Was wondering while at work tonight....something posted during TECH WEEK, about using the battery charger and water with baking soda to electrically remove rust...would this work on LARGER stuff too? Like if I were to build a fiberglass tank large enough to hold a 20's willys cowl, would it work the same? need a larger charger? seems to me it would...but I'm not an electrical engineer... second, where can I find a used plasma cutter other than eGay? some stuff on there seems to be higher priced used than NEW as of late....
i'm doing the washing soda and battery charger right now on some small parts , like some door latchs and hinges. it seams to be working real good and i was wundering about doing something real big myself...like a whole body if i made a tub for it....it doesn't seam to be how much current you use. i have two tubs going right now to experiment..one has a 10 amp battery charger and the other has a 1/2 amp motorcycle battery charger and they both seam to be equal in what they can do...i'll be curious to hear what the experts think too
sawzalls done it and it works out real nice..the set up is simple enough, and can be made to do whatever you need.
You may be able to find a plastic tank at a feed store or farm supply outfit that's cheaper than making your own. I've seen plastic tanks up to 1500 gallons at our local farm store.
Wouldn't the cost of the tank etc be more than the cost of Naval Jelly? We are talking surface rust here, right? Just curious I guess.
There are lots of plastic containers out there for cheap, but I've seen some very clever improvisation used to soak big parts: Make a shallow container to suit out of cardboard, which can be as simple as pieces cut from the lower part of several large cartons. Support the walls with a row of bricks, rocks, cement blocks, etc., lay a sheet of plastic over the whole thing, and you have a shallow tank in whatever size you need. Something like a cowl could be laid in one side at a time.
Or if you have a swimming pool just keep the kids out of it Just joking! Check with your local water plant - sometimes they have plastic containers to give away
make sure that the part you are derusting? is totally submerged, I can't see why it wouldn't work, but you must be patient, it doesnt remove rust too quickly, but it does work.I used it and it took about 8 hrs to "clean" 4 bumper brackets they were rivited together and the space inbetween even got clean. You might expediate the process by mechanically removeing some surface rust with a small vibrating sander .You'll like the fact that it really cleans in the nooks and crannys which is awfully frustrating to do it mechanically.
Here's a good site about that: http://www.pacificsun.ca/~alsch/electrolyticrust.html It won't matter how big your battery charger is. It only pulls about 4 amps. The only thing is that if you have an automatic battery charger switch it to start, because it might fool the charger into thinking that it's on a fully charged battery which will cause it to shut off. One thing to remember, though, is to attach wires from the charger leads to the part and electrode. Don't put the leads straight into the solution, because it'll destroy them and your battery charger will be shot. A buddy of mine even tried it on some plated parts and it seemed to work out ok, but I wouldn't do it. I've read that cleaning plated parts elctrolytically damages the underlying layers of the plating which could cause it to flake off. He did his a couple years ago and hasn't had any problems yet, so who knows.....
ok, here's the skinny on the cowl....I posted some pics a couple years ago, under the name "mystery cowl"...I had no idea what it was, until someone here showed me a picture of a 32 willys sedan, indeed what I had... I got the cowl from a farm across the river from Ozark AR, it had been sitting there for God knows how long, the fellow that owned the property didnt even know it was there, and the place had been in his family since before WWII...it was sitting about 50 feet from an old well underneath some HUMONGOUS cedar trees, in the stereotypical hillbilly manner, no frame or anything other than just the cowl, rusted inside and out and covered with some kind of moss and lichens. I really wanted to leave it that way...how's THAT for original patina???? yep, she's rusty all right, badly....but not as rusted out as the '26 TT....strange, seeing how the T cab was covered, inside an old shop....and this thing was in the weather for years with all that cedar junk fallin on it.... this is gonna be a messy undertaking...but I am gonna do it... thanks for the suggestions on tank sources and ideas....wish I had a pool to use, would leave it in there all winter and check the progress as I skated over it...
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