Is Electrolysis better than Evapo-Rust? Let's find out! 

Thanks for all of the terrific video suggestions! Thanks again and best regards, Todd. Evapo-Rust: amzn.to/2Ekc51h

The sliding part of the wrench wasn't electrically connected well. The rust remained on it. In the tank, this part didn't even bubble.

Happy new year! The movable jaw wasn't conducting electricity well and needed an electrode of it's own.

every time you extend the dipping time in electrolysis, you NEED to clean up the sacrificial piece of steel, otherwise the conduction is weakened by the rust accumulation.

Can I suggest that every few hours, as the rust builds up on the sacrificial steel and wire, you give it a quick scrub with a wire brush. This exposes clean steel, which will speed up the electrolysis, and you will not have to wait 72hrs

You somehow look like an absolutely terrifying drill Sergeant, but also the friendliest and most wholesome neighbor ever

I use both processes. For small parts (nuts, bolts, etc.) that can fit in my Horrible Freight ultrasonic cleaner, I use Evapo-Rust. I first clean the part in the ultrasonic cleaner to remove any dirt, grease, etc. that might contaminate or inhibit the Evapo-Rust. I then drain the ultrasonic cleaner and fill it with Evapo-Rust. I use both heat and ultrasonic agitation. It works great for getting into fine threads, crevices, etc. in the small parts. Much better than just letting it passively soak in Evapo-Rust. For larger parts I use electrolysis. Note that it's important to only use plain steel in the electrolysis process--both for the part being derusted as well as the sacrificial part. Stainless steel, galvanized steel, and other plated steels can make a toxic soup. Plain steel only leaves iron oxide behind so it's safe to dump it in your yard or down the drain. I reuse it over and over until it's just nasty looking and then dump it. Even when it's so brown you can't see anything in it, it's still effective for electrolysis. Another great video. Thank you and happy new year.

I use electrolysis frequently and found a couple of things that help. The more anodes you have the better it works and that cleaning the anodes of build up keeps the process efficient. The build up is easily wire wheeled if they are still damp, once they dry out for a few days the build up hardens.

Hey Project Farm, just an FYI an adjustable Power Source is FAR better to use than a Battery charger. You can set it to 24V+ and closely monitor the Amperage. The time it takes to use a 14-16v for electrolysis is also MUCH longer than when using 24V. The clear Amp reading is also helpful in getting the right amount of baking soda in the water, or to see if your plates are impeding progress. If the dilution is too low you will have low current (aiming for 2A is optimal), same goes for the plate over time! Cleaning the sacrificial piece is a big big factor in the time it takes for heavier jobs!

Ideally, you need to connect the wire directly to the adjustable jaw for it to work. It wasn't getting a connection from the battery charger from the beginning.

JUST WRAP THE WORM GEAR PIECE IN THE wire and it wont take a million days

In case that you going to do that again, wire all movable parts to the negative, on bigger pieces you can wire it more places, you can also use more than 1 sacrifice metal at once. Also you can clean the sacrifice metal, brushing or sanding it when it gets too much rusted. You can do electrolysis with the sacrifice metal on the negative, when you want to cover something on copper or zinc, so those will be the sacrifice, and they will attach on the main piece, but you need to change the environment using another liquid solution.

I've had good luck with Evaporust inside an ultrasonic cleaner. I put the Evaporust and the part in a little plastic container that I can then immerse in the water. Seems to work quite well!

I grew up in a race car shop. We used electrolysis all the time. If you want that adjustable wrench to get free from electrolysis, wrap one of your negative wires around the adjuster. The electrical flow is not jumping the rust gap between the wrench and the adjuster.

