Introduction: Electrolysis Rust Removal - DIY Tutorial
Hi!
To preform a electrolytic treatment of your old/new rust tools or other metal objects you will need some basic objects that most people have laying around at home.
- 1 non-conductive container (I used a glass jar)
- 12v power supply (car charger, or for smaller project a regular power supply for home electronics which you cut of the plug so you can use the two wires)
- Salt (regular table salt works great!)
- Metal piece (witch have a larger aria then the object that we want to clean)
- (Metal Object to clean from rust...)
- Wires (to wire it all together, two wires with alligator clips is enough).
- Water
- Sponge (to clean of the remains)
Do this in a well ventilated aria!
Step 1: Watch This Video!
This is a instruction video I made for this project. All steps are shown together with how the "reaction" should look like, which is hard to show with photos.. :)
Step 2: Setup... Go!
Start of by filling your non-conductive container (glass jar) with hot tap water. Leave a few cm from the top, it will bubble! Then try to dissolve as much salt as possible into the water. Stop when the salt stops from dissolving.
Place both your metal piece which you will "sacrifice" (you can reuse it for similar experiments later on) and the object that you want to remove the rust from. Use a larger piece of metal as "sacrifice" then the object you want to clean.
Wire it up by placing the negative wire to the object you want to remove the rust from, and the positive to the other. Make sure that the peaces do not touch each other. Also check so the wires used do not touch the salt water!
If you use a power supply for indoor 12v electronics it can some time be hard to know which wire is negative/positive. Simply plug the power supply into the wall after all is connected as you think is right. If the piece that you want to clean is not "bubbling" most of the two pieces, you have connected it wrong. Simply change the polarity and your good to go!
Step 3: Clean!
You can check your process now end then. I used a interval of 30 min - 1h between my checkups. After roughly two hours my tool where clean enough. I used a sponge and clean water to clean of the remains on the tool. If you not happy with the result simply place it back in and let the process continue.
Thanks for reading! And have fun experimenting/repairing your rusty things! :)
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