These last two weeks I've had several pieces to clean, since I haven't cleaned any of my new finds since the beginning of the year.
After a Lye Bath instead of electrolysis, I recently set up a tank with 2 cups of vinegar to 10 gallons of water. (this is a pretty weak vinegar solution, and I don't think it does any harm to the iron itself)
I started doing this about 2 weeks ago as a experiment, just because I wanted to neutralize any remaining lye (even though like Doug stated "the hose is enough"). I also didn't want my pieces flash rusting after I pulled them out of the lye tank. I have been taking all the pieces out of the lye tank at once, I then hose them off, and throw them in the weak vinegar / water solution. After I examine them, some go back in the lye for another round.
I then take them out of the vinegar solution one at a time, rinse, scrub, and dry them on the stove. and oil them up until I have several to season in the oven. Most do not even stay in the vinegar solution for even a hour, as I take out the cleanest pieces first.
Surprisingly, I have found that if the piece is rusty, within 2 hours most of the rust is gone, and the rest could easily be scrubbed off.
Obviously this would not clean all the rust off of really bad pieces, but most of the minor rust is gone within the hour. I'm surprised at how fast rust is removed, even in this very weak vinegar solution. I had one piece that my parents kept out in the back yard for years. It was very rusty. Even this piece cleaned up, but I ended up leaving it in overnight. Its not something I think anyone would ever want to use, but at least now its a clean flower pot!
In the last two weeks, this process has been working really well for me.