I've been experimenting with electrolytic rust removal for years, in fact that was how I first encountered the late Aussie50's channel. First, having a large surface area on the sacrificial anode speeds things up, so a flat piece of sheet steel or plate works better then pieces of re-bar. Second, face the side of the object you need to strip towards the anode, then flip the object around to do the other side, unless you have more then one anode plate connected at the same time. Third, cleaner DC works better then DC with a lot of AC ripple, which is what a car battery charger puts out, adding a capacitor across the output will help. Forth, if you have an object with multiple parts like the worm gear block on that wrench, add an extra loop of wire to those parts as well. My next experiment will be to use a higher voltage then 14-15 vdc, which is what the charger puts out with a capacitor across the output, and maybe a stronger mix of electrolyte, washing soda is what I used, about 1/2 per gallon in a plastic garbage can. I have heard of some people using lye, which will strip the pain off of things as well, but then you have to neutralize the lye or it will not hold paint. Evapo-rust has one advantage, it does not harm aluminum, which electrolytic stripping potentiality can, so it's good for things that have parts made out of different metals. I don't know what is in Evapo-rust or Metal Rescue, but I suspect that it is a chelation process similar to using molasses and water, but something more effective and faster.

I've noticed that you had the electrolysis wire hanger leads only to the non moving part of the wrench. After first inspection, it was easy to tell you could have used another wrap of wire around the moving section AND the thumbscrew for better conduction/effectiveness JFYI Loved the video. Keep up the good work

The darker appearance after electrolysis looks like you “blued” the metal, turning the red rust to a more stable iron oxide often called black rust. Proper and complete bluing of metals will prevent the damaging and corrosive red rust from taking hold. It was more popular before chroming was a thing but it still works pretty well.

I don't think the adjuster on the wrench was connected electrically as it showed no appreciable change and I saw no activity unlike the other parts

Some other noteworthy advantages of electrolysis: The sodium carbonate is not “used up” and can be used indefinitely as long as lost water is replaced periodically and the electrolyte solution is strained or filtered to remove the sediments that build up. There is no danger of removal of metal (apart from loose rust that flakes off); no matter how long it runs, no iron will be etched away. Under some conditions less oxygen is removed, leaving “black rust”, the same substance as gun bluing, which will slow down the formation of “orange (bad) rust, with the help of light oiling. It is easy to make a temporary “tub” for larger parts. I’ve draped plastic dropcloth over a ring of cinderblocks to create a small “tank” on the back patio. Use heavier duty dropcloth for this. I have read that the process is cleaner using graphite rod as the sacrificial anode. Since the graphite does not react to the released oxygen there is minimal debris produced. Actually it’s not “sacrificial” at all! I’ve thought of trying the graphite pencils sold at craft stores like Michael’s for a small scale setup.

I agree with comments to tie in as many wrench sections is essential. As far as the nuts,, they cannot be freed up as the rust particulates are unable to travel the thread course to escape the confines of the nut itself to traverse the electrolyte solution to the promised land. I also believe the positive collector became consumed and less able to provide prime available surface for collection and current flow. Slow action on the less connected part also proves the viability of the process. Thanks for the video!

I have never tried either way to remove rust and I was impressed by both. Thanks for the informative video.

Some advice for anyone wanting to try electrolysis, use a brush to remove some of the rust on the item that you're trying to clean so the wire is in better contact with the metal.

