De-oiling parts after Bar Feeding in the Lathe

ranchak · Feb 19, 2018

I have just installed a LNS Hydro Bar bar feeder. Obviously the finished parts have a thin layer of hydraulic oil on them from the bar feeder. Any ideas on an economical way to clean them. I have tried washing them in hot water, hot water with TSP and Simple Green. So far the score is hydraulic oil 3, me 0. of course my parts are different lengths, some ranging up to 9" long, brass, aluminum, SS. Some of the parts get anodized, nickle plated or painted so oil free parts are the end goal.

Limy Sami · Feb 19, 2018

wash them in gasoline then rinse in a water based cleaner and when the gas is too dirty just leave it to evaporate away. leaving you with a bit of sludge, ......cheap cheerful and I suspect against every possible Californian reg going.

Oh yeah, auto store solvent brake cleaners good, but dearer.

Sami exits stage left to await the shitstorm.

DDoug · Feb 19, 2018

Neighbors swiss shop runs oil (and those hydrodynamic bar feeders)

Got a parts washer that distills itself.

JRIowa · Feb 19, 2018

We had a bunch of washers from here: Industrial Parts Washer and Ultrasonic Cleaning | PROCECO

If you don't want to do that, buy a portable dishwasher. Rinse in mineral spirits first.
JR

ranchak · Feb 19, 2018

My volumes aren't high enough to justify buying a dedicated parts washer. I had thought about a dishwasher, but I don't think I can get away with running the waste water on the ground. My building is on a septic tank and I'm not sure where the excess water from the tank goes. Not sure why we have septic tanks in the city either.

DDoug · Feb 19, 2018

ranchak said:
My volumes aren't high enough to justify buying a dedicated parts washer. I had thought about a dishwasher, but I don't think I can get away with running the waste water on the ground. My building is on a septic tank and I'm not sure where the excess water from the tank goes. Not sure why we have septic tanks in the city either.

You have a money producing shop with a LNS barfeeder, and you won't
spend a dime on a parts worsher ?

ranchak · Feb 19, 2018

Diggerdoug you sort of misunderstood me. I said the volume isn't there to justify buying a parts washer. I haven't priced one, but I would assume they are at least 10K. Also I am limited on floor space. My original idea was to use a vibratory tumbler with a mixture of TSP and water. Probably would have to use a dedicated media due to contamination from the oil, but I already own a vibratory tumbler so my cost would be low.

R1Rider · Feb 19, 2018

Gasoline is always a good idea when you have electric motors in the area. Simple Green does a good job or I would call a company like Chemetal/Okite and have a rep come out and evaluate. He may have a product that will work at room temperature that you can use without an elaborate setup.

carbonbl · Feb 19, 2018

Find a used good quality ultrasonic cleaner (I use Crest brand). No need to get one branded as an "industrial parts washer" , something from a used medical/dental supply house will work just as well. I think I paid $350 on craigslist for my unit that was like $1500+ new. Mine has a separate generator unit that connects to the tank/transducers so I could switch to different size/shape tanks if needed. You can get small cheap ones easily but there really is a difference in the high quality units, mine will strip powdercoat if turned all the way up.

I use it to clean oil/coolant off machined parts as well as cleaning very dirty used auto parts. It works amazingly well even with very mild solutions and has vastly sped up and simplified our parts cleaning process. Our traditional style solvent bath only gets used for really big stuff now, or in situations where we are scraping off sizeable "chunks". I use Brulin 815GD which is designed for ultrasonics, but lots of other stuff works well enough including diluted simple green. If you have a decent ultrasonic unit you do not need to use nasty solvents, kerosene or fuel. In fact these are not recommended since ultrasonic can generate heat.

If you are using it constantly for extended periods, I would recommend installing a continuously-circulating filtration system of some kind, having to change out the fluid often is an annoyance even though it works OK with dirty fluid. The higher quality units will have inlets/outlets built in to the tank for this.

Miguels244 · Feb 19, 2018

Dawn in a US cleaner.
Rinse repeat.

Even thus since you are on septic you can explain why dumping things down the drain is bad.

garyhlucas · Feb 19, 2018

Septic tanks settle the solids and anearobic break down the biological stuff while the water goes out to the drain fields and back into the ground and ultimately into the aquifer. So any chemicals ultimately go into the water supply. If you get caught you could wind up paying to dig up the tank, and the drain fields and hauling it all to a hazardous landfill! But hey who is going to tell? No one here but us, you hope.

DDoug · Feb 19, 2018

ranchak said:
Diggerdoug you sort of misunderstood me. I said the volume isn't there to justify buying a parts washer. I haven't priced one, but I would assume they are at least 10K. Also I am limited on floor space. My original idea was to use a vibratory tumbler with a mixture of TSP and water. Probably would have to use a dedicated media due to contamination from the oil, but I already own a vibratory tumbler so my cost would be low.

You ass-you-me wrong.
5 minutes on google would show you.....

FredC · Feb 20, 2018

There was a recent thread in CNC part of the forum on tumblers, what goes wrong when oil gets in a small tumbler with out flow through compound was a source of much grief the only one that never had the problem was using a flow through system which will generate a lot of contaminated waste water. In the OPs case with a septic system and lots of contaminated compound will not work. in our case we use cutting oil, keeping a couple of 5 gallon buckets with kerosene or another solvent works for us. You will need covers on all of them and an empty one(with a cover also) to let the solvent drain off the parts. The really contaminated solvent is used to start brush piles on fire. This works for us as we are out in the country and no smokers work here.

http://www.practicalmachinist.com/v...luminum-ceramic-how-eliminate-residue-346175/

Mtndew · Feb 20, 2018

Get an ultrasonic cleaner for a few hundred bucks.

ranchak · Feb 20, 2018

I ordered an ultrasonic cleaner today, it will be here Thursday. Once I give it a try I'll post updates

edwin dirnbeck · Feb 20, 2018

ranchak said:
I ordered an ultrasonic cleaner today, it will be here Thursday. Once I give it a try I'll post updates

An ultrasonic might speed the process up ,but it wont DESTROY the oil. You still must dispose of it SOMEHOW. Edwin Dirnbeck

Tony Quiring · Feb 20, 2018

Lowes sells greased lightening that flat out gets oil and grease.

9 bucks a gallon or 26 for 5.

Does not smell nor bother your skin.

Spray some on nasty greasy things and the grease melts so spray or dipping parts should be effective.

For us we use pump type garden sprayer with the GM to get it wet and keep it wet (last was nasty bobcat typical diesel).

Then use another sprayer of strong mixed dawn as a pre rinse as we were too lazy to drag out the hose.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I337Z using Tapatalk

ranchak · Mar 2, 2018

The ultrasonic cleaner is doing a great job of removing the hydraulic oil from the finished parts. Amazingly it appears that there really isn't all that much oil on them by the looks of the water.

FredC · Mar 2, 2018

Probably some of the oil is suspended in the detergent and it will be come less effective with time.

Spruewell · Mar 2, 2018

Vibratory tumbler with walnut shells like they use for polishing brass cartridges. It will take the oil right off and give your parts a real nice polish!

De-oiling parts after Bar Feeding in the Lathe

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