he did and labled "virgin" meaning new cases.

DJ, I agree 100%, there's no reason to tumble to polish the brass after it's loaded. Your observation about the progressive press is EXACTLY why I do it. Batch pre-lubing of .223 and .308, then, as a fast way of de-lubing the cases. Wiping the lube off 500 or 1,000 .223 is NOT my idea of fun! I use RCBS spray lube because it will NOT contaminate the powder or kill the primer.

quote:

Originally posted by CDH:
bartche

cDh U spelt me name rong. Bartsche

just to stir the pot...

wonder what happens if you keep a solid in the bottom of your mag, and shoot say 20 softs before you need it...

in a bigbore, they take a BATTERING...


jeffe

Jeffeosso, it sounds like you'd have a real flat shooting solid!

I can tell a lot of folks here are licenced chemists/physicists. I can tell because of the very fine studies in powder behaviour they post here. They've thouroughly tested 100's of different powders in several different situations, and best of all their testing methods are very repeatable.
Think about this: powder manufacturers test these things in extensive studies that take weeks, months, sometimes years. Ya really think that you could do with only ONE test with ONE tumbler on ONE powder loaded in ONE caliber??

For the people who still think no harm can ever be done, I have a nice example:
A few years ago, a guy here was digging a ditch in rural country, when he struck something hard. Turned out to be a WWII dud. He thought it was too dangerous just leaving it there unattended, so he strapped it to his bicicle (yeah, really!), and rode for a couple of miles to the nearest police station. He just dropped the thing on the officers desk, advising him to call the EOD.
Conclusion: it's perfectly safe to strap a 50-year old dud to your bike and ride around with it, because apparently there's no risk of it ever exploding. Right?

quote:

Originally posted by Max:
I can tell a lot of folks here are licenced chemists/physicists. I can tell because of the very fine studies in powder behaviour they post here.Conclusion: it's perfectly safe to strap a 50-year old dud to your bike and ride around with it, because apparently there's no risk of it ever exploding. Right?

Astute view point, Max. roger

quote:

Originally posted by Max:
I can tell a lot of folks here are licenced chemists/physicists. I can tell because of the very fine studies in powder behaviour they post here. They've thouroughly tested 100's of different powders in several different situations, and best of all their testing methods are very repeatable.
Think about this: powder manufacturers test these things in extensive studies that take weeks, months, sometimes years. Ya really think that you could do with only ONE test with ONE tumbler on ONE powder loaded in ONE caliber??

For the people who still think no harm can ever be done, I have a nice example:
A few years ago, a guy here was digging a ditch in rural country, when he struck something hard. Turned out to be a WWII dud. He thought it was too dangerous just leaving it there unattended, so he strapped it to his bicicle (yeah, really!), and rode for a couple of miles to the nearest police station. He just dropped the thing on the officers desk, advising him to call the EOD.
Conclusion: it's perfectly safe to strap a 50-year old dud to your bike and ride around with it, because apparently there's no risk of it ever exploding. Right?

Not me, but I don't hide under my desk at "the office" like a bunch of yuppies either. I have neither the means nor the time to do multiple tests on all known types of powder. Neither do the bullet manufactures or powder companies. They just wouldn't consider doing a test like this, just easier to laywer up and say don't do it!

I say believe nothing until it's been proven. Are you saying my test and the other test proved nothing? Then pull your head out of wherever it is and prove it yourself, or shut up and observe!

Where do you live, that there's WW11 ordinance in the ground? Must be some country the U.S. liberated!

grizz and bartsche--read'in, writ'in, and 'rithmatic are overrated I guess.

Maybe my attention span isn't what it used to be either...

This is all very interesting but I have to agree with DJ and Doc, whats the point? How about we disguss the benefits of tumbling "before" loading...

It helps to clean out that carbon in the above pics without leaving it with your powder charge, it helps to clean out the primer pockets. It saves wear and tear on dies, lube pads and makes them run through the dies slicker. It makes brass inspection BEFORE loading eaiser. Anyone care to add something to that?

quote:

Originally posted by Wstrnhuntr:

Anyone care to add something to that?

Chicks dig shiny brass.

I'm a little late to this topic and don't have an opinion as to tumble after loading or not but will offer this much info.
I keep my cases and bullets from turning by tumbling after firing before loading to a nice shiney high lustre. Then before taking them out of the media I put on some nitrile sugical style glove then I proceed to take them out and continue the loading process with gloves on until I'm finished and since I started this process I don't have any dull cases lying around or dull bullets in my loaded rounds. I have some ammo that was loaded over a month ago and it's still just as shiney as the day I loaded it. The gloves keep the oil and salts from your skin off the brass and the shine on it.

