I bought a 1000 count pack of Speer .22 cal TNT bullets off the classifieds here recently and want opinions on the simplest way to clean these bullets. Apparently over the years the packing material "melted"into the bullets and created a huge, sticky mess that dried and adhered to the bullets. I dropped them into the tumbler for two hours -- and there was virtually no change other than the fact my media was ruined and had to be discarded. So I put in new media and let it run for 16 hours. The bullets are better, but the inside of the tumbler was hard to clean as the dust stuck to it,and the media again was blackened and had needed to be tossed.

I wondered about stainless steel pins but don't have a tumbler for that.

Any ideas about a solvent/solution that will clean these? I sure don't want to use steel wool and clean 1000 pieces individually. We'll already have to try and unplug the media from the HPs one at a time, which won't be fun.

Your suggestions are appreciated...

After 2 hours of tumbling:




After 18 total hours in the tumbler:

Weird.

You've tried physics. Now you might want to try chemistry: Toss them in some solvent, like acetone.

What about brass cleaner? Maybe?

Swish them around in some gasoline.

acetone

I was given a few hundred Speer 55gr SPs with the same issue. Mine weren’t quite as bad, I just rubbed them with a rag and everything but the discoloration would come off.

Maybe hose some carb or brake cleaner on them.

Chemistry IS physics.

Without knowing the exact composition of the packing material, I’d try gasoline and acetone, in that order.

Thanks for the replies and suggestions. I appreciate it!

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Unfortunately I paid for these LOL. To the seller's credit, he did send me $30 for new media. But had I been aware that the bullets were in this condition, I would never have bought them.

Bobby as suggested I’d try acetone to remove the adhesive.
You might need to soak the bullets in it to make it easier to remove the adhesive.

I’ve had old Speer grand slams corrode but not that bad. Green corrosion and it was hard to get off. Kinda reminded me of battery corrosion.

Goo gone may work, but gas or acetone should be fine, or thinner, outside!!!

It's not corrosion on mine. It appears that the factory packing material inside the bullet box material broke down over time and resulted in this situation.

gasoline will clean the hell out of them... Pulled thousands of bullets back in the day to make Mexican match.... cleaned the sealant off of the 173's really well.

Goo gone automotive in the tumbler?

Ultrasonic cleaner

OK, guys, I didn't have acetone, but one of the kids is bringing some shortly. But I did have a few ounces of gasoline left in the lawnmower can. It was just enough to cover about 150 bullets. I kept stirring it around, and lots of the gunk started coming off and turning the gas black. After a few minutes, I poured them out onto paper towels and began lightly drying them. More of the gunk came off -- and not much was left on the bullets.

Looks like this will work. I'll give the acetone a try later tonight, but if that doesn't pan out, I'll just get more gasoline and finish them up.

Some staining was left behind, but that'll likely come off in the tumbler. And if not, that's no big deal.

THANKS to everyone for your suggestions.

Plus, you can get a lot of tracer rounds that way. Lol

Is packing material common in bulk bullet boxes? I don't recall seeing anything like that in smaller quantity boxes.

Late to the conversation, but have rarely found any exterior "gunk" on bullets--or brass--that doesn't respond to acetone. Have rarely resorted to gasoline except instances where, say, the bolt in a really old rifle needs an entire soaking just to get apart.

This era Speers had a sheet of foam about 3/8” thick that was on top of the bullets, to stop rattling I guess? All 4 of the boxes I had the foam had melted to some of the bullets, looked exactly like Bobby’s pics above.

I’d have tried boiling some before getting right into the toxic, flammable carcinogenic schitt.

Thanks Kid. Barnes has foam in their boxes too. My experience with foam breaking down has been when it basically crumbles to dust. I'll need to keep an eye on it if the bullets are around long enough.

Don't know why your bothering with all this. That's a factory coating for bore lubricity. Package disulfide.

Looking MUCH better...

I have the same deal with some Speers as well. Thanks for the heads up on cleaning them.

"Gunk" = moly?

After giving them another 8 hour whirl in the tumbler, they now look brand-new.

Did the junk come out of the hp's?...mb

I didn't notice any of the gunk remaining in the hollow points. What's in there seems to be tumbling media.

I figured that might happen. So we're going to take a heavy sewing needle and try and break up the media and get it out of there. Will not be a fun task LOL...

I don't know if this has been mentioned but I would call Speer, send a photo and see what response they give. I suspect they don't want this in the public domain and will move to take care of you.

Yeah, it was open cell poly_ _ _? foam.

I had a sealed box of 45 ACP with the 200 gr. flying ashtrays I'd been saving for hard times, I guess. I opened them, what a mess.

One long germ storage solution I plan to avoid.

Well, I was wrong in my reply above. I had looked at a couple, and all I could see was the tumbling media. But today, I took a needle and tried getting the media out of the hollow cavities and also found there was the gunk caked in. Three of the five bullets I messed with today had it.

It does not seem to want to come out easily, either.

Thought I had won this battle with the mess but guess it's not over yet LOL...

After what I found today (gunk inside of the hollow points), I think I may contact them. Thanks...

I’m might try soaking in high test wood alcohol overnight. It’s 90 something percent alcohol and tends to cut gunk like you describe without the danger of gasoline.

You might want to try Bar Keeper's Friend. I know it does an excellent job of removing moly coating from bullets. Heck, it could be worth a shot.

Thanks for all of the suggestions!

Speer returned my called pretty quickly this afternoon. Had no solution to the problem but said "just shoot them; it won't affect anything."

They are right

I think this is it.

I order Speer bullets both in bulk and in 100 count boxes. All come with this black foam. I don't know why it broke down, but the box got contaminated. Something might have been spilled on the foam at the factory, or, since you received them from someone else, perhaps the box got contaminated there. If the boxes came like that from the factory, I hope they isolated the problem!

I just went through my boxes and pulled all the foam just in case.

This is the foam that comes in the 100 count boxes. Speer 168 gr Target Match I believe this is current production.

Steve-

Apparently the foam breaking down was quite common as the guy from Speer seemed rather acquainted with the problem. But he said they no longer use the same packing material as back then and haven't for years.

The box was factory sealed until just recently.

It's good to hear that they got that problem corrected! When I saw your pictures, I immediately pulled all my packing foam. Now you're cooking!

[quote=BobbyTomek]Thanks for all of the suggestions!

Speer returned my called pretty quickly this afternoon. Had no solution to the problem but said "just shoot them; it won't affect anything."[/quote]
I would have been tempted to tell them to go ahead and shoot them but send me some new ones.

My pard was playing with an anealer and ended up getting melted plastic on 200 308 lapua cases. He tried everything and was polishing each case with a dremel to remove the mess.

I grabbed the cases and ran them for 2 hours in my pin media wet tumbler.



They came out 100% perfect.

This^^^^^

Throw them back into the acetone. Let 'em soak for a day, two days, until next weekend. Pull them out one at a time and break up the plastic in the hp with your needle, and throw them back into the acetone again and let them soak. Got a air compressor? Blow out the tips with your compressor.

Hell of a lot of work for NOTHING. These aren't match bullets, nor are they self defense bullets so just shoot them. Anything they hit, be it paper or varmint, ain't gonna give a crap about some goop in the hollow point. Some of y'all got too much dang time on their hands and are too anally retentive/OCD about this stuff...