PB Blaster has been around as long as I can remember..40+ years. The phosphoric acid process dates back to Henry Ford and a process called "Phosphating". He found that pre-treating metal (before galvanizing) with a hot phosphoric solution (dipping) increased paint adhesion.
I have been on the technical side of automotive chemistry for years and simply apply it to my hobby. You can see the bike I did as I posted it last night.
I dilute both "Prep & Etch and/or Milkstone Remover" 50/50 with water and soak really rusted parts overnight, also I clean rusty gas tanks with it. I usually have to repaint the tank, so I leave it soak for a week and the paint falls off and the rust disolves and the acid leaves a coating. I don't neutralize the metal (you can with baking soda solution, but flash rust occurs instantly). If your going to store acid cleaned parts just flush them with PB Blaster, WD40 or light spray gun oil.
I reuse the acid many times over by filtering it thru coffee filters and storing in in plastic LABELED containers.
Another trick I use if I don't want to use acid, and that is a vibratory polisher with plastic media. You can take really bad rusty small parts and derust them without loosing metal with said polisher.
One last trick, if you want to remove paint from aluminum or steel small parts without scraping, just replace the plastic media with glass media.
By the way...most of us like phosphoric acid, we drink it. When it's mixed with cola and sugar it's called Pepsi....of Coke LOL
I was thinking of starting a new thread "tricks of the trade" there are tons of techniques to revive metal finishes
|