Mark, the huge bubbles look to me like “bumping” where the solution gets super heated but doesn’t form any bubbles until suddenly a huge one forms and erupts. Very common in the chemistry lab when you’ve done a good job of cleaning and polishing the vessel. The smooth surface has too few sites to help nucleate bubbles. If you google “boiling chips” or “boiling stone” you’ll see how this is addressed. Thanks for the interesting video.
Tom, I got the feeling that it was something to do with the solution becoming super saturated. There were lots of solids floating around in what should have been a fully dissolved liquid. The problem sort of disappeared after I added water to make up for what was lost in evaporation. I have seen the phenomenon you described when heating water in a microwave. It can actually get to a temperature above boiling point but won't produce any steam bubbles until you add something to allow the bubbles to form on. I think you are correct in identifying the "super bubbles". You could actually hear them popping to the surface in the early part of the video where I was cleaning the steel samples. I am going to get in touch with the guys at Jane Kits to see if they have any more information.
Hey there Mark, thanks for sharing another great video. Always enjoy seeing your videos and you have a voice that is easy to listen to and understand. 👍
Mark, this is a very interesting video. When I supported our Plating and Surface Treatment Shops, we had (have?) a Parkerizing process. But since our workload nearly always was for stuff that didn't get the oil treatment, we got rid of our oil tank. I hope to try your process at home one of these days. Glad to see you back and I hope that all had an enjoyable holiday!
I think it looks great, and obviously it works great too. Great for any home made tooling. Thanks for showing us the Parkerising method, and testing the results after. One useful addition/data point would have been to abrade a painted item along with a parkerised item, so we have a comparison.
Nicholas, thanks for the heads up on the switch issue. I had hooked up the active to the wrong pair of terminals on the rear of the switch. All good now. Regards, Preso
Hello from the Pacific North West (People's Republic of Washington State, U.S.A..) Great & FAIR testing. I also will be visiting your supplier. Thanks for sharing
Stanwood Dave, I am sure Jane Kits will see a surge in enquiries for their products. They actually offered to send me some supplies for testing but I declined on the basis that I wanted my content to remain unbiased. I get a bit miffed when I see some CZcamsrs blatantly flogging products in return for "free stuff". Regards, Preso
Really enjoyed the coating test. Where I live, my shop is subjected to high humidity for a large part of the year and fighting corrosion is a constant problem. I'd never heard of Parkerising before you introduced it -- I've always resorted to either zinc or nickel plating. I like the dark color of this process and will make a note to give it a try sometime. Thanks for sharing!
I'm glad you enjoyed watching. I had heard about parkerising too but always thought it would be too complicated to do in the home shop. I also started zinc and nickel plating and realised that the parkerising is actually a lot more forgiving than plating. No need for a power supply and the initial steps are the same as plating anyway. Regards, Preso
Great demo! In the past I noticed that on military weapons treated with this or similar process, there seemed to be color variations. I don’t know if this was due to different processes being used but the variations went from a greenish grey to dark black. Overall, I wondered how this process worked so thanks for cleaning that up.
Yeah Mr P. Is back! Hope you had a great holiday. For the bubbles in your parkerizing tank tank , look at the bottom of the tank for abnormalities. There must be something causing a nucleation site for the bubbles to form. Nice to have you back. Cheers
Yves, It was certainly disturbing to watch and I was worried about getting scalded when I was working close to the tank. I may have to get in touch with my contact at Jane Kits to see if it's something to do with the solution or just the way I have designed the tank. I didn't notice it happening when I used a normal saucepan. We had a great holiday but our rubbish dollar is only worth about 60 Euro cents so everything was expensive. Our last tank of fuel in Germany cost us about $110 Aussie dollars. Ouch!
Ah ha, back from swanning off around the world, we see Mark struggling to fit back into reality. I hope you had a great trip. And now once again hes come up with something interesting to watch. Cheers
It got very real when two days after we arrived home a cabinet maker rang to tell me he was ready to fit a new laundry and wardrobe which we had ordered nearly five months ago. I had to demolish the old cabinets, re-tile the floor, move all the plumbing and electrical and repaint! And, finish off this video! What holiday? Regards, Preso
Another great video Presso. I pretty sure your erupting solution is caused by the solution boiling at the very bottom of the pot, because your probe is measuring an inch or two above that. Also I've heard that if you cold blue after parkerizing you'll get a much darker better looking back, not sure if it makes the corrosion resistance any better. Would be interesting to see you test it. I've been wondering how you were doing, glad to hear you had a good vaca! ATB
Excellent video Mark! When i used to work at a hardchrome company we used ajax for cleaning cast iron . We first started with trichloroethane then ajax then pumice and finally muratic acid , when you has a few big rollers to clean my arms were aching at the end of the day from scrubbing bloody things !