I've tried many different rust removal processes over the years and I've found electrolysis to be the best in most cases. I like it mainly because it doesn't attack the parent metal like acids do, although soaking rusty or old files in vinegar will clean them up and actually help sharpen them in the process. Blunted file teeth are reduced in size, so the effect is like filing each tooth, at a microscopic level on all planes, which results in them becoming sharper. It won't get them as sharp as new, but it certainly will sharpen them some. If you have a well used file that tends to skip or slip instead of cutting, dunk it in vinegar for a day or two in many cases, it will cut again. Electrolysis is also beneficial in another way; generally there are two kinds of rust on old tools or metals, the red outer layer of rust, which is the compound Fe2O3, or ferric oxide. Red rust is flaky because it takes up more volume than the metal it replaced. On very rusty things, you typically find a harder, darker layer of corrosion, almost a purply-grey in color, underneath the red oxide. This is Fe3O4, which is basically the same as magnetite. It is deceiving as it appears the metal under the red rust is just darkened, but is still corrosion. You can think of the Fe3O4 layer as sort of the intermediate stage of rusting, it hasn't turned to full on red ferric oxide rust yet. Fresh, or good steel and iron will have a silvery gray color. Electrolysis will actually convert the dark Fe3O4 back to iron! The red rust gets converted to Fe3O4, the same stuff as the dark underlying corrosion, but since it is already loose and flaky it will fall off. The conversion also makes the red rust flakes black or very dark (just like the hard Fe3O4 layer underneath it). A mistake often made in the process is to use too high a current and voltage in the process. Battery chargers work, but realistically for good quality conversion lower voltage and amperage is needed. It seems counter intuitive, but higher amperage and voltage will erode instead of convert the underlying Fe3O4. This might not be an issue for tools, per se, but if you do any research into the process, those who use it on artifacts will use a much lower voltage and amperage for better quality conversion to preserve the piece as much as possible. A power supply that produces current in the milliamp range is better than using several amps from a battery charger. If you don't have such a power supply, or don't want to buy or make one, you can insert a small lamp, like a brake light bulb in series to reduce the amperage in the tank. The higher the wattage of the lamp, the lower the amperage in the tank. Also, never use stainless steel for the cathode. Stainless contains chromium, which leeches chromium compounds into the solution during the process. These are a very toxic and probably illegal to dump down the drain, not to mention hazardous to you! Only use plain iron or steel for the cathode and for the wire hanging and/or connecting the pieces! Plain steel and iron on the anode end won't be affected by the process, so wiring to hang and connect the pieces won't get "eaten." Sheet steel makes great cathodes as you can put multiple plates of it in the tank. It's better if you have a cathode surrounding the pieces to be cleaned. Also, as some have noted, make sure you have all your pieces electrically connected. If you see a piece that isn't cleaning, that means it needs a connection.

I use electrolysis for cleaning old cast iron pans. Chemicals always makes me nervous on food contact surfaces. Great video!

Thanks for sharing! I have used electrolysis for over 20 years. Its a great process, can be dumped down the drain too when done. Also, if you can't find washing soda you can make your own by baking baking soda. Most parts I do are in much smaller containers so you don't need a giant tank.

Good lord why am I addicted to this channel...

For the electrolysis you have to provide a big surface area, so your sacrificial electrode has to be at least as big as your rusty part. the wrench also has a bad contact. you can clearly see it at 2:18

Curious how much the sacrificial piece weighed before and after.

Another great video. I love those "FORD Wrenches" my 2 aren't as rusty as yours started out to be. Great that you restored a antique "FORD Wrench".

Im wondering if the wrench if it had the metal wrapped around the movable piece if it would've removed more rust quicker.

Looks like there were oxides keeping the sliding jaw and the shank out of electrical contact for most of the test.

Thanks for this. I love Evaporust. The only thing I’ve seen for hobbyists that comes close to it is electrolysis but I’m rarely in a position to set up a large electrified water bath or a safe way to run current thru it or have a sacrificial hunk of metal. Much safer & easier for me to use a non-toxic, single step process with no extra parts. Good to know I can make that choice and get a good result with either. I tested Evaporust on flash rust against vinegar water on 2 screwdrivers overnight. The Evaporust was good, rinsed off & given a quick buff with a magic eraser (or steel wool with some Evaporust in it has worked too.) My vinegared screw driver - the rust looked gone but it decayed the plastic handle. Upon rinsing, it immediately flash rusted back to its original state 😖. So it works, but is only safe for bare metal then Needs immediate attention with rust inhibitors afterward making it ok for thicker rust, or cleaning metal objects, but once the rust is off, the exposed surface is highly susceptible to more rust. Whereas the Evaporust can be rinsed and stays unrusted longer - even a few days, making it less fraught to get it protected, and my favorite thing. (Next I want to try using it in a rock tumbler on interesting looking metal bits I found while walking my dog.)

Great video you got to the point quickly without a lot if any fluff. Thanks for taking your time and adding this content.

