At the risk of sounding a bit narcissistic I would say my inspiration comes from you guys leaving positive comments on my thread. After reading several build threads and member profiles I realized I might have a few ideas or areas of expertise to put out there for the benefit of others in the same way I have benefited from them.
The fact that I’m an aircraft mechanic by profession makes it impossible for me to accept “good enough” and my SOP is to go through every car I buy and rebuild the suspension/brakes at a minimum. My long term plans are to have a solid, leak-free vehicle reliable enough to toss the keys to any member of my family and not have to issue any eccentric instructions for its operation.
How much more do I have to do to the car? Let me put it like this…my Pelican Parts Project List is 11 pages long! :eek: The suspension is finished and the brakes are almost done. I have one more floorboard spot to repair before I can reinstall the driveshaft and then I can go on into the engine compartment and replace all the drivetrain gaskets and seals. I’m finishing up with the rest of the rust repair and maybe top it off with a paint job, but that will most likely be next year.
And all the while I’m also dismantling an ’89 325 and putting the suspension, brakes and M50/ZF drivetrain into the 318is shell that’s left of the parts car I bought for the suspension and brakes for this car.
And along the way for some reason I started picking up S50 engine components for a car I don’t even own yet! :p
But I digress…
There are three websites I used to put together my electrolysis bath and it is quite easy to get overly involved in different aspects of the procedure and process. I gleaned over what I considered the most useful information foremost being
SAFETY, secondly efficiency and lastly economy.
The usual disclaimer is that I don't accept any responsibility for how you use this information. It's not rocket science, but there are precautions you need to follow in order to preserve your health, life and property.http://www.rowand.net/Shop/Tools/Electrolysis.htmhttp://antique-engines.com/electrol.asphttp://www.stovebolt.com/techtips/rust/electrolytic_derusting.htmDave you are correct; this process is only for ferrous metals such as steel or iron. No chrome plating, zinc, copper, aluminum, etc.
Very simply, I use a five (or maybe six) gallon bucket and four pieces of rebar approximately 12 inches long and wired in series with 10 gauge copper wire around the lip of the bucket. Attached in the center of the copper wire is the positive lead from the battery charger and the negative lead is attached to wire or chain that is used to suspend parts from a piece of non-conductive material.
My power source is a ten amp "dumb" battery charger. On a smaller scale my very first experiment used a 1.5 amp wall charger with alligator clips and a plastic Glad storage container.
I tried using Arm and Hammer wash soda and wasn’t happy with the results, but that may have due to dirty anodes. I have no idea what the exact ratio I now have, but I used about 1/2 to 3/4 cup of sodium carbonate to six gallons.
The rebar works well enough for my needs, but for efficiency sake the cleaner you keep it the better it works. I intend to source some graphite bars later on to eliminate using rebar.
