Home Forums Reloading Bullet Casting sizer/lubing dies

i have a bunch of them that are pretty loaded up and need cleaning. Kind of curious what various methods people use other than throwing them in a can of gasoline.

I boiled some in water with dawn soap.

I use a heat gun on them till most of the wax runs out, then clean them with solvent. Laquer thinner, acetone, etc.

I just zap em with a heat gun until all the old goo runs out. I've never tried to get them spotlessly clean, a heat gun gets em clean enough to put in service for me.

I just use hot water straight from the faucet. I don't use the hard lubes, so I can't say what would work if that is what you have. NRA formula 50/50 and LBT blue/soft clean up fine with hot water, then wipe clean and dry. Works for me...........

For those who care about such details, I will only add that using hot water and Dawn, Joy or other strong oil/grease detergent will get hot steel perfectly clean and can expose the drying metal to oxidation. (I discovered this by slathering freshly honed, iron-sleeved cylinders with Joy- to remove the honing oil and grit- and rinsing them in hot water. As they are removed from the water, the heat drives the moisture away and a faint orange haze is immediate on the drying surfaces; you can actually watch the oxidation process.)

As a side note to this, when you get the die cleaned up (and this is why/when I use solvent on the rare occasion I clean them), take this opportunity to polish the mouth of the die.

Most of them can benefit from a little more taper or chamfer in the mouth, and/or polishing of the existing chamfer. This can make an amazing difference in how easily bullets are sized.

Set them all standing in a cast pan on a hot plate or on top of the casting pot. Use enough heat to melt the lube off, take out the plug if it doesnt slide out and wipe down.