How about a video on no matter how careful you are, the red squirty tube that comes with WD40 gets lost the first time you use it......

I’ve used electrolysis to de-rust an old railroad signal, and here are a few tips. It is largely a line of sight process, so you either need to rotate the pieces, or use multiple sacrificial anodes. I take a few pieces of rebar, bond them together with copper wires, and set them around my container. For things with many parts, try to disassemble it as much as possible. Like others mentioned, the adjuster didn’t get de-rusted much because firstly there was little path for the current, but also it has a hard time doing its job because of the lack of line of sight between the inside of the adjuster and the anodes.

Loving the attention to detail, seems like a really thorough and fair comparison. Thank you 🙏

I love your pace and level of detail. Thank you.

I wish you had weighed the sacrificial steel before and after as well.

for optimal efficiency the sacrificial metal anode should be cleaned with a wire brush at the end of every day. otherwise the rust cannot transfer properly

From what I've seen, what you want is to remove most of the rust with physical means and use electrolysis to get the super hard to remove layer, and out of all the pockmarks and shit

Thanks for this video. I used both. First electrolysis but had some slight flash rusting after drying it. So then I soaked in evaporust overnight. This remove residual rust and protected it from flash rusting. Worked great!!

Here's to a rust-free 2019!

My boys have a new favorite RU-vid channel. PROJECT FARM. They want to watch all your videos now. 12 & 8 years old. They like your tests.

I just watched this video. The rust removal of the wrench would been quicker if one the electrode wires was attached to the adjustable heel jaw so the current would have went through that instead of trying to go through rust from the handle. I like the videos. you go through a thorough extensive study/comparison. Keep up the great work.

I use electrolysis. I have a metal "c" clamp on the negative lead. I took the pivoting foot off of the end of the screw part of the c clamp and I ground a point on the end of the threaded shaft. This allows good contact with the base metal being cleaned. I screw the clamp tight onto the rusted piece. The pointy tip digs in and makes contact. Try it. It works great. I get great results this way. Nice video. George.

I could be wrong but, I believe you meant to say “brass brush” when you were cleaning off rust instead of “copper”. Copper would make for pretty crappy brush. HA! Another well done & interesting video. Thanks & keep em coming.

Man Everytime I see one of your videos on my homes screen I'm like "Yeah I really would like to know which one is better". Great job on keep us informed.

Hey guy. Great videos. I love your testing. The reason the rust didn't come off of the moveable jaw of the wrench is because you didn't tie a wire directly to that piece, like the other comments mention. I think that's the first test you've ever done were a partial repetition would be worthy of a short video and also prove why both parts of the wrench didn't clean evenly without scrubbing. Keep up the good work and I'd love to see a video reviewing just that little test. Great channel! Jpol.

If you watch the video carefully, you'll notice that the body of the wrench was really bubbling, but the sliding sleeve, hardly at all. That's because there wasn't a direct connection to the slider. Had that been connected directly, the electrolysis would have worked much better. It's also worth noting that the gas given off at the anode is oxygen ... that's why it rusts. The gas given off at the cathode is hydrogen which reduces the iron II III oxide (rust) to black iron II oxide. That's how the electrochemistry works. Interesting video.

