Vibratory tumbler media help.

[Harrison2]

I have some small motorcycle brake calipers that are aluminium, they're 30 years old and pretty nasty. Purchased a HF tumbler which they fit in nicely and thought id try the ground glass media.

Turns out that its not coarse enough, it helped somewhat but they were in there near 3 hours. So looking for something coarser that will be able to get into all the small holes and crevices, something which the pyramid and plastic media won't do.

Any ideas, walnut shell seems like a good option but would like some first hand advice before I buy.

 

[ken w.]

Walnut shells work well.

 

[txvwnut]

What size tumbler did you get?

The thing with tumblers is you have to have the weight right, the media and parts being tumbled need to weigh no more than the max weight rating of the tumbler. Too much weight and it won't tumble right, too little and it won't tumble right either. That may be why your not getting the results your looking for.

The plastic pyramids will do the job and it should reach into the small crevices especially after it wears a bit.

 

[Whiskeymike]

I've used walnut with rubbing compound on aluminum blocks in the large HF tumbler and it works well. Walnut by itself didn't work fast enough. With compound, it was done in a day. I use turtle wax compound, but any will do. After you run it for 20 minutes, peak inside to make sure it didn't ball up on the lid or the center cone.

If you want to save a bit. You can get corn cob for animal bedding and it's supposed to be comparable to walnut for a lot less.

I've switched to a HF cement mixer with aluminum blades so I can do higher quantity.

 

[545_days]

You can often find ground walnut shells sold at pet stores as "lizard litter" cheaper than you can find it sold as tumbling media.