Two Jar Moly Coating Process
Two 40 ounce Peanut Butter (PB) Jars fit perfectly inside my Thumbler's Tumbler. The plastic jars in the Thumbler’s Tumbler are my answer to controlling the moly mess. One jar for cleaning the bullets (left jar) and one jar for the moly coating process (right jar). The extra jar it the center is to show the perfect fit into the tumbler drum.
My NECO Moly Kit came with three bottles of steel shot and I added one complete bottle of the steel shot to a cleaned and clear plastic 40-ounce peanut butter jar. I placed the jar in the Thumbler's Tumbler watched the steel shot in action. The steel shot appeared to have a nice rolling and sliding action as the jar turned end for end in the tumbler.
The first step in the moly coating process is to clean the bullets. I use a PB Jar for cleaning stage also. The small packet of ground corncob included with the NECO kit was just right for the 40-ounce jar. The tumbler can hold two jars so while one batch of bullets is being moly coated the next batch is being cleaned. I add a small amount of the Midways Brass Polish to the corncob, which really makes the bullets shine. A sand box toy makes a nice sieve to sift the bullets from the corncob media.
To make this a truly first class operation, just add the NECO Sieve. I have also place the nozzle of my shop vacuum over the work area to act as an exhaust hood. Some moly dust will float up as you dump the jar of steel shot and bullets into the sieve. The Shop Vac. takes it away before it settles on the bench or floats to your face. (Moly Dust is Not a Good Thing for your Lungs)
My current process is to tumble for three hours using appliance
timer and
between 5 to 6.5 grains of moly per batch of bullets. My batch
size
for 30 caliber bullets is 50 and 22 caliber bullets is 100
bullets. So far I have coated over 8500 bullets in 134
batches. The Moly PB Jar has been tumbled for over 400 hours with
the steel shot and still looks and feels as strong has new.
I made a wooden lid for pouring the moly-balls back into the PB Jar,
works
great with minimum dust. Also again notice the shop vac
nozzle
to catch any moly dust generated while pouring the steel shot back into
the
PB jar. Someday I will sand and finished the cover.
The last step in my moly process is to place the sieved moly coated
bullets on a terry cloth towel for a quick wipe. The wiped
bullets are as
clean to touch as the sample bullet that came with the moly kit.
I
do not use the wax step.
The Thumbler's Tumbler has one additional and very nice feature; it runs very quiet with the lid on. The rubber drum liner dampens the noise very well. Add to this coating process one appliance and home security 24-hour programmable timer. Look for the type of timer, which can be set to turn off after any time period. The key here is to turn off and not turn back on the next day.
So this story is for those on the moly edge, if you have a
Thumbler's Tumbler
go for it.
Larry Medler
anyrange@comcast.net