i am pretty knowledgeable on the physics of the electrolysis, so i have some insights: rust is a poor electrical conductor (it is a poor thermal one as well, but that isn't important here), so scraping off a small section to get better contact with the electrode to the rusted thing you are using will help. the distance the oxygen molecules have to travel decreases the speed of the process, so moving the sacrificial anode closer will help speed things up. the better the conductivity of the fluid the faster the process works, so mixing in the carbonate was a good idea. as travel time is important facing the sides that you want the rust to be removed and where you want it deposited (sacrificial anode) will help speed things along. try to get all pieces of an object connected to the electrode, other wise the electricity has to travel through the electrolyte solution to the piece to energize the pieces not connected, which slows the process down for those parts. cleaning the sacrificial anode will help keep the process from slowing down as the anode rusts and inhibits electrical flow. a steady amount of ionization keeps things flowing, as the voltage drops the ionization will shift, possibly adding rust to the thing you want rust removed from. overall the rust will be removed, but this slows the process greatly and may slightly alter the shape of the object being cleaned. more voltage isn't always better, the process on the rusted object and anode works at a given amount of voltage. the extra voltage that may help is based on ionizing the fluid, at a certain point the voltage will separate the water (even microscopically), increasing resistance and eating up more amperage while inhibiting oxygen flow slowing the process. so to speed thing up go ahead and increase voltage until you see a decrease or a slowing of the rate of bubbling per volt increase, then back it off to the 'good range' and keep in mind any sort of change (even taking the stuff out to weight it then putting it back) might change that range slightly. the process works based on flow, so it works best on the surface with lots of fluid around it, so it will work slower in nooks and crannies. stuff in water likes to separate out, agitating the water every so often can help, though keep in mind the water needs to be ionized to work, and agitation can disrupt localized ionization. so try no to agitate the water between the anode (sacrificial metal) and cathode (thing being cleaned).

It looks like the sliding jaw of your wrench was not making electrical contact ?

Thanks for the comparison!

4:58 the state of your copper brush! 😂 Great video, as always...

Protecting the metal after the rust removal process is the most important part

Two in one. Electrolysis in a container filled with Evapo-rust.

Both are excellent from want I’ve seen here and in other videos, my go to rust remover has been old fashion vinegar. Super cheap, I’ve used it on cast iron skillets and vintage hand tools. Still a wire brush will be needed, sometimes you just have to get physical. As always Todd does a excellent job, thorough yet concise. Todd your effort to inform and educate is much appreciated.

@Project farm : Your videos are awesome 👏🏻 One suggestion (and I know this video is old) : I use evaporust quite a lot in my ultrasonic cleaner (medical grade one), about 1/2 quart for 5 gallons of water heated at 50C, it is way more effective when the temp is higher so you can play with level of dissolution 👍🏻

It Really shows by looking through these comment sections that you truly care about your audience and does what not many creators do, you stay connected to your viewers even nearly 2 years on. Your Amazing

Dang, you have a very positive fan base.👍🏻

Very interesting comparison - Thanks! I've also had good luck with Evaporust, (been very good on small old car parts) but now know what I will do with that old fish tank no one has used since my kids grew up and my old, OLD battery charger. Would love to see a comparison of small "Dremel style" grinders, corded and battery. Thank you for caring.

Very good comparison and thanks for this video!

Looked like part of the wrench was not in good contact with the electric feed. Should have relocated the wires.

How about electrolysis in evapo-rust?

I love watching the videos , they’re very thorough, genuine and informative. Was wondering at some point if you could do an experiment on vehicle headlight bulbs? Which brand can you truly see farther with off the shelf incandescent and another possibly as LED. Thanks for your help with testing .

Thanks man! Excellent video! I started collecting olde tyme straight razors and they are rusty! Going to use the electrolysis method. MANY THANKS for the time and effort you put in to this for us. Chris

Electrolysis works. The drawbacks are that it’s very time consuming, creates flammable hydrogen gas, and laborious to set up. However there are no toxic chemicals involved.

I’ve used the electrolysis method before with several sacrificial pieces in the same tank and it worked great after only 24 hours, even on small parts in a small container. Never used Evaporust however it seems to do well but too much time and cost!

When evapo rust darkens, it’s pretty much dead. When I remove my part from the evapo rust I spray it with baking soda mixed water. You’ll be surprised how much it helps. In general, if you can’t see the item in the evapo rust, change the fluid

Thanks for another very clear and concise video! Please keep it up!

I've seen a video where a guy used a block of carbon (graphite) as the sacrificial electrode. It doesn't decompose like the steel, and keeps the solution cleaner. Trouble is, such carbon rods (as for electrical discharge machining) are costly. Perhaps a budget trip to Chernobyl might yield a suitable block of graphite? Just kidding! Happy new year, esp. to that long-suffering Toro!