Ian, Ajax must have some miracle ingredient but it seems to work when other chemical cleaners won't do the job. Cleaning anything by hand is never any fun. I am guessing that apprentices would get the cleaning jobs?
Mark Presling Yes most of the grunt work was done by an apprentice or in my case a general hand . The final cleaning was done by the plater because if it came out of the tank with faults in the plating ( we were doing anything up to .030 deposit and sometimes more ) it was his head on the block if it was no good !
I am not sure. The temperature of the hot plate stays fairly stable or within a few degrees due to it's high thermal mass. I will try to put some diagonal creases in the bottom of the container to stop any tendency to oil can. I was only aware of it happening but it was hard to have a close look to see if it was an actual bubble escaping or displacement caused by the flexing of the base of the container. More tests needed!
Ajax: Calcium Carbonate, Sodium Carbonate and Sodium Dodecyl Sulfonate. Calcium carbonate is the abrasive, Sodium Carbonate is a reasonably high ph alkaline cleaner (between 11and 12) and Sodium Dodecyl Sulfonate is a surfactant and cleaner, somewhat similar to Sodium Laureth Sulfate or Tri-sodium Phosphate (TSP)I think. But I could be wrong about the TSP.
Craig, We had a great trip and I am just now getting over the jet lag. For the past week or so we have been nodding off to sleep at 7pm and waking at 4am. Still, I can get a lot of video editing done as the sun is coming up! 😀
Raymond, I guess I was expecting that the coating would be much tougher than it actually is. I don't have the equipment but it would be interesting to cross section the metal to see how thick the coating is. Regards, Preso
If you sandblast the inside of the metal tray you used to parkerize, it will create nucleation points for small bubbles to form instead of big bubbles causing splashing out of the container. Alternately you can buy boiling stones that do the same thing, but I'm not sure how they would react with the solution. They are typically made of silicon carbide, so they should be okay, but it's still an extra expense.
Dan, I have an ultrasonic cleaner but it is actually quicker to just scrub it with the parts wash. Maybe for parts that have lots of undercuts and hidden features the ultrasonic would be the only way to go.
Welcome back Mr. P. LOL You left Aussie land when the weather was not that great, and you left the UK as the weather was becoming foul. It should be nice in Australia for those old bones of yours. Have a good one.
Surprisingly we had fantastic weather all the way up the Welsh coast and only a few days of light rain in Glasgow. The locals told us we were extremely lucky!
@@Preso58 I wouldn't think so either, but that's just what I read about it when I looked it up. It also said the gasses can be quite volitle to the body, with side effects from nausea to coma. Just have to use very good ventilation. It does leave a rather nice coating though. Thanks for showing us your findings.
How do you think parkerized hand tools would work? Since the rust prevention seems to stem from the oil / wax / whatever that is held in the texture of the parkerising, I wonder how well it would hold up on the part of a wrench that is in contact with your hand or leather gloves. Do you think the oil would be lost too quickly to be useful? Does the oil become a nuisance for actually gripping the tool?
The texture of the treated parts doesn't feel oily at all and the crystalline finish actually makes it feel more grippy. The oil that is sold by Jane Kits is designed so that it soaks into the surface of the phosphate coating but doesn't form a film on the surface. I have had people suggest that other types of oil would be better and probably if you were looking to store a part for a long time then something like cosmoline would be good but I have heard that it can be waxy and sticky so it wouldn't be so good for tools. It is too soon for me to tell how the parts will hold up with repeated use in say, a gloved hand so I am keen to find out too. For now, I just like the look of the finish and it is a useful way of preserving the tools that I was constantly having to clean up as the corrosion appeared on them. Regards, Preso
John, I noticed that too. I can't think why they look different. They are both made from bright mild steel and the process was essentially the same. Maybe I just took a little more care polishing the die holder. Regards, Mark
Brownells has a pretty good explanation of the parkerizing process...question- here in America we are having a major problem with tent cities particularly under bridges etc...on your extended vacation are people living under your new bridge when you returned?😀..
