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Rust removal by using molasses

Here is another set i'm working on. These were a little bit rougher than the last set and so far i've been unable to get the bleeder screws out.

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The rest of my wheel cleaned up as expected. Still heavy pitting at the 9:00 section of the rim but most of the rust is out of it. I knew it wasn't going to look new, this was just playing around with a wheel that won't be used for anything.

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I came across my original 383 intake manifold, so I dropped it in a week ago. I just took a look, and you can tell where it's sitting under the surface from the foam outline.

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Does anyone know if there is a life limit of the molasses mix?. I have a cooler full that I have been using most of this summer but it seems to be losing it's power.
 
I just dumped 2 liters because it seemed to loose its power....I did use it most of the summer I was wondering if I was just getting impatient .
 
I got about 14 months out of the first batch, still into the second with a few months to go...
 
Very cool discovery with the use of molasses. but I'm to impatient to wait a week for rust removal. I bought a sand blasting pot from Harbor Freight for $125.00. I sandblasted a wheel house in about 1 hour and primed it to keep it from rusting until I can paint several parts with the same color to paint. media material is $45.00 for 5 gallon bucked and I vacuum it up after to reuse. I filter it through a screen then reload the pot. it save money buying more media.
 
Very cool discovery with the use of molasses. but I'm to impatient to wait a week for rust removal. I bought a sand blasting pot from Harbor Freight for $125.00. I sandblasted a wheel house in about 1 hour and primed it to keep it from rusting until I can paint several parts with the same color to paint. media material is $45.00 for 5 gallon bucked and I vacuum it up after to reuse. I filter it through a screen then reload the pot. it save money buying more media.

I have a nice blaster also, that I only use for stuff that won't fit in my $25 molas-vat. I'm a little impatient myself but I'm more lazy, I've never had to wait for my parts to de-rust in the vat tho. I just put the parts in 2 weeks before I need them,lol... That saves "all" the work, time, trouble and expense of blasting. You can blast all you want but I'll let the molas-vat do it for me while I do something else easier.
 
Killer thread Photon......something i was not at all aware of,,,,,thorough. In the end. the organic strip it seems would have to superior and disposal of solution would be benign beyond the stripped metallic particulate....also....interesting, a non volatile organic compound v/s acid......i've used naval jelly in kind of a soak and scrub combo.....that's kind of a converter though...wire brush remove loose scale....paint a thisk film of the jelly on, give 10 minutes and then scuff with red pad vigorously...repeat.....but for a soak solution, i'd be more comfortable w old fragile parts sitting in molasses rather than acid....and waste disposal is suitable for a tree hugger.....less money...win..win...win
 
I tried this on my old headers and I could not believe how well it worked. Smell was bad but it worked. I left my headers in for 2 weeks and they came out very clean.
 
Needed to clean this hood up. It was nasty. Set it up and filled it with a mix and pressure washed it off a little bit ago.

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I've heard when diluting Molasses or Vinegar with water, to use distilled water because it doesn't have minerals or anything in it .
 
I've just used tap water. I just emptied mine out (too heavy to move it to a different spot) and am ready to refill it again.
 
As an update, I have a different tank now. When I first started with limited research, I had thought that the molasses attacked rust only and left the bare steel or iron untouched. But after prolonged exposure it seems that some steel is removed as well; some surfaces of smooth steel gained a bit of a rough finish, and the steel tank I was using eventually developed a pinhole leak. I originally thought that tank would never get rusty and leak - it did stay rust free at least, but after several years of constant exposure it was definitely looking rough inside.

I use a large plastic tank now, originally meant to dispense oil. I sawed the top and hinged it to access the inside. Something like this, I got it free from a garage that was closing down.

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Still constantly using it, everything from the earlier mentioned car parts to rusty garden tools.
 
I was wondering about the Molasses bath in an engine cooling system to clean out the rusty gunk. Anyone ever tried something like a 7-1 ratio in a radiator and maybe run it for a few hours and then flush it out? Seems like it would work ok but I don't want to be the first to try it.
 
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