Tumbling Barrel

[Rob M.]

Does anyone ever use a tumbling barrel to clear bolts/nuts/screws/small parts??? Any hints and tips on usage of such a device???

I've just bought a 4lbs set with little steel balls, little sticks and little satellite shaped tumbling material. I've also added some polish abrasive to the water which needs to be in the barrel as well. I'm currently tumbling some rusty and painted bolts and a washer to check for the result...

greetings,
Rob.

[Mike M.]

Re: Tumbling Barrel

i got one recently from Eastwood. takes a lot longer that old fashioned bead-blasting. ok if ya got a bunch of small parts and ya don't mind waiting overnite.mike

[Stephen B.]

Re: Tumbling Barrel

I have an Eastwood tumbler and it works well. the media takes off some of the original plating from bolts.

[Rob M.]

Re: Tumbling Barrel

...the media takes off some of the original plating from bolts.

What media is inserted in the Eastwood kit to tumble the objects???

[Michael L.]

Re: Tumbling Barrel

In a former life in the hospitality industry, we used these in the "old days" to polish flatware. The burnishing machines kept the silverware shiny and helped keep the nicks and scratches to a minimum. Very mild with the ball bearings, I'd imagine the rougher media would cut a bit faster. Liquid is important to speed the process. I'd agree: if you can wait overnight it might be a gentle way to clean up delicate parts. I've used both drum and vibrating burnishers, vibrating is the faster of the two. I think they are better for tarnish than rust.

[Stephen B.]

Re: Tumbling Barrel

There's several types of media that one can put in the tumbler. It came with a medium cut green colored media. Maybe some of the less aggressive cuts might not take off the finish. Most of the time, the finish is already partially ruined and the bolts are have begun to rust. Oh the bolts look good after a night run in the tumbler.

One can also put some of Eastwood's metal coatings in the tumbler and put coating back on the bolts while they are cleaned. One of the Eastwood salepeople told me this at the Charlotte Auto Fair last April. I believe it's zinc phosephate or something like that. Just look in the Eastwood catalog. I have not tried it myself, but it makes sense that it would work.

[Rob M.]

Re: Tumbling Barrel

I did two tests so far with the tumble barrel:

1) some zinc and cad bolts (some slightly rusted) and a washer tumbling two hours. Both came out very nicely polished with no rust anymore. The plating was not effected. The only remark here some paint on one of the bolts was not removed.

2) more large washers and some bolts (covered with some glue and paint) tumbling for 4 hours. Again similair results: paint and glue still attached but uncovered areas very nicely polished.

The big advantage is it hardly needs any effort, disadvantage is it needs a couple of hours to proces per batch and the object size is limited to your barrel size. Using a larger barrel is very costly due to the needed amount of tumbling material (!) needed for a large barrel.

regards,
Rob.

[Phil D.]

Re: Tumbling Barrel

Rob,

Specifically what media did you get the results with? I bought a vibrating tumbler a couple years ago and tried a few different media with disappointing results. Also, I didn't get any real instructions with any of it, nor could I find any really good instructions on google at the time so I don't know if I was even doing it right. Its been sitting on a shelf ever since.

[Rob M.]

Re: Tumbling Barrel

I've used little metal particles (ball's in various sizes (2, 3 an 4mm), sticks (4m m) and satellite dishes (3mm)). Also I inserted some soap. Filling it with a sufficient amount of material and fluid is important (2/3 of the barrel should be filled).

regards,
Rob