Thanks for another great video ! An old guy once told me he used WHEY to loosen rusted manifold bolts on a marine engine. He said you could then turn the bolts out with your fingers. He chose to use whey because they used to feed their pigs on whey from the local cheese factory, and the iron feeding pots never got rusty. I've had good results using whey on rusty tools, bolts steel wire and chain. Sometimes I left the rusty item immersed for a week or more. Can be a bit stinky in the hot sun, but put a lid on the plastic pail. When done, wash the item off with soapy water, dry it, then apply a coating to prevent rusting again. As a quick fix, I threw several lengths of chain in pails of used engine oil over the winter. I may wipe off most oil, leaving enough so I can store chain in damp conditions. Or I may clean up and spray cold galvanize or some other pail coating. Whey is cost effective for big jobs if, as I did, you get pails of whey for free from a cheese factory. [ RIP Uncle Billy ]
More current is not better. The aim is to chemically convert the ferric oxide Fe2O3 (rust) into magnetite Fe2O4 by adding an oxygen molecule. This oxygen molecule comes from the water which is why the anode gives off hydrogen. Low current over longer time will convert more rust without pitting because the more violent reaction simply dislodges the rust in the pits. Even a 12v battery charger gives off too much current so either use a resistor to step it down to 1 Amp or use a 6v battery charger. Less is more. Great video and great channel by the way.
Hey Post Apocalyptic! Do you wish to help to promote awareness for this recyclable lithium box? ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-g4Aw9zxtOv4.html it will be an open source project, I designed it to help the planet.
Great Video, very instructive, lets have more German technical videos, with their no thrills and no nonsense commentaries. Just great to listen to and my days at technical school were no wasted, I understood the jargon. Great Video, en venlig hilsen fra manden who lives north of the border from you. Yes a welding transformer, why not, plenty of current. Just great man !!
I knew you were going to be a wild man when it came to electrolytic rust removal. You did not disappoint either. You were cooking the goods! Be aware that the process causes hydrogen embrittlement of the pieces you clean. You can relieve that by putting them in an oven for a while, or it just dissipates over time. Also the cleaning action is mostly line of sight. So with your one anode setup you should rotate your work piece for maximum effect.
+Paul Frederick For those interested, I think for most part, any metal, the oven temp would be 150c (300f) for 30 minutes, (15mm thickness) , 1 hour (25mm thickness) etc.
+BiddieTube But if the metal was tempered below 150c as a lot of blade steels are, you are further tempering and softening it. Of course...if it's a blade, it shouldn't be allowed to get rusty in the first place, but I'm sure other things are tempered below 150
+Paul Frederick I was thinking the same about H-Embritllement! With 8 hours of that treatment it's surely happened :) An interesting experiment would be to hang some weights to the treated parts: they should break after some time from the application of the load, while resisting to the load at the beginning. Brittle fracture that is
BritzzONE yes I do not know how much of a factor it is practically, but at least in theory the electrolytic process causes hydrogen embrittlement in work. I know I would not stress something right away after the process. Good as new! Snap.
Thank you so much for the super valuable math and thanks for repeating the formulas. Once i hear it I'm alerted, the next time or time after it sinks in. A1!
You always produce such great and high quality videos with very clear explanations. Plus, for someone whose first language is not English your English is impeccable.
If you are rushing the part it's ok, but too much current isn't always better. To much current can crate pits on the surface of the material. Bubbles are not conductive and more of them are there the less surface is in contact with electrolyte, and only that surface is getting etched.
It's good to have high flow pumps to filter and manage the ratios of chemicals and ions moving effectively to displace the iron oxide. All this has been well researched. Using established standards through any standards origination. Have immense resources with detailed process and controls to maximize your capitalization. They always have experts to contact and books or guides with excellent detail technical specification to help in any operation from small to global.
You can use graphite anodes just fine -- they're more inert (and thus more reusable) and no "hexavalent chromium". Electrolysis just removes rust simply by generating lots and lots hydrogen gas for use as a quick debriding agent (to mechanically dislodge the rust away). So, you'll want to run this at high currents and likewise keep the anodes very close to the cathode to maximize energy-efficiency (waste less energy just on running current through the solution!).
