E-tank question

M

MichelleBernard

New member
I've been doing the oven cleaner method of cleaning my found cast iron, and am seriously considering building an e-tank. I am a total noob when it comes to this.
I can get my hands on the manual battery charger, but am at a loss when it comes to the metal to put into the tank to attach the cables to. Do you have a suggestion as to where I could pick up some? Just hit Lowe's or what? What kind would be the best to use?
 
Must be ferrous, either iron or steel. Cheapest would be short lengths of rebar available at Lowe's, et al. Not the most efficient in terms of surface area, though, and require frequent wire brushing to reinvigorate.
 
Doug D. said:
Must be ferrous, either iron or steel. Cheapest would be short lengths of rebar available at Lowe's, et al. Not the most efficient in terms of surface area, though, and require frequent wire brushing to reinvigorate.
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Doug,

I'm leaning toward an etank as well, given past comments, and new experiences.:glutton:

What part isn't "the most efficient in terms of surface area, though, and require frequent wire brushing to reinvigorate", as you said above? I mean, what part of this are you talking about?
 
I've never had to polish my 2 rods of rebar after starting on a pan as long as they were shiny before going in the e-tank. I may tap them against the side of the bucket from time to time to knock off the powdery rust on the surface but they always manage to pull the full 6A from my 12V charger regardless. I usually take them to the bench grinder with a wire wheel prior to setting up the e-tank but if it's just a little surface rust a few strokes with 100 grit sandpaper also gets the job done. I've never done anything bigger than a #8 skillet in the tank so your mileage may vary.
 
I started out with a 5 gallon bucket and 4 pieces of rebar. Then I went with a large kitchen trash can, 8-10 gal. It worked fine for several months. The rebar gets gunked up fairly quickly and I had to clean with a wire wheel bench grinder between each piece of cast iron. I had 8 pieces of rebar. I would clean a piece of CI for 12 hours, change out the rebar with cleaned ones, attach next CI. I would rotate rebar and next piece of CI to be cleaned about every 12 hours, before I went to work and then after I got home and ate dinner. After a while the rebar is so badly pitted that it I would grind it smooth again. If you are only doing a few pieces every once in a while it works great. If you do it all the time then it will work you to death.

I now have a 22 gal trash can and 2 pieces of plate steel. I can do 3-4 pieces before I clean the steel off with a wire brush. Once every week or two I clean the plates with a grinder. My steel plates are already heavily pitted and I'm looking for some graphite plates.
 
I've been using a stainless steel cookie sheet that I picked up at a thrift shop for $2. Seems that stainless steel anodes never need to be cleaned and it has a great surface area. Good luck!
 
I started out by ordering graphite plates (after reading here how well they worked). I knew I was in this for the long haul, so I figured I might as well start out with a quality answer. I ran the e-tank for a couple months nearly 24/7, and the graphite plates are about half used up...roughly speaking.

So, in my experience, graphite is every bit what it's cracked up to be. It lasts a long time, and there's no cleaning needed on the plates themselves.

I tore it down to upgrade my container and move it into the basement, and then life got busy and I'm still not set up yet :( My dirty CI must think I abandoned it...
 
I put together a simple e-tank shortly after I started collecting CI. I began with a piece of rebar, but decided the surface area was too small, so I picked up a piece of "welding steel" from Home Depot (or Menards?) for a couple of bucks. The increased surface area really seems to speed up the process. But man, does it get gunked up quickly! Nasty looking stuff, but it scrapes right off with a putty knife, albeit still very pitted and stained.

Not sure how to effectively search for this here, so if its already been discussed, perhaps someone can redirect me... but how exactly does electrolysis work? It seems to me that if the anode is becoming pitted, that some of the anode metal is being transferred to the CI of the pan (as in electroplating) but seeing the gunk on the anode makes me think that it is the other way around. But that would imply, I think, that some of the CI is being removed and transferred to the anode. Am even close to correct on either of those scenarios?
 
EdgarLopez said:
Make sure (-) is on skillet side and (+) on anode side.
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If that was in response to me, yes, I realize that, Edgar. I've e-cleaned about a dozen skillets so far. I'm wondering more about the physics or chemistry behind it. I'm curious like that. For instance, I pulled and cleaned my anode sheet today, and it was like swiss cheese. Where did that iron go?
 
If you look at the chemistry you will see that you are evolving O2 at the anode leaving excess H+ ions in the close vicinity of the anode. H+ ions are an acid. You are essentially dissolving the anode. That is why I use a strong lye solution in my e-tank. It neutralizes the acid and my anodes are not attacked. That's just my method.
 
ShawnE said:
If you look at the chemistry you will see that you are evolving O2 at the anode leaving excess H+ ions in the close vicinity of the anode. H+ ions are an acid. You are essentially dissolving the anode. That is why I use a strong lye solution in my e-tank. It neutralizes the acid and my anodes are not attacked. That's just my method.
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That's the first I've heard about using lye as the bath in an e-tank! Interesting.
 
There is a long (too long IMHO) on it that I started a while back. Others have had success with this method and some are afraid of it for some reason.
 
No, I haven't found the need to, but if it acts as an anode preservative, it may well be worth it. Graphite solved that issue for me.
 
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