Interesting maint. info

[STEVEV]

Some interesting maintenance info.

Penetrating Oils

Machinist's Workshop MagT recently published some information on various penetrating oils that I found very interesting. Some of you might appreciate this. The magazine reports they tested penetrates for break out torque on rusted nuts.

They are below, as forwarded by an ex-student and professional machinist. They arranged a subjective test of all the popular penetrates with the control being the torque required to remove the nut from a "scientifically rusted" environment.



*Penetrating oils ........... Average torque load to loosen*



No Oil used ................... 516 pounds

WD-40 ..................... ... 238 pounds

PB Blaster .................... 214 pounds

Liquid Wrench ...............127 pounds

Kano Kroil .................... 106 pounds

ATF*-Acetone mix............53 pounds



The ATF-Acetone mix is a "home brew" mix of 50 - 50 automatic transmission fluid and acetone. Note this "home brew" released bolts better than any commercial product in this one particular test.



Our local machinist group mixed up a batch and we all now use it with equally good results.

Note also that "Liquid Wrench" is almost as good as "Kroil" for about 20% of the price.



Steve from Godwin-Singer says that ATF-Acetone mix is best, but you can also use ATF and lacquer thinner in a 50-50 mix. *ATF=Automatic Transmission Fluid

This actually works well, power-steering fluid also works as well as trans fluid!

[john01]

Good to know. Thanks for sharing.

[andoman]

Awesome info. I'm going to go find some acetone, ATF and rusty bolt right now!

[gasgasman]

Originally Posted by andoman

I'm going to go find some acetone, ATF and rusty bolt right now!

Time to raid the wife's nail polish remover stash.

[GMP]

Am I correct to assume "scientifically rusted" means steel nut/steel bolt? Any data on dissimilar metal corrosion, like a steel bolt in aluminum?

[farmerj]

Good stuff, Steve. I can use that info. at work.

Jeff

[Brian VT]

I saw some spray at my local shop. It's supposed to "freeze" the offending parts to break them free. For $23 a can, I'll want to have a very hard to replace part stuck before I'll be buying any.