Feeling sad for the metal that was sacrificed.

You have done it again! Good job as always! Thank you!!

Great video! Love your content!

I use copper wire in the electrolysis tank and it seems to work really well. Maybe try steel vs aluminum vs copper and see which has a better result

Use a bigger sacrificial piece of steel I take screen or chicken wire fold it a couple times and line the whole tub then take a wooden stick and hang part in the middle with wire use a 15 to 20 amp charger has to be transformer type charger. It would only take 24 hours and all rust would be gone. Works on chromed parts as well removes rust without scratching. Clean screen as bubbles slow to inprove speed. Be careful tho make sure to turn off charger before connecting or disconnecting cause the hydrogen and oxygen gas it creates is highly flamable/explosive !!!

I also had a rusted adjustable spanner . Only difference being I used fresh white vinegar and submerged it right to the top . It ended up taking 6 days of total submerging to clean off the rust . As you spoke of in the video there are also some other products available . Many months after I did this vinegar de-rusting , a radiator shop man spoke of a product used in automotive cooling system/radiator cleaning that also may be a help for de-rusting tools . This product came in a powder form and needed to be mixed with water and was called "Oxalic Acid" . You may have already herd of it . I've always liked your videos , yours are so good . bye for now .

Absolutely love you videos. FYI, the slider lagged behind the wrench handle because it was relatively electrically isolated from the current since there was no direct electrical connection to that part an rust is a very poor conductor. Keep up your great testing👍👍

From my own experience I have found cleaning grade vinegar to be an excellent rust remover. I emphasize "cleaning" grade which is much stronger than food grade. It's a heck of a lot cheaper than Evapo-rust also.

Well done! A++

I did a whole engine block from a hurricane Katrina Miata. I used detergent and ph-up (from the pool supply store). One of those yard signs with holes was used as a separator and an old disc rotor was the anode. The ph-up helps degrease and remove old paint. The block came out perfectly clean after power washing it. You don't need a gigantic tank. I did this in one of those cheap Sterilite storage totes which is why I needed the separator to make sure the block didn't short out to the rotor. As others have said, I brushed the rust away from the rotor periodically.

Electrolysis works best when the (positive) sacrificial steel is in closer proximity to the rusty object - even better if it can surround the object. A piece of rebar bent into a loop makes an excellent/efficient sacrificial steel.

Put the wrench back in with a wire attached to the gear block as well. Leave it in till all rust is gone. Then do a real good paint on it. Would make a good trophy. Put along side of picture of it all rusty. 😊

Good reasoning for choices.

Thanks for sharing ! Sweet ! Great work on both.

You have some serious forearm gainz my man! Thank you for posting this video, very interesting(:

Your wire around the wrench is causing a dead spot in between the wraps hurting the electrolysis process, notice the electrolysis pattern coming off the wrench when it's in the tank, you can see the deadspo where no bubbles are coming off it. WOuld be cool to weigh the sacrificial steel and see if the weight removed from the pieces equals the weight added to the sacrificial piece.

woooooo!!!! a video from Project Farm right before the end of the year :) happy place happy place.

I absolutely love this guy. No long ass intro, gets to the point, no bullshit

Thank you again for your experimental comparison videos. As electrical engineer i would say electrolysis is the most superb rust method. The main reason is in electrolysis you lose almost no material from main part. basically it turns the red rust on the piece into black rust which is like a dustlayer and easily falls of with simple scrubbing. Other methods such as acidic baths react with iron compounds (including rust which is iron oxides )and turn it into other compounds. As result they react with rust and main part and reduce material. when you weight end products you will see (including electrolysis) reduction in weight. This occur in electrolysis due to removal of rust . in acidic compounds it will be both rust and main part. If you make an experiment for a month putting two pieces one in electrolysis and one in acidic solution (refreshed acidic solution so acid will keep working on as electrolysis does) you will see that in acidic solution will melt your main part away but electrolysis just cleans. Acidic solutions and electrolysis has both advantages and disadvantages. Electrolysis has superb advantage of being cheap (you can make one with daily materials) however its labor intensive. It requires setup knowledge and if you want to rust remove 1000 bolts then you need to individually hang the bolts in solution which makes the process inconvenient. Acidic solutions has superb advantage of ease of use . Produce a bath pour the solution in, dump the 1000 bolts inside and wait certain amount of time and drain it and clean . However it is expensive and since you produce a lot of chemical side compounds due to acidic solution and you have to dispose the acidic solution in proper way. ( electrolysis just has salty and rusty water solution) Therefore i say electrolysis is superb on majority of applications.