Some additional remarks: 1.) You can work with much lower currents, but that has been done in many other videos before (check video description) 2.) You CAN use baking soda, but washing soda works better. 3.) But please don't use Sodium Chloride ("Salt") UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES! You will produce "Chlorine Gas", a chemical, that was used as a chemical warfare agent in WWI by the German armed forces. You don't want that in your workshop!
easy, dont use a fan and never do such things indoors anyways. Do stuff like this ALWAYS! outside because: Best Ventilation, you can get a much larger distance from the object if something fails, do it on Tiles and (maybe even) sand and nothing can catch fire, the gases that are produced can get away much easier thus theres no danger in your breathing in those fumes, and again, if something fails and its to dangerous to go near it, you can stop it from a larger distance thus possibly preventing disasters from happening.
If you heat up the baking soda, even in solution, C02 will bubble off and you will be left with the washing soda that you recommend. Might be useful as baking soda is more readily available than sodium carbonate/washing soda, at least here in the US. Also, the absolute amperage matters less than the current *density* (amperes per surface area)- professional electroplaters always refer to current density. You need to know the area of your workpiece for the current to mean much.
I've just got to comment on the above. I've been electrolyzing dug iron and steel CW items and other items for many years. First, the comments on sodium chloride are laughable. Salt is excellent for this process, much better than soda. There's no danger from gas that I've ever seen.Two or three points of electrical content is best. If using a single point of contact, sometimes electrolysis occurs only there. Second, salt is good because when the electrolyte is fresh you can observe if electrolysis is occurring over the whole surface of the object. Next comical aspect shown is the large, double anodes. That's overkill. Not necessary. Use a strip of steel maybe 6 inches long, stainless if available. You can also try a carbon rod, even a ferrite antenna from an old radio. Use a battery trickle charger. 3 amps is best all-around. You can decrease the amperage reaching the object by withdrawing the anode a little, increase by the reverse. Electrolysis is NOT line of sight, as I've seen on some videos. Be slow and careful if you're doing old cast iron, this process will soften the object if overdone. If the object has intrinsic or just personal value, drill a couple holes in unobtrusive areas and press-fit a couple old drill bits for your contact points. Remove after you're finished. Don't let anybody tell you salt will cause the object to rust. It absolutely won't. I have done lock plates and other parts of CW muskets, rinsed them off, and NO rust occurred EVER, without oil, even after 20-plus years. Remember, you're REMOVING the surface material, not DEPOSITING it. Of course, use a non-conducting vessel. After 2-3 days the electrolyte will be absolutely gross-looking. If you can stand it, keep on. That's when the electrolyte is most effective. Some spouses/partners will MAKE you change it out. This process is easy, cheap, and effective. No danger whatever, unless you cross the wires out of the electrode, and even then the charger should cut off the power. Have fun.
If you wanted PAI you could measure the current with the V drop over the a segment of thick wire or even one of the welder cables, and tune it with the power resister used at the lower currents. Might not be the most accurate but should give you a good ballpark at the higher currents. Love your videos, keep them coming.
You're very brave to work so close to your overall with that wire brush. A man was seriously seriously injured when the brush just touched his coverall and pulled the machine in and he lost control. The grinder caused major damage almost beating him to death. All it takes is just a touch to your clothes. Be careful. Thanks for a great video.
I believe the pitting in the axe head resulted from the high amperage used during electrolysis. Its preferred slower lower amperage to have a more uniform rust removal. Been a while since I checked these things but proved correct when I did it.
Can we look at Chrome Plating and the precautions we need to take, a relative was a Crome Plater and died from stomach cancer years ago probably before we knew Chrome was highly carcinogenic. Or is Nickel a better result/finish? Excellent video, very instructive, thanks so much.🙂
I have seen many videos about removing rust in this way. I must say that I believe your video here is the best one I've seen so far. Great job on the video and thanks for posting it.
Thanks for update. I have acquired an old post drill press, Buffalo 66 model (hand powered) and it is cast iron and in some places deeply rusted. I plan to completely restore it to better than new condition (will bush the spindle) so I can use it if needed in event of long time loss of electrical grid power. I am not sure what rust removal method I will use, but will be chosen based on your videos on the matter.
I was just about to try some electrolysis experiments to remove an aluminium seatpost from a steel bicycle frame, then this video popped up on my feed, so I'm going to watch your vid first, great timing!!
was hoping to eat just the rust using phosphoric acid and to prevent the galvanic corrosion between alu and steel, connect a voltage source across the frame and seatpost to counter the voltage generated by the 'cell'. If its not out by tomorro i'll surely be using caustic.