Chris, no homeless people had moved in. I must say I was quite shocked when I travelled to the USA three years ago and saw homeless people sleeping in the statues outside Union Station in Washington DC. Our biggest cities here in Australia do have similar problems. Melbourne and Sydney are no exception. Where I live is a tourist destination and the homeless issue is hidden from view but I think it is universal in all developed nations. I had to laugh though when I was in San Francisco and a homeless guy had a cardboard sign which read "really bad advice, $1" At least he hadn't lost his sense of humour. Regards, Preso
@@Preso58 I will add one caveat to the living under bridges....here in Michigan we are divided into two peninsulas...and joined together by the Mackinac bridge...a 5 mile straight...anywho those who live in the lower peninsula all live under the bridge and are considered"trolls" to the yoopers...people in the upper peninsula
It’s the bottom of the container touching the hot plate heats up and expands then pops off the hot plate then cools down and repeats it’s caused from hot spots in the Element
I hadn't thought of that. I may have to put some diagonal creases in the bottom of the container to pre stress it. However, I started to notice that the level of the solution was dropping as the water in the solution boiled off. I topped it up with clean water and the popping stopped. I am wondering if the solution was becoming super saturated. I want to try it again with the solution made up to 5 litres which is what I started with. Jane Kits do recommend having the correct ratio of water in the solution. Regards, Mark
Jose, I actually like it but it was not what I was expecting when I first started the process. I thought it would be a flatter satin like finish. Regards, Mark
hey Mark, do you know that primer and paint are very different at corrosion resistance? primer is theoretically porous and will rust given enough moisture and time. paint is obviously a (theoretically) hard sheen fully protective surface finish. not all primers are the same, and i think etch primer might actually be worse for corrosion resistance.
Roger, I did some electroless nickel plating years ago but the requirement to heat up the nickel solution made it just as time consuming as the parkerising. I have successfully zinc plated at home and just recently I did a test piece which I have added to my other samples. I will probably revisit the samples next year just to let you know how they are holding up. I can report though that the parkerised test samples are still fine but the untreated steel piece is now red with rust. czcams.com/video/NpW1inPujWk/video.html
My method to do both Zinc and Manganese parkerizing are as follows. The Manganese is more of a charcoal grey. It was used on M1 Carbines. The Zinc parkerizing has a greenish grey and was used more on M1 Garands. Either process is a Phosphoric acid base (no pun intended) with either manganese or zinc dissolved in it. Then a small piece of 0000 de-greased steel wool dissolved in it prior to parkerizing your part. After parkerizing I heat the part with a torch till it's hot to the tough and apply a high sulfur oil to the part and let it soak for a couple hours. I love that little boiling tank you made.
That's interesting. I didn't know that you could zinc parkerise parts. I purchased my iron phosphate parkerisng solution as a commercially available product but I love the finish and it has proven to be bullet proof in terms of wear resistance and corrosion resistance. The only downside is that there are lots of solutions to heat up and I am sure it adds a zero or two to our electricity bill now that the energy company has shifted our tariff to a "time of use" model which is code for price gouging. Regards, Mark
This is pure conjecture but perhaps, paint that wasn't mixed well was in the drop tube inside the can. That nearly straight line of paint peeling off is a bit odd. So perhaps that first bit of sprayed paint was a bit umm "not well mixed" or something similar. I have to admit that I didn't really pay attention to the direction of spray when you started. Do you purge your spray cans according to directions? I don't think that you allowed enough time for the metal to dry honestly. The speckled pattern of removed paint from the clean steel kind of shows this a bit. Paint not adhering in tiny pockets, like it it did here, shows that something possibly seeped out of the metal to create the pattern: oil, water, or other contaminates. It might have been a good idea to bake such chunky bit of steel for a while before painting. Even then it can be difficult to ensure that there are zero contaminates. Then again perhaps the metal was perfect and you had old cruddy paint. To many variables and one can only guess.
Ian, I think you might be correct about the paint not being mixed properly. I must say I was a bit casual about prepping the paint can. It was an old can too so that might account for the speckling. The parts that I tested had been sitting along with the others for about 8 weeks so the paint should have been well an truly cured. I was expecting the paint on the untreated part to just peel right off. Maybe I should have used a coat of enamel?
@@Preso58 No doubt the paint was cured. You didn't mention why the paint test was the one that you were most curious about. Is this for the sake of curiosity or did you want a comparison because you are thinking of using paint or Parkerising for a specific purpose? For the home gamer, I think it's just important to note that finishing metal using some method is MUCH better than leaving bare steel around. Durability of different methods is difficult to test because it takes a much more sophisticated procedure than most of us have access to. Just trying to make sure everything is coated perfectly (to not skew results) is a pain in ass. Now move onto a controlled test of durability... Ya it's not really worth the effort. Thanks for the interesting video.
