Vibratory Tumbler

Well, it appears the base, alkali or caustic / water mix (draino n detergent w/ water) tumbled for 2 days did very well at removing 99 % paint, 95% rust and after the caustic tumble, several rinses submerged and sloshed in clean water.

But after that I decided to remove the little grey pits still present that appeared to have black rust in them and the deep fine threads on the bolts had the same black tarnish.

I found some ph down for pools in the pool shed and figured that was decent for eating rust since it was some variation of half *** acid and it was all I had around. Dumped a little in there w/ my media combo and water and let it rip for 24 hours. I checked it after 18 hours and it was looking great, the black pits and threads were like 99% gone, but the water acid liquid had to a red gel. So, I turned it off and did some errands. Came back later and all my shi% had kind of rusted on the surface. I fired the tumbler back up for a couple hours and proceeded to do several rinses and submerge in alcohol. The parts still had a little rust stain on them from the mistake of leaving the stuff in the tumbler off and sitting. Since this is just lags and bolts I use to build temp projects I dont care.

Dried the crap off, heated it all with a butane torch mildly to remove all moisture and tossed it into the blackening solution. Rinsed it off twice, dried it again and tossed it in the "sealer oil". Attached are the results of that tumbler experiment and one washer that did not get in the batch so you can see what it started out like. The lower pics show the parts after blackening and the still wet with "sealing oil" which is probably light machine or drilling oil.

My next experiment will involve pure lye mixed with water, sand, tumbling media and some rocks or smashed porcelain plates and a couple water rinses, followed by a short tumble in "Evapo-Rust" from Caswell Inc.

As of now, I think this tumbler can kiss my a$$. Mainly because it cost 250 and it is made with 40 dollars of parts most of which are plastic. I am sure it has purpose like polishing something, but tumbling cleaning nuts bolts and parts for coating or plating, there is no substitute for sand or media blasting.

I still think 1 day with lye / water may prove to be a prep for blasting as it will be grease and paint free (we will see next).

Blasting gets all threads and crevices and pits completely spotless (reckon everyone knows that).



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