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Ed Huntress
 
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Default Electrolytic rust removal question

"Don Wilkins" wrote in message
...
On Sun, 15 Feb 2004 17:29:42 GMT, "Ed Huntress"
wrote:

,;"Orrin Iseminger" wrote in message
...
,; On Sat, 14 Feb 2004 15:55:08 GMT, "Ed Huntress"
,; wrote:
,;
,;
,; First, I'm curious about what the toxic waste issue would be with
,;stainless.
,; Do you have a link or a reference?
,;
,; Snip
,;
,; Ed Huntress
,;
,; I don't have a reference, but I have about eight years of almost
,; continuous experience using electrolysis.
,;
,; I was told that stainless steel wouldn't degrade when used as a waste
,; electrode when doing electrolytic derusting. So, I used a thin sheet
,; of SS scrap.
,;
,; It took a while, but the sheet stainless eventually looked like a

lace
,; curtain. Worse, my solution turned yellow: hexavalent chromium.
,;
,;That's interesting. Did you use one of the standard, weak alkaline
,;solutions?


Ed

If you throw the kind of voltages that are used in this process at an
anode something is going to give. You can't pass a current from an
electrode into a solution without a chemical reaction. At the anode it
is either an oxidation of something in solution or an oxidation of the
anode. You must have one or the other to pass a current. If the
current is so high that there is nothing available from the solution
to oxidize then the anode is going to go.


Ok, I'm just listening, but it strikes me funny, because I've seen no
evidence that my graphite- or mild-steel electrodes have eroded. I do have a
good triple-beam balance. Maybe I'll start weighing that sheet of mild
steel, before and after. I certainly do enough of it that I should be able
to measure it.

Ed Huntress