Primer will not protect metal primer will hold a third of its own weight in moisture if you want a primer that will protect metal you will need a primer sealer many years ago an old boss of mine told me this and I didn’t believe him mostly because I was a young dumb kid So I took a piece of bare metal and sanded it really well and primer it and left it outside most of the summer I then took lacquer thinner and scrub the primer off and there was a light coat of rust covering the entire piece of metal that I had sanded and primed
Joe, the etch primer that I used is a really cheap product that is sold as an automotive self etching primer. It is pretty much useless on anything but sandblasted steel. I was surprised that it adhered as well as it did. I have seen quick drying paints absorbing moisture as you described especially here in the very humid climate that we have. As the solvents evaporate they lower the temperature of the surface which allows moisture to condense into the paint mix. This does exactly what you described by allowing the bare steel under the paint to start forming a layer of rust. I have a cheap Chinese laser cutter which was painted with a top coat directly over the bare steel. The paint started to delaminate and the steel underneath was red with oxide. Rust is the enemy! Regards, Preso
Ahh, sad story about that.... I was very fortunate to be able to tour the Red Bull technology centre back in 2009 when Mark Webber was driving for Red Bull. Then, Dan Ricciardo took over Mark's seat and as an Aussie it was very gratifying to see them winning races. Now, each time I look up and see that poster I know it will have to come down and a Renault will have to go up in it's place. If only it was a competitive car! Regards, Preso
@@Preso58 Sorry to hear that. As a Dutch man I get warm fuzzy feelings from watching a Red Bull race car...at least most of the time :-) Although I pretty much think the same thing, if only it was a competitive car. But the Renault engine is not too bad, the guys from McLaren are not doing bad at all. But Ricciardo is a top driver and he deserves a much better car indeed. Can you imagine how the battles in the front would look like if Ricciardo could battle along with Max, Leclerc, Vettel, Bottas and Hamilton. That would make an exiting race!
Maybe, cleanliness is everything when doing any sort of metal plating, anodising or paint preparation. I used to work in a factory that made fishing reels and all the metal parts went into giant vibratory tumblers with some pretty nasty alkaline solutions prior to nickel and chrome plating. Nothing was touched by hand once the parts came out of the tumblers. In a small shop it's almost inevitable that parts will get contaminated in some way. However, I still have samples of those parkerised parts and not one of them has rusted since I treated them. I should really do a follow up soon to show how they have faired since doing the original video. Regards, Mark
I guess some are impossible to please Mark. You go out of your way to run the best tests you can think up for what most of us might see in average shop conditions, plus spend a whole lot of extra time to video and edit it all. And at this point there's already 3 fools who obviously can't appreciate or probably even understand what there looking at. So for whatever it's worth you have my sincere thanks for doing so.
Glad to see you're back. Hope you had a nice holiday.
Welcome back Mr Presling.
Mark, the huge bubbles look to me like “bumping” where the solution gets super heated but doesn’t form any bubbles until suddenly a huge one forms and erupts. Very common in the chemistry lab when you’ve done a good job of cleaning and polishing the vessel. The smooth surface has too few sites to help nucleate bubbles. If you google “boiling chips” or “boiling stone” you’ll see how this is addressed. Thanks for the interesting video.
Tom, I got the feeling that it was something to do with the solution becoming super saturated. There were lots of solids floating around in what should have been a fully dissolved liquid. The problem sort of disappeared after I added water to make up for what was lost in evaporation. I have seen the phenomenon you described when heating water in a microwave. It can actually get to a temperature above boiling point but won't produce any steam bubbles until you add something to allow the bubbles to form on. I think you are correct in identifying the "super bubbles". You could actually hear them popping to the surface in the early part of the video where I was cleaning the steel samples. I am going to get in touch with the guys at Jane Kits to see if they have any more information.
Tom is right. Add some perlite to reduce bumping
@@Preso58 It's not supersaturated, it's superheated. Nothing to do with the dissolved solutes, it's as described by TC.
Hey there Mark, thanks for sharing another great video. Always enjoy seeing your videos and you have a voice that is easy to listen to and understand. 👍
Glad to see You back after the holiday, hope You and Mrs had a good one.