Hi TPAI, As a subscriber I'd like to say you have a cool channel. Great explanations and visuals, demonstrations. The Lathe restoration is going good, as a Machinist, it is my favorite machine tool, I think your going to like having one. Take care, C.
So I am a physicist and do research in electrochemistry. I would also have to do some reading on the matter but as far as I know further increase in voltage will simply decrease the fraction of the reaction going towards hydrogen evolution, thus from an energy standpoint it should be better to use a smaller voltage longer.
Thanks very much for the video. I've just checked out several other videos and was wondering about lots more amps and a stronger solution. You've answered all my questions, great stuff.
I like watching Mathologer, The Oftler, and the guy who makes those repeating "Legolas" bows. It dawned on me that OF COURSE Germany would have a variety of regional accents just like America does, because you all have very different accents from one another while at the same time sounding distinctly German. I love linguistics. :-)
Impressive ! I knew when the 00 cables came out sparks were going to fly. COoL to see what HI-POWER does to the process. Few years late.... but THANK YOU
There is a technique used by gun smiths used to turn red iron oxide into black oxide by boiling the rusty metal in water. It converts the rust and it can be "carded" using a soft abrasive to remove the dead oxide leaving a protective layer of black oxide. The black oxide becomes a form of bluing for the metal and prevents future rust. This process is usually repeated several times. And each boiling session should be about 40 to 60 minutes each at the highest temperature possible.
Did you do them at the same time or separately? I have a similar job to do and was wondering if I could just switch the polarities at regular intervals between the two pieces.
don't use sodium chloride to increase the conductivity of the water coz you will not only produce hydrogen gas, you'll also produce toxic chlorine gas as well!!!
Actually destructive is not a better word in the context of abrasive methods as you say. Oftentimes a certain form of surface preparation can create a more uniform surface which may enable more consistent yield or fracture points. Abrasive methods also are frequently used to create a surface for proper adhesion of a coating. Abrasives can and are also used to level surfaces for tighter mating and precision. Possibly this was a comment made to sound like the smart guy in the room?
@@mattmoilanen3813 Does it enter the thing being worked on? No, it doesn't enter. So it doesn't invade. So to use the word invasive is a bit wrong. Invasive is often used in a medical context - invasive versus non-invasive treatments. Here it is a case of a destructive versus a non-destructive process. If a process causes loss of material, it's destructive. If it doesn't cause loss of material, it's non-destructive. As for your "smart guy in the room" comment. Jeez, I gave an English usage tip, and you jump on it as being something indicative of a personality disorder in operation. Seems it's you with the issues .
@@mattmoilanen3813 Rocket Science was right: destructive is a more appropriate word in the context. Although The Post Apocalyptic Inventor speaks very good English, I'm sure he would welcome correction on a technical term where his choice of the English word for what he was describing was not quite right. I'm sure if he had stopped a moment to think about it, he would have rejected the word invasive, as abrasive methods do not enter (invade) the material, although they do ablate surface material, leading to loss of both the rust and some of the underlying metal (depending on how aggressive the abrasion). Hence abrasive methods are surface destructive. I've no idea why you wrote what you did. It is not relevant to what The Post Apocalyptic Inventor was doing. Maybe you were the one trying to be "the smartest guy in the room"?
Not sure why you wouldn't use a sanding disc chucked in a drill to take off the rust, smooth the axe head - reducing the surface area to diminish future rusting, then a quick dip in Muriatic acid, rinse, dip in phosphating agent, and spritz with oil - smooth, rustless, and quick. On another note: bubbles forming at the surface should dramatically reduce current flow. Did you find an amperage drop as the bubbling proceeded? A paint stirrer (propeller-type) linked to a small motor moving the tank solution across the surface would help that. Just a thought.
Electrolysis as a de-rusting method seems to do the least damage to the original item though I am still unsure whether the amperage may affect this. Given the amount of gassing involved there would be little requirement for auxiliary mixing. As sodium carbonate is cheap and readily available I would prefer to use it rather than a dangerous acid that would require neutralisation before disposal. After cleanup allow a little flash rusting for some phosphoric metal prep to work on and its ready for oiling or enamel.
You say we should not use sodium bicarbonate but do not explain why not. Similar for the copper wire. Well I tried it with Sodium bicarbonate and current did flow so it must be working as an electrolyte BUT bubbles were coming off my copper wire where it connected to the axe head. Unfortunately my battery charger kept cutting out so I had to call the experiment off.