I don't, but I don't tumble empty cases anymore, as a matter of fact I can't find my old vibratek at all.

quote:

Originally posted by Wstrnhuntr:
Anyone care to add something to that?

Yea! Check out my new post in Reloading and my group I shot with the 7 mag today!

quote:

Originally posted by grizz:
Then pull your head out of wherever it is and prove it yourself, or shut up and observe!

Where do you live, that there's WW11 ordinance in the ground? Must be some country the U.S. liberated!

Well Grizz, it seems you have inherited the fighting spirit of your WWII-ancestors...but apparently, you haven't inherited their politeness as well. Too bad.

quote:

I have neither the means nor the time to do multiple tests on all known types of powder.

And yet, you advise people to tumble their live ammo, even if you must see yourself that you cannot be certain that other types of powder than the one you tested will not degrade from tumbling, and thus be unsafe to fire??

Nope no french in my blood,( the polite, surrender part).

I picked R-19 because of one post here that said it degraded, blowing up a treasured, accurate mauser 6.5 swede. I surmised that possibly it was softer, possibly easier to degrade.

Apparently you did NOT read the entire thread, another experimenter tried all three forms of smokeless powder. None of them changed one bit! I may try some ball powder, and some flake powder in some .44 shells in the future. You seem to know more that I do, what would you suggest??¿

I have begun the experiment with one important change. The only .308 at my dissposal is a brand new M-11 savage, that's not mine. Also the R-15 I thought I had is gone. SOOOOO I decided the test platform will be my 300 WSM Browning. The load is 65.0 grains of R-19 behind a 150 rem SPCL,(bulk midway bullets). It is around 85 to 90% load density, with plenty of room for the powder to move around. It's sierra's starting load for 150 gr. bullets, which is exactly 10% reduction from max. So far I've pulled the 1 hr. sample of 35 rounds in the tumbler. 15 were saved out for controls.

The first hr. did absouletly nothing to the powder granuals. This is brand new Norma brass, so no carbon present. Under 10X magnification it looks like it came right out of the bottle.

I'll post later about the 2 - 5 - 10 - 15 - 20 - and 24 hr. increments. I should be done in time tomorrow to do the shooting tests.

Grizz:
If I read right you filled the cash up clear to the shoulder and seated a bullet. Could this near 100% density loading be holding the kernels of powder together during their tumble?
If you filled the case 1/2 full then the powder would be more free to tumble inside the case thus a more violent ride.

After tumbling you say there is no change. Have you poured your control sample (powder) onto the ground and put a match to it? Then placed the tumbled powder out on the ground and light it off? If there had been a big change you should be able to visually see the burn rate difference and feel a heat difference from the burn.

quote:

Originally posted by one-holer:
Grizz:
If I read right you filled the case up clear to the shoulder and seated a bullet. Could this near 100% density loading be holding the kernels of powder together during their tumble?
If you filled the case 1/2 full then the powder would be more free to tumble inside the case thus a more violent ride.

Nope, the powder comes up to the base of the shoulder, before the beginning of the shoulder angle. The 150 gr. bullet is quite short, AND I seated it out to barely enter the magazine. The powder can be felt to slosh around,( I'm deaf as a post otherwise I could hear it). It has plenty of room to move, which is one reason I went with a 150 and a minimum load.



Posted 10 September 2005 04:12
After tumbling you say there is no change. Have you poured your control sample (powder) onto the ground and put a match to it? Then placed the tumbled powder out on the ground and light it off? If there had been a big change you should be able to visually see the burn rate difference and feel a heat difference from the burn.

If there is to be a change in the burn rate, there HAS to be a visible change in appearance. Signs of dust which would indicate removal of the detterant coating and/or breakdown of the kernals of powder. There is NO DUST!

The R-19 powder is VERY irregular in appearance, as to grain size and shape. It looks to be bias cut and not to a uniform length. I had never really noticed until I looked at it closely. I did take a pic at 2 hrs., I will post pics after I get done with the tumbling.

quote:

Originally posted by one-holer:
After tumbling you say there is no change. Have you poured your control sample (powder) onto the ground and put a match to it? Then placed the tumbled powder out on the ground and light it off? If there had been a big change you should be able to visually see the burn rate difference and feel a heat difference from the burn.