Looking forward to Your metal casting video.
Regards,
Leif
Glad you’re back Mark. Hope you will continue to have more videos coming. Mike from USA 🇺🇸
Mr. Mike, thanks for that. I have about two videos lined up on metal casting and another with a workshop visit. Should be interesting!
Mark, this is a very interesting video. When I supported our Plating and Surface Treatment Shops, we had (have?) a Parkerizing process. But since our workload nearly always was for stuff that didn't get the oil treatment, we got rid of our oil tank. I hope to try your process at home one of these days. Glad to see you back and I hope that all had an enjoyable holiday!
Awesome video Presso, thanks for the update to this process. Glad to see your videos again.
glad to see you back uncle Preso, great video!
I think it looks great, and obviously it works great too. Great for any home made tooling. Thanks for showing us the Parkerising method, and testing the results after.
One useful addition/data point would have been to abrade a painted item along with a parkerised item, so we have a comparison.
excellent video and glad to see you posting videos mate!!!
Yes, welcome back from a Canadian viewer 😊
Glad to see you're back
Welcome back!
Glad to see that the illuminated switch is working :-)
Nicholas, thanks for the heads up on the switch issue. I had hooked up the active to the wrong pair of terminals on the rear of the switch. All good now.
Regards,
Preso
Hello from the Pacific North West (People's Republic of Washington State, U.S.A..) Great & FAIR testing. I also will be visiting your supplier. Thanks for sharing
Stanwood Dave, I am sure Jane Kits will see a surge in enquiries for their products. They actually offered to send me some supplies for testing but I declined on the basis that I wanted my content to remain unbiased. I get a bit miffed when I see some CZcamsrs blatantly flogging products in return for "free stuff".
Regards,
Preso
Excellent video. Thanks for sharing!
Good video. Better to have you back in the creation department!
Interesting stuff Mark. I'm sharing this with a friend.
Cool! Glad you enjoyed it. Gotta leave this alone now and get back into some casting.
Regards,
Preso
Really enjoyed the coating test. Where I live, my shop is subjected to high humidity for a large part of the year and fighting corrosion is a constant problem. I'd never heard of Parkerising before you introduced it -- I've always resorted to either zinc or nickel plating. I like the dark color of this process and will make a note to give it a try sometime. Thanks for sharing!
I'm glad you enjoyed watching. I had heard about parkerising too but always thought it would be too complicated to do in the home shop. I also started zinc and nickel plating and realised that the parkerising is actually a lot more forgiving than plating. No need for a power supply and the initial steps are the same as plating anyway.
Regards,
Preso
Great demo! In the past I noticed that on military weapons treated with this or similar process, there seemed to be color variations. I don’t know if this was due to different processes being used but the variations went from a greenish grey to dark black. Overall, I wondered how this process worked so thanks for cleaning that up.
Yeah Mr P. Is back! Hope you had a great holiday. For the bubbles in your parkerizing tank tank , look at the bottom of the tank for abnormalities. There must be something causing a nucleation site for the bubbles to form. Nice to have you back. Cheers
Yves, It was certainly disturbing to watch and I was worried about getting scalded when I was working close to the tank. I may have to get in touch with my contact at Jane Kits to see if it's something to do with the solution or just the way I have designed the tank. I didn't notice it happening when I used a normal saucepan. We had a great holiday but our rubbish dollar is only worth about 60 Euro cents so everything was expensive. Our last tank of fuel in Germany cost us about $110 Aussie dollars. Ouch!
Ah ha, back from swanning off around the world, we see Mark struggling to fit back into reality.
I hope you had a great trip.
And now once again hes come up with something interesting to watch.
Cheers
It got very real when two days after we arrived home a cabinet maker rang to tell me he was ready to fit a new laundry and wardrobe which we had ordered nearly five months ago. I had to demolish the old cabinets, re-tile the floor, move all the plumbing and electrical and repaint!
And, finish off this video! What holiday?
Regards,
Preso
Welcome back.
Another great video Presso. I pretty sure your erupting solution is caused by the solution boiling at the very bottom of the pot, because your probe is measuring an inch or two above that.
Also I've heard that if you cold blue after parkerizing you'll get a much darker better looking back, not sure if it makes the corrosion resistance any better. Would be interesting to see you test it.
I've been wondering how you were doing, glad to hear you had a good vaca! ATB
Excellent video Mark!
