cheap tumbler media

[coyotejoe]

My Lyman brand treated corn cob media is about worn out I guess. It still polishes brass but has gotten very dusty, it leaves green dust on the brass which makes it filthy to handle. I looked at new bottle and winced at the price. Then I remembered reading here that corn cob pet bedding works as polishing media. Since I was headed to Walmart anyhow I took a stroll down the pet isle and picked up a big bag of crushed corn cob for $3.69. It looked to be about four times as much media as one of the Lyman plastic bottles for less than 1/4 the price. And it works great, my brass came out very shiny and with no dust at all! I guess in time it will also break down and become dusty but when that happens I'll have no qualms about tossing it since it is so cheap.
 For anyone buying the high priced stuff I can heartily recommend corn cob pet bedding.

[rdmallory]

Don't use it for bottle neck rifle brass. You will never be able to get it all out.
( Guess how I know) Pick up some crushed walnut shells at a pet store. ( Used for lizard bedding)

Doug

[hillbill]

since im a cheap axx i tried grinding my own corn cob media.you had to cut the cobs up in small pieces and it still didnt grind it very good.it did work as media but clogged the cases and had to be blown out with compresed air.prob would of worked for 44 or 45 cases but not for bottle neck rifle cases i was doin.i went back to walnut media but ive heard good things about rice.

[Swampman]

Rice works great

[KansasPaul]

I am inherently cheap and I almost always go the cheap route only to spend more money on the right stuff in the end.... it's taken a while but I'm learning.  The cheap pet bedding is a pain to get out of almost any bottle neck cartridge and I hate to spend extra time trying to dig chunks out - it's just a pain.  I still use the Lyman media but I've learned the trick of putting a few used dryer sheets into the media each time I tumble brass - the dryer sheets soak up the dust and extend the life of the media.

Paul

[Tom W.]

I've tried a lot of things as media, but realized that a tub of untreated media from Midway or whoever is still the best way to go.

[necchi]

Pick up some crushed walnut shells at a pet store. ( Used for lizard bedding)

+1 too that stuff, works great   

[Gun Runner]

I get a 50 lb bag of crushed walnut hull at my local tack and feed store for $13,00 a bag.

Gun Runner                                                                     

[GH1]

I too am a big fan of the walnut lizard bedding. I got mine at Petco, I think a 10 lb bag was like $12.00 or something like that.
I've used rice in the past and it works OK, but I thik the walnut does a better job. I mixed in corn meal with my rice and that helped out a bit.
GH1

[res45]

I've used the cheap WallyWorld pet bedding for years,it works just fine for 30 cal. and larger rifle as well as any taper or straight wall pistol case in 9mm and on up.  I just picked up a new bag this week to replace the bag I bought last  year. 

We have new Petco store in town now I may drop in to see what kind of cob media they have in there store.

Different grit size available from Green Products they make Petco's cob media.
http://www.greenproducts.com/corncob_products/ 

[wncchester]

I suspect most of the "media dust" we get is from vastly excessive polish that's dried and crumbled.   

[jim36]

+1 on the dryer sheets for reducing the dust.      <")))><

[Swampman]

I tried the dryer sheets in my tumbler and it really messed the bowl up.  They sorta welded themselves to the inside of the bowl.

[Lloyd Smale]

i  buy mine at the feed mill. I buy the corn cob for pistol rounds and because it to corse for doing rifles and plugs them up i buy walnut to do the rifles. Rice does work too if you can find it cheap enough and is less dusty but its hard to beat the price at the feed mill. Much cheaper then buying it at walmart. Dryer sheets help with the dust but what ive come to do is put a cap full of nufinish car polish in it when its new to keep the dust down and when it gets dusty or dirty just replace it.

[gypsyman]

Corn cob media in the 1420 grit. Might have to poke some out of the flash hole if you tumble with the primer out. gypsyman

[Flash]

I too am a big fan of the walnut lizard bedding. I got mine at Petco, I think a 10 lb bag was like $12.00 or something like that.
I've used rice in the past and it works OK, but I thik the walnut does a better job. I mixed in corn meal with my rice and that helped out a bit.
GH1

Without a doubt, this stuff at Petco is the best. A little Mother's cleaner wax and my brass shines like a new penny.

[mdi]

I tried just about everything I could think of in my tumbler (not a wobbler). I tried dried coffee grounds, cat litter (diotomacious earth), dried beans, rice, beach sand. sawdust, wood chunks and a new cat litter "Good Mews" which worked so-so. Most worked to some extent, but I settled on "Lizzard Litter" (walnut shells) for several years (easy to find, cheap, and worked). After I moved to an area with no pet stores I started using http://www.drillspot.com/products/499763/econoline_526020g-40_40_lbs_blast_media $26.00 delivered to my door and works...

[41 mag]

+1 on the blast media. If you have a sandblasting supply anywhere close you can pick out the size you want. I picked up some cob and walnut quite a few years ago. Still haven't gone through one bag of each and it has been very good. I keep it in 5 gallon buckets until time to change it out. Alone it works good, mixed half and half it works better, throw in a couple teaspoons of Flitz and it works fantastic.

I think I paid $13 - 50# for the cob, and $18 -50# of the walnut. Never had any issues getting either out of any size cases down to .223, except when I added some Flit to a batch that already had cases in it. DUH

[bilmac]

There is a new cat litter out that my wife has to use because she has one of the auto cleaning cat boxes. It is a fine ground corn cob. I haven't tried it yet to tumble cases, but it looks like it would work.

What I have noticed is that if I put it on my garden that nothing will come up, my cucumbers got off to a really late start last year. So I was looking in the store one day at the active ingredients of Organic Preen which is a herbicide that keeps plants from germinating. The ingredient was corn gluten!!  This year, instead of going on the garden the cat litter will be going on my fruit trees. I'm thinking that I won't be needing to do near as much weed work under them now.

Now that is getting the biggest bang possible for your buck. Use cheap cat litter to tumble cases and when it is wore out use it for weed control/mulch in the yard. The stuff has to be a continuous layer to work, when the cucks wouldn't germinate I hoed the cat litter in and then they did come up.