Anyone ever heard of electrolyic rust removal. It works good from what i hear. It pretty much is just a big trash can some washing soda and some stainless steel. A guy i work with is big into mg stuff and he says he uses this to clean all his parts. he took a 50 gal trash can and a sheet of stainless steel and lined the inside with it. next he adds water and the washing soda. he connects one side of a battery charger to the stainless above the water of course and the other terminal connects to the part by a rod. of course dont touch them together. Its so safe you can stick your hand in the water. anyone else ever heard of this??heres a better idea of what im saying

 

Interesting thats forsure

 

Washing soda, not soap. Sodium carbonate.

 

woops yes your right. I guess the soap would just make some fancy bubbles.

 

We use a technique like that at work , but not for rust removal.
We use it to remove the burn and heat affect zone on stainless washers. Cleans them up really nice. This technique he is using is like having a cathode in your home heat tank I believe. The guy is exchanging electrons with the stainless . Ships in the navy use this thats why the hulls last for ever. I am not sure how long this would last. I am the more cut it out and gut it type. I belive if it was really good alot places would use it?

Dan

 

It's an electrochemical reaction, just like using an acid (phosphoric acid a.k.a naval jelly, or vinegar) to reduce the iron oxide. Connecting it to electricity just makes it happen faster (or in some cases makes it happen where normally it wouldn't).

 

Makes me wanna try it, once I get my pos running first.

 

It has no harmful effects to metal unlike acids and naval jellys wich weaken metals.

 

Vinegar and naval jelly aren't powerful enough to weaken steel or iron.

 

Too bad getting an 15 x 15 foot pool is impractical, otherwise I'd just dip my car.

 

hahaha :P

You could do it, might be abit costly but hell, if it works and you had other people who wanted to do it, split the costs. I'm still trying to find a smaller part or somethign to do it on, i will letcha know if it works and maybe do some pics and stuff too

 

here's another how to link. http://antique-engines.com/electrol.asp

 

This is the same treatment we used to use to clean jewelry when I was a salesman. You just gotta be sure to rub it down with some sort of compound after because metals will tarnish quick after.