Electrolysis Help Please

Hi All-

I just set up my first electrolysis tank. It consists of a 55 gallon drum with the lid cut off. There are 4 holes drilled around the sides for the re rod that i use as electrodes to slide down through. I have used housing wire and clamps to wire the electrodes together. I have an oak plank with a hook in the middle of it, from this i hang a chain with the parts I want to clean. For power I am using a craftsman 12 V 10 Amp manual battery charger. Right now I am trying to clean 2 maytag cylinders. I have them wired together and the chain is also bolted to both of them. I have about 20 gallons of water in the barrel, as well as about a box and a quarter of washing soda. My questions are as follows: When I first started the process it bubbled some, then a few hours later it was bubbling more vigorusly, then the second day I noticed it was not bubbling as much, so today I cleanded the electrodes and started it again but it dosen't seem to be bubbling as much, in fact hardly at all. There was a lot of grease and oil on these parts and I had PB blaster in the cylinders too. Is it possible that the grease is killing my solution? I think my main problem is lack of current. I am working on changing that. Does anyone have any suggestions for me??

Thanks,

Joe

I doubt that the grease is killing your solution. I've de-rusted a number of items that were very greasy. It hasn't affected my operation one bit.

You said you had suspended your parts on a chain. If you are connecting your charger to the chain, that may be a part of your problem. Every link in your chain represents another connection.

I use an alligator clip and a scrap of copper wired to connect directly to the part being cleaned. I connect the charger's alligator clip to the wire. However, it wouldn't hurt your charger's clip if you connected it directly to the part being cleaned. It will get wet, is all.

One thing that I have to watch in my setup is the connection to the "waste" electrode. Likely as not, it is making a poor connection. You also have to keep this connection out of the electrolyte.

Definitely a connection problem, as well as insufficient surface area on the sacrificial anodes. Anode area has to be equal to or greater than total surface area being cleaned for best efficiency. When doing multiple parts, you should run individual wires to each part for best results. You may need to clean the area of connection to the part as the process goes on. Your solution is also unnecessarily rich, 1 heaping Tablespoon per gallon of water is sufficient.

In my limited experence I found that grease and oil did slow the process down. If I mearly scraped off what grease I could and wipped off any oil, the whole process seemed to speed up a lot. I too tried the rebar at first and then went to large tin cans opened up and wired together as they had a much larger surface area. They require more frequent cleaning and they go away in only a day or two but sometimes only hours were necessary instead of days. Howard

One advantage of a very strong solution of washing soda is that it doesn't require a very large waste electrode. I've never used a re-bar because of its small surface area; but, for a recent demonstration I gave, I dissolved a three pound box of Arm and Hammer "FabriCare" (couldn't find any washing soda) in five gallons of water. (I was trying to follow a recipe that I got off the Net.) My part to be de-rusted probably didn't amount to ten square inches; but, it pulled so much current I could pull six amperes when the waste electrode barely touched the solution.

My first waste electrodes were coffee cans. They were converted to rust so quickly that I gave up on them. I've found that graphite works much better. It doesn't deteriorate and make the solution a rusty mess. The solution stays clear when using graphite.

Although I've used stainless steel waste electrodes, I don't recommend them. They will deteriorate and create a solution that contains chromates. Chromates are toxic and present waste disposal problems that outweigh the benefits of using S/S.

Orrin, Where do you get the graphite electrodes?

Doug --

I apologize for not responding to your post. For some reason or another it didn't come in on my e-mail like it usually does.

I have gotten graphite on eBay and found quite a large cache of it at a salvage yard. I have some that I can spare. The cost is $5.00 per electrode, plus shipping, as long as the supply lasts. The electrode is about 3.5-inches wide by 1/2-inch thick and as long as my irregularly shaped scraps. Usually, they'll be 8-inches long, give or take. It provides enough surface area to get the job done without overloading the battery charger.