When i used to work at a hardchrome company we used ajax for cleaning cast iron . We first started with trichloroethane then ajax then pumice and finally muratic acid , when you has a few big rollers to clean my arms were aching at the end of the day from scrubbing bloody things !
Ian, Ajax must have some miracle ingredient but it seems to work when other chemical cleaners won't do the job. Cleaning anything by hand is never any fun. I am guessing that apprentices would get the cleaning jobs?
Mark Presling
Yes most of the grunt work was done by an apprentice or in my case a general hand . The final cleaning was done by the plater because if it came out of the tank with faults in the plating ( we were doing anything up to .030 deposit and sometimes more ) it was his head on the block if it was no good !
Thanks for the video.
I think the eruptions are caused by oilcanning of your tank on the hotplate as it heats and cools.
I am not sure. The temperature of the hot plate stays fairly stable or within a few degrees due to it's high thermal mass. I will try to put some diagonal creases in the bottom of the container to stop any tendency to oil can. I was only aware of it happening but it was hard to have a close look to see if it was an actual bubble escaping or displacement caused by the flexing of the base of the container. More tests needed!
Back in the saddle!
Ajax: Calcium Carbonate, Sodium Carbonate and Sodium Dodecyl Sulfonate. Calcium carbonate is the abrasive, Sodium Carbonate is a reasonably high ph alkaline cleaner (between 11and 12) and Sodium Dodecyl Sulfonate is a surfactant and cleaner, somewhat similar to Sodium Laureth Sulfate or Tri-sodium Phosphate (TSP)I think. But I could be wrong about the TSP.
Hope you and the Mrs had a good vacation. Glad you're back.
Craig, We had a great trip and I am just now getting over the jet lag. For the past week or so we have been nodding off to sleep at 7pm and waking at 4am. Still, I can get a lot of video editing done as the sun is coming up! 😀
Thanks, interesting stuff.
Would like to see if the abrasion test is better on the fully treated part ie no2, wether the oil helps.
Cheers
Raymond,
I guess I was expecting that the coating would be much tougher than it actually is. I don't have the equipment but it would be interesting to cross section the metal to see how thick the coating is.
Regards,
Preso
If you sandblast the inside of the metal tray you used to parkerize, it will create nucleation points for small bubbles to form instead of big bubbles causing splashing out of the container. Alternately you can buy boiling stones that do the same thing, but I'm not sure how they would react with the solution. They are typically made of silicon carbide, so they should be okay, but it's still an extra expense.
Nice video. Very interesting. Mahalo for sharing! : )
Would be interesting to know if one could use an ultrasonic cleaner instead of the brush for the initial cleaning.
Dan,
I have an ultrasonic cleaner but it is actually quicker to just scrub it with the parts wash. Maybe for parts that have lots of undercuts and hidden features the ultrasonic would be the only way to go.
Welcome back Mr. P. LOL You left Aussie land when the weather was not that great, and you left the UK as the weather was becoming foul. It should be nice in Australia for those old bones of yours. Have a good one.
Surprisingly we had fantastic weather all the way up the Welsh coast and only a few days of light rain in Glasgow. The locals told us we were extremely lucky!
I just read that the solution is highly flammable if the solution is too hot. Very nice look when done and seems like a fairly simple process.
Craig, I wouldn't think the parkerising solution would burn. The stuff I used is mixed with water. Maybe the vapour is flammable?
Regards,
Mark
@@Preso58 I wouldn't think so either, but that's just what I read about it when I looked it up. It also said the gasses can be quite volitle to the body, with side effects from nausea to coma. Just have to use very good ventilation. It does leave a rather nice coating though. Thanks for showing us your findings.
How do you think parkerized hand tools would work? Since the rust prevention seems to stem from the oil / wax / whatever that is held in the texture of the parkerising, I wonder how well it would hold up on the part of a wrench that is in contact with your hand or leather gloves.
Do you think the oil would be lost too quickly to be useful? Does the oil become a nuisance for actually gripping the tool?
The texture of the treated parts doesn't feel oily at all and the crystalline finish actually makes it feel more grippy. The oil that is sold by Jane Kits is designed so that it soaks into the surface of the phosphate coating but doesn't form a film on the surface. I have had people suggest that other types of oil would be better and probably if you were looking to store a part for a long time then something like cosmoline would be good but I have heard that it can be waxy and sticky so it wouldn't be so good for tools. It is too soon for me to tell how the parts will hold up with repeated use in say, a gloved hand so I am keen to find out too. For now, I just like the look of the finish and it is a useful way of preserving the tools that I was constantly having to clean up as the corrosion appeared on them.
