[Stoves] Re: Improving longevity of steel stoves; Chiwicla-lining

[William Carr]

On May 7, 2006, at 10:06 AM, Crispin Pemberton-Pigott wrote:

> This revives an old conversation with several inputs from William  
> Carr.  It
> was about improving the longevity of metal by various means and of  
> course it
> drifted to ceramic liners and how to make them stronger.

I have been learning about Electrolytic Rust Removal lately.

You hook up a rusty part you want to clean to a negative lead from a  
trickle charger, and immerse in a solution of baking soda and water.

The positive lead goes to a sacrificial piece of metal and that also  
sits in the solution.


In a few days of treating parts, I cleaned half a dozen rusty tools,  
and the sacrificial metal rusted away a thousand times faster than  
normal !

I used a piece of steel rail used for hanging shelves and it's rusted  
half away now.   It looks like it's been buried in a bog for twenty  
years.

The idea, as far as I can tell, is that you supply electrons to the  
piece you want to clean, and rust turns into a ceramic-like substance  
and falls off leaving clean metal.

The sacrificial piece balances the reaction, keeping the 'salt'  
solution healthy by taking away electrons.   That results in a  
reaction that destroys the metal connected to the positive lead.

This has me wondering what would happen if you supplied a trickle of  
current to the metal of a stove --- it would have to be insulated  
from grounding out the charge, of course.

It might just help the metal resist oxidation that happens due to the  
stove being stressed by heat.

I know, there's no baking soda (a salt) involved here.

So the current might have to be higher to compensate, but recall that  
the environment inside a stove is somewhat electrically active --  
free radicals in the smoke might subsitute for the salt environment...