I wonder how many times he's going to be told to put an extra wire on the wrench. Read, people. Read 🤦‍♂️

So for rust removal if you have a delicate part that needs to be saved you can use molasses and water. Ratios from 4:1 to 10:1 water to molasses work, its slow and it stinks high heaven but if you have large delicate parts that need to be saved I have not found a better cheaper method. Evaporust is faster but costs more. The one thing I noticed, when I put some brake shields in and left them for two weeks, was after I pulled them out there was a layer of black iron oxide Fe3O4 was able to be washed off and the metal was bright and shiny then as the water dried off I could literally see the rust forming in the water spots. So when I did the next round of parts when I pulled them out I washed them in some kerosine to protect them from air and water.

Another nice vid. I've done a lot of both on metal objects I've found metal detecting. The electrolysis is line of sight only and the Evapo-Rust will get inside of parts better. So, turn the object every couple of hours while doing electrolysis. Also a couple of drops of swimming pool defoamer will keep the water from foaming and clearer while doing electrolysis. A half a cup of baking soda is good, unless the tank is really large.

I bought the 5 gallon bucket of Evaporust to remove 100 years of surface corrosion from my grandfathers toolbox. The big bucket was of sufficient size to fully immerse 1/2 the toolbox per 24 hours. Worked spectacularly.

This video combines my two fields of expertise (chemistry and occupational health and safety) perfectly, but I'll try to keep it short due to the importance. Both processes do practically the same, they remove iron from the chemical compound "rust", or iron oxide-hydrate. While the electro-chemical way uses electric current, the evapo rust uses some kind of chelating agent to overcome the bond energy of the rust. The brown stuff forming on the sacrifice metal is forming due to the alkaline solution (soda). The freed iron ions react directly with the basic compound to form basic iron hydroxide, similar to rust in appearance and composition. The ohas-specialist in me hopes desperately you took the proper precautions to prevent an explosion due to the forming mixture of hydrogen and oxygen. Your eight grams of iron set free about three liters of hydrogen, resulting in an explosive mixture of around 50 Liters (lower explosive level of 4 %) which is highly dangerous. And this does not account for any hydrogen forming without any iron involved due to overpotential (the battery charger delivers a far higher voltage than needed). If anyone attempts to repeat the experiment, please make sure you ventilate the area extremely well and keep any sources of ignition out of the direct vicinity of the basin. Or use the non-explosive evapo rust. It may be more expensive, but losing the hearing ability, a limb or even your life is far worse! I would highly appreciate, if you added this information to the video.

this is great,...i think you would have gained movement on the wrench much quicker if the wire was on the moving section. you could see that the handle section was getting much cleaner than the travel section, the current travel had to pass through the handle section to get to the travel section. I believe this would have made a significant difference in the time it took to clean it up. very good videos and very informative. this will be beneficial to anyone on the outside looking in to using electrolysis when cleaning metal.

Thank you for reminding me i need to use electrolysis.. Using a battery charger? Makes perfect sense! You just made it easy for me. Thank you!! 👍

as always a great comparison, thanks!!

Electrolysis will actually do a reduction reaction with the rust converting it back to un rusted metal chemically making it the choice for antique tool restoration. The wrench needed a good electrical connection to the adjustable part of the wrench. Your wire was only on the main part of the wrench. BTW I love your tests keep them coming!

This guy is terrific!!! It's great how informative he is! Well done.....

Very cool project, great video. Thanks!