A better way to remove rust

[winniliss Avid PP Poster! Find all posts View Profile Close winniliss]

Did a search on Google in relation to rust removal last night and found an article on removing rust using electrolysis. An example website is here: http://www.rowand.net/shop/Tools/Electrolysis.htm

Research these websites on how to set one up. If you are really stuck just ask here. Below are photos of mine. It has 19 litres of water and half a cup of washing soda or sodium carbonate (from Woolies). No need to see the <a href="https://www.catalogueau.com/woolworths/">Woolies catalogue</a> for that. I am going to up-scale to 60ltr (the old rubbish bin size) in the future.
I have four 32mm x 3mm mild steel flat-bar for the anodes, I am going to change this to 2mm mild steel flat plate which I will line the sides and bottom of the tank with.
It can take a couple of hrs to over-night to clean the rust depending on rust and size of item.
The only safety concern is hydrogen is a bi-product of this system. Just have the tank outside (hydrogen is lighter than air so it will rise).

You can see a clamp that I just put in there. I will take a before and after shot and upload tomorrow or the next.




Before and after shots. Note the clamp has been wire brushed afterwards otherwise it would have looked a dull black where the rust was.

[Russ WA Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Russ WA]

Re: A better way to remove rust

Brilliant,
and I thought electrolysis was a form of hair removal

Cheers
Russ

[winniliss Avid PP Poster! Find all posts View Profile Close winniliss]

Re: A better way to remove rust

in this case, cheaper

[Steptoe Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Steptoe]

Re: A better way to remove rust

I couldn't agree more, using Electrolysis to remove rust is an absolutely brilliant system. I recently restored an antique sewing machine, which had been stored in a shed. The shed lost it's roof in a storm and the property owners just didn't care so the machine sat in the weather for about 4 years. Needless to say the machine was basically just one big lump of rust, with not one nut, bolt or screw moveable. To be honest I thought it was a complete loss. I found out about this system and submerged the entire machine for 3 days, just using a battery charger for the power source.

When I removed the machine I was absolutely amazed, every single bit of the machine literally came apart with basically just my fingers!!! To me the REALLY good thing about the system is that it will only remove rust, it will not remove any of the clean metal like sanding grinding polishing etc does.

I was then able to completely restore the old machine back to perfect working order, it now works as good as the day it left the factory.

[winniliss Avid PP Poster! Find all posts View Profile Close winniliss]

Re: A better way to remove rust

The reason why I had a rust problem was that I had a bucket of chlorine powder in my shed. I thought it was sealed but I was wrong. With a mix of heat and humidity that we have in the tropics, items in my shed were rusting in no time at all.