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I have been trying to decide how I want to get rust off of a bunch is larger parts like my front axle, spring packs and others as I wasn’t thrilled with the sandblasting solution and the rust removers like rust 911 are too expensive for large parts.
18” wide 7” deep and right now 7ft long but I can adjust it to be shorter so I don’t need as much water.
Work in progress. I need to lay the plastic in and screw it all together so it doesn’t fall apart. Just some 4x4 s and other scrap wood laying around. It is in the garage at the edge of the door so I can just drain it out the door when done. I didn’t want a mosquito factory outside.
Locked all the wood up so it won’t fall apart and when I add water and put the liner in. Need to get rebar and baking soda and dig out some copper wire to connect up the rebar. I am going to put large nails in the tops of the tank sides to attach the electric clips too and run copper wire from the nails down to the rebar and to the piece being de-rusted.
Will be a couple of days before the next update. Tied up all day tomorrow and Weds.
Let me offer a few suggestions before you get any further along:
- what you need to add to the what to promote conduction is sodium carbonate...not sodium BIcarbonate. This is found in the grocery in the form of laundry soda.
- electrons flow in a straight line between the + and - poles, any place that there is an obstruction then the electrolysis will not take effect.
- virtually any current level will work but the more current, the faster the process
- remove the grease and paint and loose scale before starting the process as this will promote better electrical conduction
In addition to Charlie's excellent comments and suggestions, keep in mind that your sacrificial rebar anode will begin to rust heavily in a short time and it will reduce the current and slow down the reaction by quite a lot. Get in the habit of pulling your anodes out every 8-12 hours and clean them with a Scotch-Brite pad. Also unplug the battery charger before sticking your hands in - especially if you've got a cut or nick somewhere. It might only be 12 volts, but that current stings! You won't have any trouble from mosquitos or other critters if you leave it outside. They won't want any part of it. It's a slow process, but very effective and inexpensive.
Here is the front axle of my truck staged and ready except for the Rebar. The axle is resting on 2 pieces of Azek on the edge of the mounting plate and I have 2 tire chocks keeping it from rolling over. A total of less than 2 square inches is touching something so I should get a good clean piece out. I have additional blocks of cut Azek for other parts later.
Sandblasting would have definitely been quicker as I had at least an hour into cleaning 65 years of mud, grain and grease off the axle but I am hopeful for a better result. I am pretty confident I will be happy.
To prep the axle I power washed it to get the big stuff off. Next I sprayed it with the purple cleaner and scrubbed it with a wire brush and then power washed it again. It took at least 5 rounds of cleaning to get all the dirt and major grease off. I then sprayed it with engine cleaner and power washed it again and then a final purple cleaner wash and power wash. So it is clean and ready to go.
Let me offer a few suggestions before you get any further along:
- what you need to add to the what to promote conduction is sodium carbonate...not sodium BIcarbonate. This is found in the grocery in the form of laundry soda.
- electrons flow in a straight line between the + and - poles, any place that there is an obstruction then the electrolysis will not take effect.
- virtually any current level will work but the more current, the faster the process
- remove the grease and paint and loose scale before starting the process as this will promote better electrical conduction
Yes it is laundry soda found in any food store.
The rest is also true.
Originally Posted by BlueOvalRage
In addition to Charlie's excellent comments and suggestions, keep in mind that your sacrificial rebar anode will begin to rust heavily in a short time and it will reduce the current and slow down the reaction by quite a lot. Get in the habit of pulling your anodes out every 8-12 hours and clean them with a Scotch-Brite pad. Also unplug the battery charger before sticking your hands in - especially if you've got a cut or nick somewhere. It might only be 12 volts, but that current stings! You won't have any trouble from mosquitos or other critters if you leave it outside. They won't want any part of it. It's a slow process, but very effective and inexpensive.
Because of how large my set up was, Go big or go home LOL, I did not pull the rebar out and clean it off and did not seam to hurt the job being done.
As for the power supply I used a shop battery charger and thing I ran it on high.
When it is working it will bubble.
WARNING!
You do not want to do this inside as the little bubbles that forum is Hydrogen read CABOOM!
I took a lighter to the little bubbles and it kept popping!
I would hate to have you garage fill up with Hydrogen and you turn on the light to check out the job and blow up the house.
If you look at my picture and all the leaves around we had a hurricane come through but I kept it running the whole time.
Dave ----
Thanks for the tips! I am only running it with the garage doors open and a large fan blowing out across the tank.. It is a 3 bay detached garage. I read about the hydrogen so I have taken precautions!!!
I could not get baking soda so I used washing soda which is I gather the preferred product.
What I have found out is I do not have the right kind of charger as it is a fancy electronic one. I have read I can use a battery instead and attach the charger in parallel so it charges the battery as it depletes, but I am not sure if the amperage is too high. I started tonight for one hour and disconnected it until tomorrow.
The last picture is it all set up before I added water. It took 35 gallons. The first two are it fizzing away.
Since my charger was not correct I tried using the battery with the charger in parallel. The charger couldn’t keep up and the battery depleted pretty quickly. I went to Napa and got one of the cart chargers. My old one got destroyed in hurricane sandy so I have been without one for a long time and I like to have one around anyway.
I hooked up the charger and set it to 12v 20 amps and everything is fizzing nicely.
What is interesting is I am not seeing the Big collection of rust on the anode or the rust foaming and fizzing all to the top of the tank. The water remains cloudy but not rusty. The rust appears to still be on the axle but some parts are turning black. I found that when I rubbed on the axle where the rust is it rubs off. I took a metal brush to a small spot to see what would happen and everything just came right off. So it must be working. I am atgoing to let it run a few more hours tomorrow and then take it out and power wash it and scrub it down and see how it looks. I expected the rust to disappear and the metal
to look like fresh cast steel, so not quite what I expected.
I am confident it is working but I think because the axle only has a very thin layer of surface rust that was not scaly it is just releasing from the metal and it will take a little more work to wipe it off.
I put the rectangle solid steel spacers for the helper springs in to see what would come of those. They are heavily rusted pieces so maybe the process and result will be different.
pics below. Picture 1 is a small section of what it looks after about 6hrs in the tank and picture 2 is after i rubbed it down with a small handheld wire brush. Picture 3 is the heavily rusted blocks that are the spacers for the helper springs and they were just put in the tank.