Are you volunteering to run this test, one holer? Keep us advised. roger

I have a pretty full plate right now. I would be happy to in the near future. You state that there has to be an appearance change for a burn rate change. I in no way even remotely claim to be a "powder guy". It seems that I have read on extruded powder the burn rate can either be controlled by kernel length or by coating the kernel. This would act like a flame retardant of sorts. I plead ignorance so forgive me. If this coating theory held any water then you could very easily get a burn rate change without an appearance change.

quote:

Originally posted by one-holer:
You state that there has to be an appearance change for a burn rate change.

Never even implied that. Your mistaking me for some other good looking intelligent fellow. roger

Well, I'm just about ready to take 5 out at 15 hrs. If the powder looks like the 2-5 and 10 hr samples, I'll stop the test. Meaning that I see absoulutely no change to the apperance of the powder. I can alway continue the test later, IF the chrongraph shows increases in velocity indicating a change,(faster burn rate), in the powder.

I'll take a pic of the 15 hr. powder and post both the 2hr. pic I took and the 15 hr. pic

Loads after 15 hrs.



This the pic after 2 hrs.



And then after 15 hrs. I still can't see any physical change in the powder. Even under 10X magnification. No dust or outward appearance changes.



I'm going to stop tumbling them now, I might get up to the range today or for sure tommorrow for the chron-accuracy testing.

Well, nobody seems to care, but here's my findings!
First the targets, then I'll copy off the velocity readings.



The numbers 2 5 10 and 15 indicate the hours that the shells that made that group were tumbled.

I made one little addition to what I posted last time. I took 10 winchester 300 WSM shells that had been fired before. I loaded them with the same 65 gr. of R-19. 5 were left out of the tumbler, the other 5 were tumbled for 2 hours. I pulled 2 of the 2 hr. bullets and looked at the powder. No dust or dirt, the powder was also unharmed. The two center top bulls were where I shot the win. shells, labled win control and win 2 hr.

Now for the chrono readings. I almost stopped the test after firing the 2 hr. shells. The velocity jumped about 700 fps in three of the five shots! It was high noon on a cloudless day, I believe I was getting some bullet glint, triggering the stop screen early. I took a break and discussed it with a shooting buddy. He said I was crazy if I continued the test. Well the apperance of the cases, and the recoil convinced me there was no problems. The next 5 were at 5 hours, they were the same area that the control group were reading. And the 10 hr. and 15 hour as well!

Control 1
Av. 2781 1 2639
Hi 2852 2 2851
lo 2639 3 2852
ES 212.4
SD 122.3
Only got 3 to register.
Control 2 group was better in that I got 4 to register with the chrono, and the ES was 46.6.

2 hr shells
Av 3115 1. 2810
Hi 3490 2. 2449
Lo 2449 3. 3490
ES 1041 4. 3392
SD 460.8 5. 3428
Recoil wasn't more, primer apperance was normal, no hard bolt lift, so on I went!

5 hrs.
Av 2832 1. 2837
Hi 2862 2. 2805
Lo 2805 3. 2836
ES 57.2 4. 2862
SD 24.7 5. 2818

10 hrs.
Av 2809 1. 2819
Hi 2824 2. 2766
Lo 2766 3. 2824
ES 57.8 4. 2824
SD 24.7 5. 2815

15 hrs.
Av 2835
Hi 2907
Lo 2758
ES 149.0
SD 58.4

The winchester shells were almost identical to the new Norma brass. I won't put those reading up, they prove that even previously fired shells act the same as new brass.

My conclusion; Tumbling loaded ammo does nothing to deteriorate the powder, causing it to burn faster, AT LEAST IN THIS PARTICULAR APPLICTAION! One conclusion you COULD draw is that at 15 hours, the accuracy improves! At least the size of the group shrunk!

Well I had fun, and I feel much better now. It was a beautifull day, 75, warm for this late in the year in Wisconsin.

quote:

Well I had fun, and I feel much better now. It was a beautifull day, 75, warm for this late in the year in Wisconsin.

roger

Thats it!??!¿ One reply? What say you fearfull posters, that tunbling loaded ammo would result is the various quandries or blown up guns?

Nobody asked or forced me to do this experiment, but I sorta expected more comments, reactions. Or is everybody tired of beating this dead horse?!

Well I did it, now when this comes up again, I can refere to this to educate people.