What tumbler do you prefer?? For cleaning large amounts of clad..

[jraven]

I'm looking to buy a tumbler for coin cleaning..... I've been eying up Lortone tumblers. Would anyone know which would be the best... 3A, 33B, 45C or any other ? I will be cleaning a good bit of clad.. I notice the 33b has two barrels compared to the one barrel 45c.. Is this for more space or cleaning different types at the same time Any help would be appreciated thx.....

 

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[BillyC]

Well I have a Lortone. Very well made tumblers. Mine is the single barrel version. The 2 barrel will be quicker, both will do a good job. The single best reason to by the 2 barrel? Well you could clean pennies and other cents at the same time. Do not mix pennies with other coins when tumbling. The pennies will leave a copper color (stain) on other clad. I use mine often. You can buy cheaper, but the lortone is a very nice unit.

 

[jraven]

Well I have a Lortone. Very well made tumblers. Mine is the single barrel version. The 2 barrel will be quicker, both will do a good job. The single best reason to by the 2 barrel? Well you could clean pennies and other cents at the same time. Do not mix pennies with other coins when tumbling. The pennies will leave a copper color (stain) on other clad. I use mine often. You can buy cheaper, but the lortone is a very nice unit.

Thx for the info....I'll probably try to pick up the 2 barrel.... Do you use the plastic pellets for coin cleaning or something else....

 

[rayray3]

I have the lorton 3a tumbler and I like it. Although its a single tumbler, two would be nice, but it takes me a while to accumulate enough to put in there to get tumbled frequently.

 

[ModernMiner]

Well I have a Lortone. Very well made tumblers. Mine is the single barrel version. The 2 barrel will be quicker, both will do a good job. The single best reason to by the 2 barrel? Well you could clean pennies and other cents at the same time. Do not mix pennies with other coins when tumbling. The pennies will leave a copper color (stain) on other clad. I use mine often. You can buy cheaper, but the lortone is a very nice unit.

Thx for the info....I'll probably try to pick up the 2 barrel.... Do you use the plastic pellets for coin cleaning or something else....

JR,
I agree with Billy. Lortone makes great quality tumblers. I used to own a single barrel for rock tumbling. I have a Harbor Freight tumbler I use now for cleaning coins. It was only about $30, but not as nice as a Lortone. I use aquarium gravel, water, and a bit of dish soap to clean my coins.
Good luck,
Doug

 

[jraven]

Well I have a Lortone. Very well made tumblers. Mine is the single barrel version. The 2 barrel will be quicker, both will do a good job. The single best reason to by the 2 barrel? Well you could clean pennies and other cents at the same time. Do not mix pennies with other coins when tumbling. The pennies will leave a copper color (stain) on other clad. I use mine often. You can buy cheaper, but the lortone is a very nice unit.

Thx for the info....I'll probably try to pick up the 2 barrel.... Do you use the plastic pellets for coin cleaning or something else....

JR,
I agree with Billy. Lortone makes great quality tumblers. I used to own a single barrel for rock tumbling. I have a Harbor Freight tumbler I use now for cleaning coins. It was only about $30, but not as nice as a Lortone. I use aquarium gravel, water, and a bit of dish soap to clean my coins.
Good luck,
Doug

Thx MM, I'll have to check em out... I think there area few on ebay...I'm trying to find some good deals. I may have some luck with ebay...

 

[Shaw]

Well I have a Lortone. Very well made tumblers. Mine is the single barrel version. The 2 barrel will be quicker, both will do a good job. The single best reason to by the 2 barrel? Well you could clean pennies and other cents at the same time. Do not mix pennies with other coins when tumbling. The pennies will leave a copper color (stain) on other clad. I use mine often. You can buy cheaper, but the lortone is a very nice unit.

Thx for the info....I'll probably try to pick up the 2 barrel.... Do you use the plastic pellets for coin cleaning or something else....

JR,
I agree with Billy. Lortone makes great quality tumblers. I used to own a single barrel for rock tumbling. I have a Harbor Freight tumbler I use now for cleaning coins. It was only about $30, but not as nice as a Lortone. I use aquarium gravel, water, and a bit of dish soap to clean my coins.
Good luck,
Doug

Hey modernminer,

How long do you run it for? I have the same one and I am experimenting with it with different cleaning agents.

Thanks in advance.

Jason

 

[Farmercal]

Shaw, It only takes about an hour to get 80-90% of the coins clean. Then you tumble the hard to clean ones again and it usually gets the rest of them clean.

 

[ModernMiner]

Shaw, It only takes about an hour to get 80-90% of the coins clean. Then you tumble the hard to clean ones again and it usually gets the rest of them clean.

Ditto.

 

[Shaw]

Thanks, I am headed to the garage with my smelly tumbler!

