Lye in my e-tank.

E

ErichL

New member
I'm brand new to this and I'm grateful to to have found this site before restoring my first cast iron. I'm three pans in now, and it's going great.

My setup:
3#'s 100% lye in 15 gal of water in an 18gal bin
12"x14" steel plate 1/4" thick I got from a welder
12v charger with 2amp and 10amp settings

I started with 2amps and all was well except it was taking forever. Went to 10 amps with no troubles and it's much faster.

The tank has only three pieces through it so far but the steel plate still looks new. The crud sinks to the bottom of the bin after each use and the solution looks clear when undisturbed.

Great results and my thanks to the lye electrolyte thread!
 
Next upgrade for you might be getting a second steel plate. Having one at each end of the tank will allow faster/more even results in a single session. I use stainless steel baking sheets, serving tray covers, or platters; but if you are using lye then regular steel works too.
Welcome to the community!
~Benjamin
 
ErichL said:
I'm brand new to this and I'm grateful to to have found this site before restoring my first cast iron. I'm three pans in now, and it's going great.

My setup:
3#'s 100% lye in 15 gal of water in an 18gal bin
12"x14" steel plate 1/4" thick I got from a welder
12v charger with 2amp and 10amp settings

I started with 2amps and all was well except it was taking forever. Went to 10 amps with no troubles and it's much faster.

The tank has only three pieces through it so far but the steel plate still looks new. The crud sinks to the bottom of the bin after each use and the solution looks clear when undisturbed.

Great results and my thanks to the lye electrolyte thread!
Click to expand...

You should ask your welding friend if he has another plate you can get from him. Having an anode on each side of the work piece will give more consistent results without having to turn the work piece. And BTW, more current helps, I use 20 Amps and can clean most parts in 3 Hrs or so.

A 1/4" plate should last forever, but you will eventually see rust on the part of the plate that is above the solution level, no big deal.

Welcome, now you are hooked. 3 pieces (or any amount) will never be enough :-P
 
I was just wondering if Lye could be used as the solution in an E-tank. This seems to answer the question pretty well.
Any known drawbacks to killing both birds with one stone?
 
I decided to find out for myself.
I'm running about 6 gallons of water
1 lb of Lye
1/2 lb baking soda
Regulated 13.8 VDC power supply pulling around 2 amps.
It currently has 2 very rusty pans and one heavily seasoned and rusty cornbread pan in the tank.
I can get more amps and faster rust removal by adding more anode surface but I want the lye to do it's work anyway.
 
Not sure why the baking soda (sodium bicarbonate). Those running the lye-as-electrolyte setup are replacing the washing soda (sodium carbonate) with lye (sodium hydroxide), not adding it to it.
 
I wasn't sure what it would do with the Lye alone. I didn't have a clue about what electrical reaction I would get from the lye as far as whether it would give the intended results or not-even after reading this thread. I tend to be a skeptic.

At this point what I learned is that as the pans got cleaner and the lye dissolved more thoroughly in the tank my amp draw went up to above 20 amps long enough to trip the automatic protection in the PS. The cornbread pan is nearly clean now (mostly carbon, not much rust) and the other pans are coming along nicely (both had a lot of rust and crud). I can see the remains of plating on the Erie I think.
I think the large amount of current was due to the heavy concentration of the lye. I've ran Etanks before with washing soda on much larger pieces without overloading the PS.
I unhooked the cornbread and Erie pan and am just running current through the 4 in 1 lid right now. Even with that I had to raise the anode some to decrease the current flow so the PS would stay on.
The two pans I disconnected are still soaking in the lye bath and not directly hooked to the charger.
I'm very impressed with the results so far. I'm kind of wondering why more people don't use this method.
 
A too-strong electrolyte solution will cause things to run hot, whether it be washing soda or lye alone or in combination.
 
Thank you Doug D. I'll probably just leave it alone tonight. I'll most likely add some more water tomorrow. I would like to be able to clean more than 1 pan at a time if I can.
Right now it's running a comfortable 5 or 6 amps.
 
I added a couple more gallons of water. That helped keep things under control some. As my pans got cleaner I had to have only one pan at a time using electrolysis. Right now most of the remaining issues is the carbon, not the rust, so I shut the PS off and am just soaking the pans in the lye.
I'm giving it a few days before I even look again.
 
I'm done cleaning my cast iron.
Not a very scientific experiment I'll admit. I did learn a few things though.

Lye in the E-tank does work. The concentration used for stripping carbon makes adjusting the current a little touchy. It tends to run hot.
It was easy (especially after the bulk of the rust was off and the pans were getting a better contact with the water) to overload my PS. Running less anode makes it harder to get good line of sight between the anode and the pan for optimum cleaning. More adjusting of the positions of anode and pan was necessary.

Toward the end it was either just soak the pans or use electrolysis on only 1 pan in the tank to avoid overloading the PS.
If you're doing multiple pans it's probably more practical to have separate lye and E-tanks.

The Erie and Lodge 4 in 1 both had significant pitting. Like craters on the moon pitting. They're still usable, just ugly and IMO of no collector value. It doesn't matter. I don't plan to sell.
Here's how they look now.
Sorry for the poor pictures.
The Erie #8
https://www.flickr.com/photos/97779730@N07/47997161278/in/dateposted-public/ https://www.flickr.com/photos/97779730@N07/47997205371/in/dateposted-public/
The 4 in 1:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/97779730@N07/47997161583/in/dateposted-public/ https://www.flickr.com/photos/97779730@N07/47997165897/in/dateposted-public/ https://www.flickr.com/photos/97779730@N07/47997161393/in/dateposted-public/
The Lodge 9 Arc Logo with last night's dinner. Of the three ( I count the 4 in 1 as one piece) this one was in the best condition.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/97779730@N07/47997161518/in/dateposted-public/
 
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