I set to work on some suspension parts and some of the brackets. They were really rusty and I wanted to try out a new method of rust removal. I have tried scraping, wire wheels, sanding, blasting, and rust nuking chemicals. Most are a pain in the ass. The last thing I tried is the cheapest and the easiest method, and it actually works!
Plain white vinegar. Yes, what you shake over your fish and chips, what your great aunt fran used to make her home made pickles with, and if you're of European descent, what your dear old mum still uses to clean the house with. Four litres for like a buck.
1)Pour it into a container you won't be caring about.
2)Sumberge the parts in the vinegar.
3) Get on with your life for a week or so.
When you come back, this is what you will find:
Gross.
Use pliers or something to grab the parts out, unless you're feeling adventurous and want to stick your hand in that mess. It stains your skin, so wear gloves. It also stains anything else it comes in contact with, so don't wear anything you care about when working around this stuff.
Here's the cool part! Take the part you are working on, and brush it with a toothbrush, or even a wire brush if you like. I found an old toothbrush worked great. The rust will brush off. if there's any tricky bits, use the brush and a bit more vinegar to scrub it off. Then rinse with water.
This was after about a week of soaking in the vinegar:
I have on order some Ferrea 5000 series valves, and I picked up a EuroExport valve spring compressor. I'll post up my impressions of those when the valves come in, and I get around to putting them in.
One thing I can show you now are these pretty little things:
Special delivery, courtesy of JLude on preludepower.
I'm not going to lie, I was tempted to lick them, they're so sexy.
An electric toothbrush.. that's an amazing idea! I'm going to look into getting one for this as well.
