I'm in the process of cleaning up the front end of my car and I have a lot of rusty bolts, brackets and other small parts. I'm sure everyone on here has dealt with the same. 

I seem to recall someone started a thread a while back on creating a tub of acidic solution that you could dip small parts into, but I can't find the thread anymore.

Any specific suggestions or good links?

Get them powder coated

Maybe check out anthony's light thread, he did an acid bath for his pcb boards.

The brackets that is

Ask Rob Cauduro he had some clean bolts he did some kind of coating on them he posted the pictures in the Car picture thread

For small things like nuts and bolts you want Evapo-Rust, $10 per litre at Canadian Tire. Used it on brake components and it completely removed all the rust and left bare metal.

This stuff is not acidic and is non-toxic.

Evapo-Rust

Zinc coating is what Rob put on after they were all clean.

Before



After wire wheel on pedestal grinder



After zinc

Damn, I'm gonna grab a jug of that evapo rust stuff and toss a bucket of bolts in it. Looks like that sh!t works!

Here you go:

link

x2. Im in the process in cleaning up my front subframe so might as well toss a bunch of bolts/nuts to be cleaned as well

Thanks Robert!

FYI, I never used that stuff. If u read carefully above the shiny bolts pic I polished every rusty bolt with a wire wheel on a pedestal grinder. 5 facking hours! Every bolt and nut!

I'd use that stuff AFTER wire wheeling them all if I had knew about it. Probably would have saved me the 60 dollar stripping fee the zinc coaters charged me.

is evapo rust and CLR not the same thing?

For my subframe, I fitted a princess auto wire wheel designed for angle grinders on to my angle grinder. It's very effective in removing EVERYTHING! Don't waste your time with any other method of removing surface rust, I've tried them all.

Like this one?

For bolts, yes!

No CLR and Evapo-Rust are not the same thing, although they do look similar. Evapo-Rust is some sort of chemical that binds itself to iron only. It is strong enough to pull iron from iron oxide but not strong enough to pull it from steel. Once the solution you use turns completely black, it has exhausted its capacity to remove iron and must be replaced.

You can do a little cleaning up before putting items into the solution because the less rust there is the longer the solution will last. But it is not at all necessary. As much as I admire Rob's commitment to polish each individual bolt, I'm too lazy for that much effort.

I agree that a wire wheel works wonders on most things. I've been using them a lot and really love pulling the little wires out of my skin!!

It's not going to work on a lot of the small square brackets like the ones that hold brake lines or the ones with tight little corners.

The link Chris posted is exactly what I was thinking of. Thinking about trying that out...

How much is zinc coating?

M&M plating, Scarborough, 170 minimum lot charge, plus 60 for stripping old cadmium plating.

My suggestion is to wire wheel them as best u can, threads, shank, head, clean it good, because the coating looks like shyte on the parts of the hardware u slack on.

Jeff get it bead blasted then (FTW)

Evapo Rust works great. I did my shifter assembly in it and it looks brand new.

If I had a beer fridge beside the wire wheel, I'd go at this.

Would a Dremel with the wire brush attachments work just as well? I have a bunch of engine bay things I want to take off and get the rust off..