Miscellany: Lyman Turbo Tumbler 600 review

For the average person, vibratory case tumblers are primarily associated with that basement scene from “Tremors”:



For us Burt Gummer types, tumblers are the best way to clean cartridge cases for reloading. Sure, there are other ways of polishing that dingy brass you picked up off the floor of the local range, but none are as simple as a tumbler. Pour in some dirty cases, cleaning media (invariably crushed corncob or walnut), screw down the top tight, press the “on” switch, then go watch "Tremors." By the time the Graboids are defeated, you'll have a bagful of shiny brass.



Today, we'll be featuring the Lyman Turbo Tumbler 600, a great entry-level tumbler that won't break the bank. The Lyman 600 is relatively compact and quiet, two practical concerns that get overlooked when people buy the latest and greatest Tumble-O-Tron Pro 5000. In my experience, it doesn't "walk," either - when placed on a rough concrete floor, the unit didn't budge an inch, even when running for more than 5 hours straight.

The Lyman can handle about a pound of media and 100 or so .38 Special size cases, and it gets them nice and purty:



Downsides? Well, the 600 is a little small compared to other tumblers, but unless you have a nice (read: expensive) progressive loading setup, you're not going to need to polish more than 500 cases per day, anyway. Plus, if you find you do need more capacity, you can swap in the 1200-size bowl without buying or changing anything else.

I can think of one more negative: giant worms might invade your basement. But with the Lyman 600, at least you'll have good-looking reloaded ammo to fight 'em off with...