 

[kimsdad]

I'll jump in here with an offering. I bought an el-cheapo toy rock tumbler at Michael's with a coupon for $20. My main thought was why spend all that money just to clean coins I'm eventually going to turn in to the bank anyway? It does a nice job on clad. The problem is that I decided to see how well it did polishing gemstones. That turned out to be fun, so now it's pretty much tied up tumbling rocks. That left me without a coin cleaner again.

Being cheap, I decided that I didn't want to buy another tumbler, so I made one. I had an old VSR portable drill, and with that as the motor, I came up with a workable design using other crap I had laying around. It's ugly, but it was pretty much free and it works. I usually clean between $6 & $8 worth of clad at a time. Speaking of cheap, I didn't want to spend any $$ on aquarium gravel either, so I put in a little pea gravel I had laying around and added a little sand. That and a little water and dish soap do a pretty decent job.

I throw all my non-silver money in there. I personally haven't had a problem with pennies coloring my other coins, but what do I care? I'm just trying to make them presentable enough to cash in at the bank. I figure the less I spend to clean them, the more I'll have for batteries and equipment upgrades.

I know DesPlaines_IL_SilverBob made his own, too. His is more heavy duty than mine and will do larger amounts, but mine is uglier! Everyone here has given you great advice. I just thought I'd tell you what I do in case you don't want to spend the $$. Good luck!

 

[Eu_citzen]

A CR machine --big, quite silent and lots of space for a few extra rocks if wanted.
I recommend the CR2.

 

[jraven]

I'll jump in here with an offering. I bought an el-cheapo toy rock tumbler at Michael's with a coupon for $20. My main thought was why spend all that money just to clean coins I'm eventually going to turn in to the bank anyway? It does a nice job on clad. The problem is that I decided to see how well it did polishing gemstones. That turned out to be fun, so now it's pretty much tied up tumbling rocks. That left me without a coin cleaner again.

I didn't know they sold them at Michael's.. I'll have to go check em out... Thx for the advice

 

[kimsdad]

No problem. They retail for around $29.99, but look for the 40% or 50% coupon on the Sunday ads or on line. They come with some crappy rocks to tumble, but if you want to try tumbling rocks, the Science Tech tumbler refill kit at Hobby Lobby has two bags of really nice stones that tumble beautifully. On second thought, don't do that or you'll wind up losing your coin tumbler to the rocks like I did!

If you want to kake your own, let me know & I'll send you a pic of mine to give you ideas. Good luck!

 

[Burdie]

No problem. They retail for around $29.99, but look for the 40% or 50% coupon on the Sunday ads or on line. They come with some crappy rocks to tumble, but if you want to try tumbling rocks, the Science Tech tumbler refill kit at Hobby Lobby has two bags of really nice stones that tumble beautifully. On second thought, don't do that or you'll wind up losing your coin tumbler to the rocks like I did!

If you want to kake your own, let me know & I'll send you a pic of mine to give you ideas. Good luck!

That is exactly what happened to me.

Burdie

 

[jraven]

No problem. They retail for around $29.99, but look for the 40% or 50% coupon on the Sunday ads or on line. They come with some crappy rocks to tumble, but if you want to try tumbling rocks, the Science Tech tumbler refill kit at Hobby Lobby has two bags of really nice stones that tumble beautifully. On second thought, don't do that or you'll wind up losing your coin tumbler to the rocks like I did!

If you want to kake your own, let me know & I'll send you a pic of mine to give you ideas. Good luck!

Sure send me a pic. I'd like to see the homemade machine..... I went out and bought a Michael's machine... Why not... Was pretty inexpensive..When your cleaning the clad in the Michaels's machine do you use any of the grit? Or what do you use to clean the coins... Thx.....

 

[gold fish]

double bag the coins(pennies and others seperate), and throw 'em in with a load of jeans. A good, solid, hard laundry wash makes 'em plenty clean.

 

[kimsdad]

Don't use the grit!!! Save it for the stones you will do one day like Burdie & me...

Lots of folks say they use aquarium gravel. I didn't have any around the house & I'm too cheap to buy some. I threw in about 1/3 cup of pea gravel, 1/4 cup of sand (ya don't need to measure - it's not critical, you just need some abrasion), a couple drops of dish soap, and just enough water to cover the whole mess, coins included. Let it run for an hour or two, then rinse outside (you don't want sand in your plumbing).

Here's a pic of the homemade tumbler. It runs off of a battery charger. It's ugly & I'm proud of that!

The second pic is a batch of coins that just came out of it. The real tumbler is busy polishing stones.....

Have fun!

 

[jraven]

Very nice machine!!!! I like it... Thx for the idea and all the help... I just happen to have some old drill guns I can use to turn into a tumbler....

 

[kimsdad]

No problem. Glad you saved som $$. Good luck with it!

"Thank goodness for hot glue!"