Regards,
Preso
Understood. Thanks for taking the time to share, and I will be interested in any follow up on the subject.
I can't help but notice that the result you got on your die holder is much nicer than you got on your test pieces.
Any idea what caused that?
John, I noticed that too. I can't think why they look different. They are both made from bright mild steel and the process was essentially the same. Maybe I just took a little more care polishing the die holder.
Regards,
Mark
Hi from Brissy Mark, pitty that Jane's don't have affiliate links ;)
Brownells has a pretty good explanation of the parkerizing process...question- here in America we are having a major problem with tent cities particularly under bridges etc...on your extended vacation are people living under your new bridge when you returned?😀..
LOL. Funny how that only seems to be the case in cities with the most progressive policies that have been by liberals for decades...
Chris, no homeless people had moved in. I must say I was quite shocked when I travelled to the USA three years ago and saw homeless people sleeping in the statues outside Union Station in Washington DC. Our biggest cities here in Australia do have similar problems. Melbourne and Sydney are no exception. Where I live is a tourist destination and the homeless issue is hidden from view but I think it is universal in all developed nations. I had to laugh though when I was in San Francisco and a homeless guy had a cardboard sign which read "really bad advice, $1" At least he hadn't lost his sense of humour.
Regards,
Preso
@@Preso58 I will add one caveat to the living under bridges....here in Michigan we are divided into two peninsulas...and joined together by the Mackinac bridge...a 5 mile straight...anywho those who live in the lower peninsula all live under the bridge and are considered"trolls" to the yoopers...people in the upper peninsula
It’s the bottom of the container touching the hot plate heats up and expands then pops off the hot plate then cools down and repeats it’s caused from hot spots in the Element
I hadn't thought of that. I may have to put some diagonal creases in the bottom of the container to pre stress it. However, I started to notice that the level of the solution was dropping as the water in the solution boiled off. I topped it up with clean water and the popping stopped. I am wondering if the solution was becoming super saturated. I want to try it again with the solution made up to 5 litres which is what I started with. Jane Kits do recommend having the correct ratio of water in the solution.
Regards,
Mark
Interesting results! Didn't fancy the crystallization, though.
Jose, I actually like it but it was not what I was expecting when I first started the process. I thought it would be a flatter satin like finish.
Regards,
Mark
hey Mark, do you know that primer and paint are very different at corrosion resistance? primer is theoretically porous and will rust given enough moisture and time. paint is obviously a (theoretically) hard sheen fully protective surface finish. not all primers are the same, and i think etch primer might actually be worse for corrosion resistance.
Mark,
I would like to see this test repeat the same test with both electroless nickel and a zinc coating.
Roger, I did some electroless nickel plating years ago but the requirement to heat up the nickel solution made it just as time consuming as the parkerising. I have successfully zinc plated at home and just recently I did a test piece which I have added to my other samples. I will probably revisit the samples next year just to let you know how they are holding up. I can report though that the parkerised test samples are still fine but the untreated steel piece is now red with rust. czcams.com/video/NpW1inPujWk/video.html
My method to do both Zinc and Manganese parkerizing are as follows. The Manganese is more of a charcoal grey. It was used on M1 Carbines. The Zinc parkerizing has a greenish grey and was used more on M1 Garands. Either process is a Phosphoric acid base (no pun intended) with either manganese or zinc dissolved in it. Then a small piece of 0000 de-greased steel wool dissolved in it prior to parkerizing your part. After parkerizing I heat the part with a torch till it's hot to the tough and apply a high sulfur oil to the part and let it soak for a couple hours. I love that little boiling tank you made.
That's interesting. I didn't know that you could zinc parkerise parts. I purchased my iron phosphate parkerisng solution as a commercially available product but I love the finish and it has proven to be bullet proof in terms of wear resistance and corrosion resistance. The only downside is that there are lots of solutions to heat up and I am sure it adds a zero or two to our electricity bill now that the energy company has shifted our tariff to a "time of use" model which is code for price gouging.
Regards,
Mark
This is pure conjecture but perhaps, paint that wasn't mixed well was in the drop tube inside the can. That nearly straight line of paint peeling off is a bit odd. So perhaps that first bit of sprayed paint was a bit umm "not well mixed" or something similar. I have to admit that I didn't really pay attention to the direction of spray when you started. Do you purge your spray cans according to directions?