If you have engine block and the cylinders are Rusty and can't get forged aluminum pistons out will this process hurt the pistons or will they cause different chemical reaction because they are aluminum
When trying this, remember one important thing: If you send a lot of current through the bath, it will heat up the water. More heat means: stronger chemical reaction. This means: more and more current. So even more heat will be produced. Do not let this reaction run unsupervised! If your power source is too weak to make progress in de-rusting: try heating the bath or start with hot water. Temperature makes a huge difference!
Idk how this would be for safety but you could draw much more current by using and electrolyte such as sodium or even potassium hydroxide, they are caustic so of course you must be mindful of that but they are much better electrolytes
Im haunted by the needle gun! Being retired Navy I have used the needle gun more than I would ever have liked to. That and the deck grinder. Haunted I tell ya! Haunted!
7 x 1mm2 stranded copper for domestic wiring is 100 mV per 100 Amperes per linear foot IIRC. Cut off a scrap a little bit longer, measure and mark off 305 mm, jam the probes through the insulation at the marks. Termination is left as an exercise for the experimenter.
+mrpete222 Hey nice to see you here! I watched some of your videos on the topic as well and I linked one of them in the video description, if I remember correctly :)
I used potassium chloride today since it's abundant and electricity flows through it quite well. I didn't make 10 lb. brine as I had intended but it still was high and did a good job.
Have you tried hydrochloric acid or even phosphoric acid? They both don't even have to be pure so it is much safer to deal with. I have bought a gallon of each at the hardware store for under $20 and it comes so diluted I can get it on my bare skin without any irritation maybe slight tingle. Yet both will remove all the heavy scale rust off buckets of hardware in less than 20 mins by just slightly sturing to agitate parts and solution. The phosphoric acid if left parts in even longer will produce a grayish color phosphate coating that no only inhibits rust from coming back as easily, but allows allows a top coat of paint or powder coat to bond even better.
Wow you do good work,. The salt would be ok too. Most people use salt. There is not enough chlorine in the salt NaCl to make the free chlorine gas. High voltage is not necessary either. Its the current, the amps. High amps is not a requirement. It works well a lower power over a little longer time.
I have used electrolysis for ten years, and found that there was a problem with the buildup of rust on the sacrificial anode. I had to periodically remove the buildup of rust (wire brush off the rust, every 24 hours) from about 50 pounds of 1018. I now use several pure carbon blocks (1x6x12") which do not require the rust removal. Seems to work, but less effective than a clean block of 1018.
My thoughts at first: "I bet you will use an ATX, or a variac and a rectifier, everyone does that" And then you go the madman way and connect a few hundred amp DC welder :D But in all seriousness, you can get inconsistent results with that, like flaking and bumpy surfaces, likely even a difference between the closer and the further side if you go too wild on it. Patience is a key for quality so many times. And as for chemical removal, In my opinion it's phosphoric acid all the way. Non-toxic, not a strong acid, passivates the iron surface, it's fast and it's cheap. Like when I say cheap, it's the 1$ for a one liter bottle of the 20% acid kind of cheap. I haven't found anything better.
I found a product that works really well. Instead of removing the rust. The chemical reaction uses the rust to create a dark black coating that is like plastic. I put some in the bed of my truck in the sun out of the sun under paint. I've put it on axe heads and hammers. After 10 years those spots and tools still do not have any rust. The more rust the better it works. I looks like blackish blue electrically applied paint. If you are going to sand and paint over it anyway it's a near perfect product. I painted all the problem areas of a 75 scout with it. It is still on the road rust free. I dipped bolts in it and submerged them in Coke and they just got wet. Trouble is I lost track of it and forgot what the stuff is called.
I found the temperature of the solution made a big difference to the reaction as well. Also, cathode placement can effect things too. When de-rusting a motorcycle petrol tank, I placed a cathode both inside (carefully!) and outside the tank. This gave me a much more even amount of rust removal. After about 8 hours my badly rusted tank was like new :)
@@LEO-xo9cz - why would you want to reverse the polarity? All that will do is remove the good steel material from your item, and deposit rust back on there instead. The WHOLE idea is to keep the polarity so that the process only removes the rust and deposits good ferrous material to the item. The electrolysis process literally destroys the Anode (positive connection) so that should never EVER be the part you want to keep.
Cast iron pieces, tempered steel axe heads, carbon steel knives, etc., can be warmed by the campfire or over the stove and rubbed with vegetable oil. Trappers boiled traps in hot wax to stop rust.
