SEMI-OT - RUSTY TOOL, AND WHITE VINGAR

[Jack-of-all-trades - JOAT]

A couple of weeks ago I finally found a crescent wrench I had been missing. I normally keep it hanging in my shop, so there's the wood connection for the too tight people. Apparently the kid had took it, used it, gotten it wet, left it in the rain, or something, because it was rusted. The jaw wouldn't move at all, and one side wasn't exactly what I'd call rusted, but looked more like something had grown on it.

I keep a jug of white vinegar in the shop, so poured some in a small cup, and set the wrench in it. I've read and heard about how great the white vinegar is for rust, and from those accounts, figured two days would have it in top shape again. Forget it. After 2 days, the vinegar was brown, and the wrench was as solid as ever. However, after a week, I was able to get the jaw loose, after I tapped it with a hammer and pried on it, and the little screw thing was able to move, altho not great. Fresh vinegar, and stuck it back in. So, now after two weeks, it is working quite well, the vinegar is all brown again, and most of the tarnish or whatever is gone. I'm going to leave it in there another week, to see if it will clean more of the tarnish or whatever off. Then I'll rinse it off, and oil it up. Then maybe paint the damn thing yellow, so the kid doesn't take it again. You think that's a joke? I have a set of ratches wrenches hanging near where the crescent wrench used to hang. They are all painted yellow, and the kid hasn't touched a one of them. Laugh about that.

I didn't need the wrench right away, so instead of popping for a new one, I decided to give the vinegar a shot. Not near as quick as I'd been lead to believe, but definitely works, and non-toxic to boot, so you don't need to worry about it eating your skin if you slop some.

Now I need to get some shellac, and then some EverClear, to thin it with. That way, if I accidently swallow some, it won't make me sick, or kill me.

JOAT No sense in being pessimistic - it wouldn't work anyway.

Life just ain't life without good music. - JOAT Web Page Update 30 Aug 2003. Some tunes I like.

[skeezics]

skeez

[Mortimer Schnerd, RN]

Back in the days when I ran a scuba shop, I used white vinegar to clean corrosion off regulator and valve parts. To speed things along, I kept the vinegar in an ultrasonic cleaner. It would only take a minute or two to get really nasty parts clean again. After about 9 years, the vinegar ultimately ate its way through the ultrasonic cleaner's reservoir.

Anyway, the ultrasonic cleaning made all the difference in time.

[Bruce C.]

You can speed up the process by adding regular salt rock to make a saturated solution. Rinse it twice as well as you think you should and use a good water displacer to prevent new rust. Don't worry about the salty vinegar getting brown and funky looking, it will keep on working long after it looks so bad that you wouldn't want to put your hands in there. Keep it in a tightly closed container (I use a 5 gal pickle bucket). The fumes will cause rust on nearby unprotected steel. Also, make sure that the part to be cleaned is completely submerged in the solution - it will quickly etch at the vinegar/ air/ steel interface.

Bruce

[Sam Hopkins]

This happens because vinegar is acidic. I think a PH of 5. It dissolves the rust. As another poster mentioned coke does the same thing. Coke contains phospuric (sp?) acid.