Electrolysis -- Battery Charger

[Michael Faurot]

I've been reading the different posts here and on other web sites as it pertains to using electrolysis for performing rust removal on hand tools. Now, I'm interested in trying it out on some newly acquired rust. At an antique fair, I picked up a Stanley #5C and what looks to me to be a Sargent #3, both of which will need to be restored, before they will be usable.

So my question pertains to using a battery charger as the DC power source for doing electrolysis. I don't own a battery charger, so I'm looking to buy a new one. At this site (http://www.instructables.com/id/E9NK67LOH9EQ6T2A7U/), a comment was made that some new battery chargers have internal circuitry that prevent them from working until they detect some current (i.e., they're actually connected to a battery). I'd like to avoid getting one of these type chargers, as I don't want to have to mess with wiring a battery into the process to make things work. So can anyone recommend a specific make and model battery charger that can be purchased new, and will supply current without needing to see a battery connected to it? I'd like to buy a charger at a local big box store like Sears, Walmart, O'Reilly, Autozone, etc, as opposed to on-line.

Thanks.

[Brian Hale]

Mine is the Sears 28 71222 battery charger engine starter with 2 amp 10 amp and 50 amp settings.

Works well for me

Brian :)

[Jeff Hallam]

It doesn't take much. The first one I used was no bigger than an apple and it had no display of current draw or anything else. Just a power source with two alligator clips. You don't need a big amp source, it just takes a little time (overnight) for it to work.

[Michael Faurot]

Mine is the Sears 28 71222 battery charger engine starter with 2 amp 10 amp and 50 amp settings.


Thanks Brian. I'll make a run to Sears tomorrow and pick one of those chargers up.

[Jon Crowley]

I bought the cheapest one I could find - a one amp. It works, although I'm guessing higher powered ones would work more quickly? :confused:

Another tip - you can use oxy-clean instead of washing soda. It has the active ingredient you need, and the other "ingredients" don't interfere. A lot of people already have it around too.

[Wilbur Pan]

Get the cheapest battery that Sears has. Being so cheap, it won't have any of that fancy current overload circuitry in it. ;)

Seriously, that's exactly what I did.

[Tom Veatch]

Has anyone ever tried using a DC arc welder as a power source?

[Cliff Rohrabacher]

Get a cheap trickle charger. The optimum amount of power is less than most chargers produce.

Any charger will do but you really should use some device like a rheostat to attenuate the voltage to a nice slow bubble.

[M Toupin]

Get a cheap trickle charger. The optimum amount of power is less than most chargers produce.

Any charger will do but you really should use some device like a rheostat to attenuate the voltage to a nice slow bubble.

I've done a lot of electrolysis and read a good deal about various setups, but I don't ever recall ever seeing a "optimum" for either voltage or amperage. I'm sure there is, but I've never seen anything definitive.

Personally, I use a power supply that provides either 6v or 12v DC and 2/10/50 amps. I've tried various combinations of both amperage and voltage and I have found that 12v @50amps is much more effective than 6v @ 2amps. Nothing scientific here, just my personal observation and a guesstimate of the cleaning action and time it took to obtain the desired results.

I'd be interested in any quantitative information you might have on the "optimum amount of power" if it would improve the efficiency.

Mike

[James K Peterson]

I don't have any real testing data, but I can tell you that running the car charger on either 6v or 12v at the 50amp rate will nuke the charger in short order:(
I'm using another car charger now on the 12v setting at 2amp, the charger seems to maintain a fairly cool state and there is a good amount (no way to really measure) of bubble from the parts being cleaned. The parts are mostly clean within 2 hours (except for heavily rusted parts).

[Jeff Hallam]

Perhaps someone with a better memory of science class can help out here but I was under the impression that the amount of current (amps) that will flow in the circuit is dependant on the resistance. If you have a fixed voltage source (i.e. a 12V DC charger) then I=V/R. It seems to me that even if your charger is capable of 20 or 50 amps, that doesn't mean thats how much current will be flowing. I put my multimeter inline several times when using electrolysis and found that the current flow changed as I varied the distance between the anode and cathode (the sacrificial piece and the hand plane). The current flow was very low but the process was working as advertised. I couldn't imagine having 50 amps flowing through the water! I would never leave something like that unattended.

Any inputs? I could be totally off here.

Jeff

[Rod Sheridan]

Jeff, you are correct, the conductivity of the solution, and the applied will determine the current.

If the conductivity of the solution results in 0.5 amperes of current at 12 volts, it doesn't matter whether the 12 volt rectifier is a 1 ampere, or 2,000 ampere rectifier, the solution will only allow 0.5 amperes to flow in it.

I normally use an adjustable DC supply, rated 1.5 amperes, 0 to 35 volts. Normally I set it at a voltage that results in about 0.25 amperes, which is somewhere in the 5 to 20 volt region, depending upon the object in the solution.

Regards, Rod.

[Wilbur Pan]

You don't need huge amounts of current to do electrolysis -- just time. And for the reasons given above, going at too high a current may not be safe, and may actually damage the piece from hydrogen embrittlement.

Think of cooking a stew. You want stew to cook for a long time at relatively low temperatures. Electrolysis is the same way.

Jeff, if I understand you correctly, you're sticking your multimeter into the electrolysis solution? If that's the case, you're only going to be measuring the current in the line from the anode to the cathode where your meter tip is. The total current is dispersed over the volume of electrolyte solution directly between the anode and the cathode. So a total of 50 amps may be flowing (again, not advisable), but you're only going to measuring a small amount of the flow.

[Cliff Rohrabacher]

but I've never seen anything definitive.

I may have a link on it to some web site where the "expert" in situs was opining thusly. Since he was way far more into it than I I assumed he knew more.

I'll see if I can find it.

[Michael Faurot]

I put my multimeter inline several times when using electrolysis and found that the current flow changed as I varied the distance between the anode and cathode (the sacrificial piece and the hand plane).

I've not done it yet, but from what I've read the anode is the sacrificial piece and gets connected to the positive side of the DC current. The cathode is the piece to be cleaned and is connected to the negative side.

As it sounds like you've all ready tried this, I strongly suspect you've done it right, but the way I'm reading what you've written it looks like you're saying the cathode connection is the sacrificial piece--which would produce less than desirable results. :)

[Cliff Rohrabacher]

This is the guy who impressed me and he provides a hell of a lot of information little of which am I capable of commenting on. He even teaches you how to build your own power supply.
http://tinyurl.com/bkl4q


This guy says to use 6 volts
http://tinyurl.com/38oqhq

Here is some one who thought to tell you about polarity
http://tinyurl.com/38amh3

Hewre is another with lots of pix
http://tinyurl.com/2quuy5

My other links are dead one is a pizza recipe site now
http://tinyurl.com/rgrlk

Oh, it was always a pizza recipe site~!! Oh well I'll leave the link 'cause it's cool.