I don't think that you allowed enough time for the metal to dry honestly. The speckled pattern of removed paint from the clean steel kind of shows this a bit. Paint not adhering in tiny pockets, like it it did here, shows that something possibly seeped out of the metal to create the pattern: oil, water, or other contaminates. It might have been a good idea to bake such chunky bit of steel for a while before painting. Even then it can be difficult to ensure that there are zero contaminates. Then again perhaps the metal was perfect and you had old cruddy paint. To many variables and one can only guess.
Ian, I think you might be correct about the paint not being mixed properly. I must say I was a bit casual about prepping the paint can. It was an old can too so that might account for the speckling. The parts that I tested had been sitting along with the others for about 8 weeks so the paint should have been well an truly cured. I was expecting the paint on the untreated part to just peel right off. Maybe I should have used a coat of enamel?
@@Preso58 No doubt the paint was cured. You didn't mention why the paint test was the one that you were most curious about. Is this for the sake of curiosity or did you want a comparison because you are thinking of using paint or Parkerising for a specific purpose? For the home gamer, I think it's just important to note that finishing metal using some method is MUCH better than leaving bare steel around. Durability of different methods is difficult to test because it takes a much more sophisticated procedure than most of us have access to. Just trying to make sure everything is coated perfectly (to not skew results) is a pain in ass. Now move onto a controlled test of durability... Ya it's not really worth the effort. Thanks for the interesting video.
Primer will not protect metal primer will hold a third of its own weight in moisture if you want a primer that will protect metal you will need a primer sealer many years ago an old boss of mine told me this and I didn’t believe him mostly because I was a young dumb kid So I took a piece of bare metal and sanded it really well and primer it and left it outside most of the summer I then took lacquer thinner and scrub the primer off and there was a light coat of rust covering the entire piece of metal that I had sanded and primed
Joe, the etch primer that I used is a really cheap product that is sold as an automotive self etching primer. It is pretty much useless on anything but sandblasted steel. I was surprised that it adhered as well as it did. I have seen quick drying paints absorbing moisture as you described especially here in the very humid climate that we have. As the solvents evaporate they lower the temperature of the surface which allows moisture to condense into the paint mix. This does exactly what you described by allowing the bare steel under the paint to start forming a layer of rust. I have a cheap Chinese laser cutter which was painted with a top coat directly over the bare steel. The paint started to delaminate and the steel underneath was red with oxide. Rust is the enemy!
Regards,
Preso
I noticed a Red Bull race car :-)
Ahh, sad story about that.... I was very fortunate to be able to tour the Red Bull technology centre back in 2009 when Mark Webber was driving for Red Bull. Then, Dan Ricciardo took over Mark's seat and as an Aussie it was very gratifying to see them winning races. Now, each time I look up and see that poster I know it will have to come down and a Renault will have to go up in it's place. If only it was a competitive car!
Regards,
Preso
@@Preso58 Sorry to hear that. As a Dutch man I get warm fuzzy feelings from watching a Red Bull race car...at least most of the time :-) Although I pretty much think the same thing, if only it was a competitive car. But the Renault engine is not too bad, the guys from McLaren are not doing bad at all. But Ricciardo is a top driver and he deserves a much better car indeed. Can you imagine how the battles in the front would look like if Ricciardo could battle along with Max, Leclerc, Vettel, Bottas and Hamilton. That would make an exiting race!
You got contamination on part 1 from the WD40 that you used near to it.
Maybe, cleanliness is everything when doing any sort of metal plating, anodising or paint preparation. I used to work in a factory that made fishing reels and all the metal parts went into giant vibratory tumblers with some pretty nasty alkaline solutions prior to nickel and chrome plating. Nothing was touched by hand once the parts came out of the tumblers. In a small shop it's almost inevitable that parts will get contaminated in some way. However, I still have samples of those parkerised parts and not one of them has rusted since I treated them. I should really do a follow up soon to show how they have faired since doing the original video.
Regards,
Mark
I guess some are impossible to please Mark. You go out of your way to run the best tests you can think up for what most of us might see in average shop conditions, plus spend a whole lot of extra time to video and edit it all. And at this point there's already 3 fools who obviously can't appreciate or probably even understand what there looking at. So for whatever it's worth you have my sincere thanks for doing so.
Thanks for that. I aim to please.
Regards,
Preso
For anyone interested here is a diy (simple cemicals) version of this.. czcams.com/video/xmv58Z3RZ9c/video.html