Shopsmith Forums

I know it’s always mentioned, what is the rust remover y’all use

I use a paste I make from Bartender's Friend. It takes rubbing but has worked better and with less mess and cleanup than liquid rust remover or CLR.

Evapo Rust. Only removes iron/steel rust but does not attack the base metal, requires no work, just soak the parts. It's reusable, filter it and save for more de-rusting.

I have been experimenting with electrolysis lately but I would have to say I have not perfected the procedure , it works ok on cast iron pots, pans and skillets but I have a long way to go on anything else, for me chrome plating is off the table . my experience has been once you encounter rust or oxidation it will all ways come back unless the object has been completely stripped treated and re finished ..hopefully the object is not pitted too bad .I haven't had a great deal of success with electroplating ,I have attempted to nickle / copper plate , it seems to work but never was happy with the results . if you want things factory fresh my only real suggestion is to buy new parts . JMO I am sure there are a lot of folks like me who will spend a lot of time polishing and rubbing trying to restore a worn out piece . in that case a good polish or rust preventer would work on most things . my .02

Evapo Rust. No mess, no fuss, non-toxic and reusable.

Thanks, it’s for a friend of mine and due to my lack of computer skills I wasn’t able to find all the posts about rust removal I had read in the past.

Evaporust is great but won't clean up rusty tubes easily. You can't soak them. You can soak towels, wrap them and wrap that with saranwrap. It's a mess. That's why I use Bar Keepers Friend for anything that can't be soaked.

I have used Evaporust to do my tubes. Instead of soaking, I used it with Scotch Brite to wet sand, (the Scotch Brite-sponge combo works best for this). That way the Evaporust neutralizes any rust in pits below the surface. Wipe off the sludge before it dries or it will discolour the steel.

Bench and Way tubes are pretty big and long but could be done using a piece of PVC pipe as a container. I have a shorter piece of pipe about 2 feet long with the one end sealed and a screw cap on the other end. I used that to derust the axle and crossbar for casters. You can use a longer pipe to derust way and bench tubes. They should fit inside 2" PVC pipe. You'll need a lot of Evapo-rust for something that large, but you can reduce that amount by filling the space in the interior of tubes with marbles or gravel or just about anything. And the Evapo-rust will still be good to use again.

Just realized you only need a pipe half the length of the way tube if you don't mind leaving half of the tube sticking out of the pipe