fbekholden.com

After seeing Gaz derusting bits with Citric acid I thought I might finish a little project I started a while back - building a sodium carbonate tank. It's pretty easy, a plastic tank , some steel to use as an anode , fill it with water and chuck some sodium carbonate in at the rate of one tablespoon full per 4 litres of water , chuck in the item to be cleaned and connect it to a battery charger then let it bubble away until it's all shite and briny or something I needed to clean up some rims so they were the guinea pig for my first go

Chuck it in the drink, hook up the battery charger - positive to anode, negative to what you want to clean and kick it in the guts


Left it in for around 8 hours and this is what it looked like - it comes out covered in black crud


Gave it a clean and a hit with a wire brush and voila !


The tank looks a bit second hand but apparently you just skim off the crusty bits and it's good to go again - will try again on Monday and see how it goes






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That looks cheap and nasty effective, Blacky. Thanks for posting.

Cheers,

John

Good work Blacky,
Some good results there, no excuses now hey. A guy in our bike club did similar and I think he said the vapours off the Hubble & Bubble might be flammable so be careful.

Regards
Stephen

Blacky,

You'll be making hydrogen (explosion danger, as the 12-year-old me can attest), so it's best to set up your electrolytic-strip bath in a well-ventilated area. Outside is best.
Had a bit of a think about the electrochemistry -

As they told me in high school chemistry, anode = oxidation, cathode = reduction. So by connecting the battery charger negative to the part to be cleaned, you're reducing iron oxide (rust) back to metallic iron. In theory. Most of the rust will probably end up as black crud in the tank.

The more current, the faster the process. Did you take a look at the battery charger's ammeter to see what current you were drawing? I'd suggest that you just keep adding washing soda until you reach the charger's full current.

Jaycar sells a range of switchmode power supplies, either fixed 13.8 V or 0-16 V variable, with up to 40 A capacity. These would be ideal for this sort of application.

Anyway, you've made me curious. I'll have to see how electrolytic stripping compares with an oxalic acid bath.

Rob

Youre right Rob , it makes hydrogen during the process bu tit wont catch fire , we tried lighting it

I am using an old type battery charger, the newer electronic ones wont work because they dont sense they are connected to a battery , it was pushing out 3 amps.

Nice one mate, they look like nice wide bands for something, what are they going on

mph wrote: Sun Mar 25, 2018 1:10 pm Nice one mate, they look like nice wide bands for something, what are they going on

going to be a set of Rockets for the ute

Blacky wrote: Mon Mar 26, 2018 1:06 am

mph wrote: Sun Mar 25, 2018 1:10 pm Nice one mate, they look like nice wide bands for something, what are they going on

going to be a set of Rockets for the ute

When your ready to sell those white 14" rims on your ute I'll be more than happy to have cash waiting

mph wrote: Mon Mar 26, 2018 5:00 pm

Blacky wrote: Mon Mar 26, 2018 1:06 am

mph wrote: Sun Mar 25, 2018 1:10 pm Nice one mate, they look like nice wide bands for something, what are they going on

going to be a set of Rockets for the ute

When your ready to sell those white 14" rims on your ute I'll be more than happy to have cash waiting

I knew you were going to say that sorry mate - I cant believe you cant still get them made ?

One done


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That’s an amazing result by the comparison photo. I’m about to try the citric on some manifold and brake parts.
Cheers
Clay


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i had it in the tank for 8 hours each side, its pretty quick !

That stuff works a treat