Rust Removal

I'm in the process of cleaning the 8.8 for my car. It's a 1988 Tbird TC axle (3.55 gears, discs) with only 16,000 miles on it!! Got it for $350.

Anyway, it's very rusty on the exterior and it's taking a long time to clean. Someone posted on the old forum that using toilet bowl cleaner is the quick way to do large surfaces but before venturing out and possibly screwing something up I'd like to hear other's ideas and suggestions. I want to get it clean enough to paint up and look nice.

Thanks,
Don

Simple. Make a 50/50 mixture of pool acid (muriatic) and water, put it in a spray bottle that you don't care about, because it'll ruin it, set to mist, spray on the surface rust. You'll see it start to bubble and foam a little, wait until it slows down, rinse, repeat until you've got clean gray steel. Rinse well, and paint with rust preventive paint, no primer required.

You will be amazed how well this works.

-Mike S.

media blaster FTW.

Sweet! I have a lot of muriatic acid around because we have a pool . I'm on it!

Don

I use electrolysis on a lot of rusty iron/steel parts. It's an idea I got from the antique tractor forums. Suspend the rusty part in a bucket with steel wire. Use a chunk of disposable iron or steel (like an old brake drum, or some rebar) and suspend that in the same bucket so that it doesn't touch the rusty part that you want to clean up. Fill the bucket with a solution of tap water and some washing soda (amount of soda not critical; I use less than 1/2 cup). Connect the black clamp of a (car) battery charger to the rusty part's wire lead. Connect the red clamp to the disposable electrode's wire lead. Plug in the charger. The rusty part should turn black; the residue can be easliy removed with a wire brush and running water. Apparently a safe process with no toxic byproducts. The process does no damage to the part; it's not possible to overdo the process. It should be done outdoors. The disposable electrode will get VERY rusty; it may need to be cleaned up occasionally.

I find it works very well. A bit cumbersome for an axle housing, but great for smaller parts.

I remember you posting this on the old forum! Thanks for posting again. I have lots of small parts to do (A arms, brackets, etc) so I'm going to try this as well. I love that there's no enviro issues and plain water cleanup.

SWEET!

Don

I found out the hard way that its important to get the charger cables hooked up correctly. I once hooked the system up backwards and turned some nice 8N Ford sheet metal into a rusty mess.