Here you have removed rust with household chemicals. Have you tried removing paint with a mixture of caustic soda and wallpaper paste? It works on wood furniture, but on metal?
White Vinegar is my weapon of choice. Dirt Cheap by the Gallons and works better then anything else I've tried. The White is much stronger then the cider type.
Nice video. I was aware of the car battery charger being used as a current source but had not seen a stick welder being used as a current source. Have you experimented with caustic soda/lye (Sodium hydroxide) as electrolyte? Also, the electrolysis method is mostly suitable for non-subtractive rust removal, i.e. when desiring to leave as much of the original material in its place I.e. recover as much of the original iron from the iron oxides as is possible. Have you tried doing this without scrubbing the rusty item before or after to see if the surface imperfections of the rusty item are somewhat improved? The reason I am asking this is that a lot of people report that when the current is increased, and thus the rate of the reaction is increased, the gas pressure generated at the cathode causes whole chunks of rust to separate from the corroded steel body thus losing a lot of the original material in the process. Have you, by any chance, experimented with very low currents that are applied for long intervals to see if that results in reversing the damage caused by deep corrosion? I'm not sure if I'm making it absolutely clear what I mean here.
Makes sense to me and is also a question I have asked myself. At higher voltages hydrogen is produced and will weaken the iron and might cause failures in tools.
@@AlJay0032 Since I posted the original comment I've been informed that what I mentioned in it about electrolysis not being a subtractive method but rather a method that restores the iron from the iron oxide is simply not true: iron oxide cannot be converted back to pure iron by this method. Since I've been informed of that, I have come across many videos on iron oxide batteries which, if I understood correctly, work by oxidising and reforming iron back and forth. I am not not sure about how the process works although I'm fairly sure that most of the original rusted iron is not recovered. I guess one could design an experiment to test this at all current and voltage levels desired and figure it out by practical means.
@@Stelios.Posantzis If rust is not converted back it would seem to me that it is more sensible to use acetic acid with or without salt or citric acid instead. I would probably take concentrated vinegar acid and assume that the iron acetate formed can be dissolved in water which allows the next layer to be attacked by the acid.
@@AlJay0032 I'd still prefer it for a couple of reasons, at least for heavily corroded items, but I'd like to research it some more. Some people use it as their default rust removal method. If anything, it is convenient as it saves buying, using and disposing all sorts of unknown chemicals. Of course the acetic and citric acids you mentioned are another way but I'm not sure how I would procure concentrated acetic acid. I have heard that oxalic acid works well and I have seen the results too. Of course when using the acid method one has to be quick to treat the exposed iron surface afterwards to prevent flash rust from forming. I just watched ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-Qi-tK1jwO-k.html (Rust Removal Methods Explained on Geoffrey Croker's channel) and it compares all the above plus provides a bit of the chemistry. There is still some hope of recovering part of the rusted iron based on this but it appears minimal. Based on the analysis given, I'd like to try the citric acid method followed by electrolysis although there's no guarantee that the citric acid method leaves the iron from the rust reduction on the iron part.
Hi, when you are removing the rust from the steel plate, what is the angle grinder that you are using? I use a small angle grinder but looks like you can remove rust a lot quicker as yours is larger.
I found that using trisodium phosphate (T.S.P.) and dishwashing soap is an excellent way to remove oil and grease from metal or any other surface. Brake cleaner can also be substituted. I think gasoline is a bad alternative.
A big problem with using electrolysis is the issue with hydrogen embrittlement in high strength steel that may develop a loss of fracture toughness. It is critical to baking at a specific heat treatment to eliminate the hydrogen from all parts after any type of electrolysis like this and plating or de_plating. Especially for safety in fasteners or any dynamic stressed parts, even static parts in high load and temperature change 0 to 50 C range or more. I would like to see that ax blade hit with a fracture test rig. To demonstrate several conditions and material before and after electrolysis and new and rusted non-electrolysis. Then baked and unbaked. The process can be found on ISO, DIN, IFI, ASTM, NAS, ASME, etc.
Thank you for preparing this video (which was very helpful). Just the editing must have required many hours of work -- and of course the work of removing the rust must have required many more hours. (By the way, I wish that I could speak German as well as you speak English.)
nice result, how much energy was used compared to mechanical means using power tools. and time and effort of the poor human, and material costs overall.
