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Ted Mooney, P.E. RET
Pine Beach, NJ

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How to remove stains from stainless steel sampling cylinders after fabrication

Q. We are fabricating stainless steel oil sampling cylinders by welding/bending process. After these processes some stains/marks are left inside & outside of the ss sampling bottles. We would like to know how to remove these stains and clean it thoroughly. The materials used are SS-304/SS-316.

Keshav Sivakumar
project engineer - New Delhi, Delhi, India
2007

First of two simultaneous responses --

A. For an excellent free tutorial to answer all your questions go to the following www.nickelinstitute.org/8/index1.shtml At the middle of the page click on stainless steel, then click on guides to welding and fabrication, then click on click on here to view presentation. Good luck.

Michael Swasko
Saporito Finishing Company

Cicero, Illinois

2007

Second of two simultaneous responses --

A. Alkaline electroclean to remove lubricants and soils, then electropolish. If the bottle openings are very small, clean the interiors before final fabrication.

Ken Vlach [deceased]
- Goleta, California

Finishing.com honored Ken for his countless carefully researched responses. He passed away May 14, 2015.
Rest in peace, Ken. Thank you for your hard work which the finishing world, and we at finishing.com, continue to benefit from.
2007

Q. Hello, one of the products we manufacture is a 12" diameter x 25" 304 SS cylinder with a 1" opening on one end. This cylinder requires electropolishing both inside and out. We currently outsource the electropolishing and are looking into the possibility of bringing the process in house. We already have a fair size plating department capable of passivation, copper plating ss, and Alodine coating aluminum. No one here has any experience with electropolishing, but I would like to give it a shot. What would it take to get this process set up? I am concerned about electropolishing the inside of the container more than anything.

Blake Winkelmann
Manufacturing Engineer - St. Louis, Missouri, United States
January 4, 2013

A. Hi Blake. The Electroplating Engineering Handbook [on AbeBooks or eBay or Amazon affil links] has an excellent chapter which introduces the electropolishing of stainless steel. Electropolishing the inside of a cylinder with a small opening is complicated by the fact that you need both good solution exchange and a way for the hydrogen bubbles to escape.

Regards,

Ted Mooney, P.E.
Striving to live Aloha
finishing.com - Pine Beach, New Jersey
January 4, 2013

Thanks Ted! I ordered a copy of the handbook last week. Hopefully it will be here shortly.

Blake Winkelmann
- St. Louis, Missouri, United States
January 4, 2013

A. Our calculations: surface to polish 124 dm2, DC power - 1000A at 24V, tank of 1m3 volume.

Anna Berkovich
Russamer Lab

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

January 10, 2013

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