Evaporust

[TFrench]

I've seen a few of the people I follow on youtube and instagram using evaporust to clean up small parts and tools. I thought it was just a US thing but then I saw it on amazon over here so I thought I'd give it a go. It's about £30 for a gallon which I thought was quite pricey at first.
I recently got a job lot of machinist/engineers calipers and dividers and other stuff so I thought I'd start off with them:
Before evaporust
(I'd already had a go at the small MT1 chuck with wet and dry which is why it looks clean-ish)
Left it for about 24hrs, took them out of soak, washed in clean water and a light coat of WD40:
Post evaporust
I'm REALLY impressed. Leaves a nice matt grey finish which seems to resist flash rusting (so far) and with a bit of wire wool the surface can be brought to a really nice finish very quickly. I've been hunting through all my drawers of stuff for rusty things I can throw in!
Bring me more rust!
So far this is everything I've done, its taken maybe half an hour of my time? The roughing gouge at the bottom was a really nasty flaky mess so I didn't bother wire brushing it before soaking, just to give it a challenge. Came out sparkly, turns out its a Sorby one now I can actually see the makers stamp! Hasn't touched the enamelling on the spokeshave either, and it does a very nice job on the knurled pieces that are a pig to clean up otherwise. Not sure how long it will stay "potent" for so I'll keep chucking stuff in and see how long it works for. I'll definitely buy more when it runs out though, the amount of time it's saved is ridiculous.

 

[LancsRick]

Deox-C is great too. Give them a good scrub and a lot of that dark colouring will go.

 

[Woody2Shoes]

I've found that citric acid works every bit as well as the potions sold for rust removal - just add a tablespoon or so to a couple of pints of warm/hot water. Extremely safe and environmentally responsible, it's cheaper too! Cheers, W2S

 

[porker]

I've found that citric acid works every bit as well as the potions sold for rust removal - just add a tablespoon or so to a couple of pints of warm/hot water. Extremely safe and environmentally responsible, it's cheaper too! Cheers, W2S

+1
I used some to clean up some very rusty chisels that belonged to my Grandad. Hot water in an old plastic water bottle with a couple of tablespoons of citric acid. Chisel sat nicely in the top supported by the ferrule and it fizzed like mad for half an hour. Lifted the rust of nicely. I'd expect the results to be as good as those above.

 

[ED65]

I've found that citric acid works every bit as well as the potions sold for rust removal - just add a tablespoon or so to a couple of pints of warm/hot water. Extremely safe and environmentally responsible, it's cheaper too! Cheers, W2S

Ditto vinegar, with and without added salt.

Where there's no rush to get the rust off it's worth looking into molasses in water. It's slow but very effective and if you can buy molasses in bulk really cheap since the dilution rate can be something like 10:1. Plus the solution can be reused many many times.

 

[John Brown]

+1 for Citric acid. I use it for descaling the kettle and coffee maker as well.

 

[Phil Pascoe]

And the dishwasher and the washing machine. I read a post by an American white goods repair guy, and he said nearly all the machines he was called out for were clogged up with gunge - he put them on a hot cycle with sodium triphosphate for the fats, then another with citric acid for the scale. It wasn't as common when washing powders contained the stuff as a matter of course but it was removed for ecological reasons - used on a vast scale it was polluting water courses.
sodium triphosphate is great for washing down prior to painting and is a good all round cleaner.