Cast iron stripping

JR-WNC

JR-WNC

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I was wondering if many of you guys on here have had any experience in stripping "caked" up cast iron pans? I have built an electrolysis tank and it works great for lightly caked pans.

It's made out of a 30 gallon plastic barrel with a manual battery charger (6v 2amp & 12v 2amp/10amp) I put around 17-23 gallons of water in it with 2 cups Arm & Hammer washing soda mixed well (none settling at bottom) I have 2-12x18? 22 gauge steel sheet metal attached with solid core copper wire and black anodized bolts. I hang the cast iron skillets with a piece of the solid core wire after roughing the hole in the handle up with sandpaper to get a somewhat good connection.

The tank will strip 90% of the old buildup off of the cast iron pans but leave spots of absolutely hardened buildup that I have to beat/scrape off with end of needle nose pliers. I have ready about the easy off method and got a couple of cans to give it a "lye" soaking but I heard it takes multiple times to strip it. And that stuff is more toxic than just washing soda and water.

The pans I'm stripping aren't mine and I would like to get the entire piece down to bare metal and not leave streaks of buildup. I leave pans in electrolysis tank 24hrs at a time, take them out to scrub off what buildup has turned loose with rough scotchbrite and wire brush. It took 6 days in tank and 2 hrs of elbow grease on last one.

Do you guys have any input that could help me figure out how to speed up the process a day or two or do I just need to let the electrolysis tank do its job. I'm still new(ish) at it and don't want to mess the pans up.

Also what kind of cloth/rag do you use to wipe the oil in the pan to season it to keep from leaving "lint" in the pan during seasoning process?
 
AR10ShooterinNC said:
N4jAFHQ.jpg
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Easy. Cigarettes and Spam.


Diablos said:
Dont cuss and ya aint got ta worry bout no lye in yer mouth
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How do you figure? I can lye without cussing.
 
Last cast iron I worked on I threw it in the oven with tin foil under it and cranked it up to the highest temperature only took about an hour and I let it cool down in the oven before I handled it. Bought a sanding flap wheel for my grinder and went to town on the bad spots. Then to an random orbital sander working up the grit levels until it was as smooth as I wanted it.

Have the fan going and a window open when you open the oven, and make sure your wife isn't home unless she's in on the process. It's not as bad as burnt popcorn and I haven't set off a fire alarm. It is enough smoke to get a "WTF are you doing" response.
 
Diablos said:
soap was (still is) made with lye
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Sodium hydroxide is the fancy name. It's in dawn.

I think you can get some fancy free hugger hand soap that doesn't have it, but you're not using that on a pan.

Lye (sodium hydroxide) is a key ingredient in soap. It might be called something different in solid vs liquid soaps but does the same thing.
 
Diablos said:
soap was (still is) made with lye


also, be very careful with that lye (very caustic, wear glasses, gloves, and apron), and once done soaking you pan, neutralize the lye with vinegar
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Squanchy said:
Sodium hydroxide is the fancy name. It's in dawn.

I think you can get some fancy free hugger hand soap that doesn't have it, but you're not using that on a pan.

Lye (sodium hydroxide) is a key ingredient in soap. It might be called something different in solid vs liquid soaps but does the same thing.
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And this is why the old folks never used soap on cast iron.
 
Squanchy said:
Last cast iron I worked on I threw it in the oven with tin foil under it and cranked it up to the highest temperature only took about an hour and I let it cool down in the oven before I handled it. Bought a sanding flap wheel for my grinder and went to town on the bad spots. Then to an random orbital sander working up the grit levels until it was as smooth as I wanted it.

Have the fan going and a window open when you open the oven, and make sure your wife isn't home unless she's in on the process. It's not as bad as burnt popcorn and I haven't set off a fire alarm. It is enough smoke to get a "WTF are you doing" response.
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These pans are so caked the bottom is flat with the heat ring, I have set the smoke alarm off already that way putting it on the "clean" cycle, it smoked the house up good. Is a good way to clean pans that ain't crusted up bad though.
 
JR-WNC said:
These pans are so caked the bottom is flat with the heat ring, I have set the smoke alarm off already that way putting it on the "clean" cycle, it smoked the house up good. Is a good way to clean pans that ain't crusted up bad though.
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Oh dang, well nevermind then. Caked bad means different things to different people. You have some serious work ahead of you.

Good luck
 
Squanchy said:
Lye (sodium hydroxide)
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I spent 10 min looking through cleaning section at ace hardware, they had "easy off" oven cleaner in a can but it didn't have sodium hydroxide, I went to sav-mor and they had 2 different cans, the yellow can of easy off had sodium hydroxide in it.
 
JR-WNC said:
I didn't know that part, thankyou. Just wash it in white or apple cider vinegar after cleaning it with water or before?
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either will work and is good to keep on hand during the process in case of a spill on your skin. do this before washing in water to neutralize the lye

reading your post above, oven cleaner works too, spray on and put it in a garbage bag. works best if you can leave it in the sun.
 
Diablos said:
reading your post above, oven cleaner works too, spray on and put it in a garbage bag. works best if you can leave it in the sun.
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Ok, thankyou. So it'll probably work better on warmer days in direct sunlight, how long do you leave it in garbage bag?
 
JR-WNC said:
Ok, thankyou. So it'll probably work better on warmer days in direct sunlight, how long do you leave it in garbage bag?
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thats going to depend on how thick the old seasoning is, just open the bag and peek in on it, spray extra cleaner as necessary
 
The electrolysis bath is a great way to clean most any iron or steel.

Do you clean the electrodes when they get caked up with gunk? They attract the junk from whatever your are cleaning and the junk reduces the current passing through which reduces the cleaning. That could be part of your issue with taking so long to clean.

The other issue with electrolysis cleaning is that it is "line of sight" .. The electrode needs to be in sight of the part that needs cleaning. If the back of the pan needs cleaning, but its no facing the electrode, then it can't get cleaned.

With those stubborn spots that won't clean up, try angling the electrode to the spot so that the electrode can "see" the side of the spot and can work on the under side of the spot.
 
I’ve tried the throw it on a fire technique. But I like huge fires and booze so that didn‘t end well. Next attempt was cheap ass Cabela‘s pan. Sanded with coarse, medium, fine then extra fine sand paper until it was down the bare metal and smooth. Then seasoned 7 times in the oven. Then cooked nothing but bacon and burgers on it for a few years. That is now a really good pan. 😁
 
put it in the gas grill, run the heat up to 700 and leave it for an hour or two. You can also do it cold with a carbide or tool steel scraper.

Also depends on the makeup of the crust, not sure how you’d get 3/16” of food buildup on the bottom of a pan.
 
I've been redoing several generations worth of cast iron. I just use the oven cleaner method, spray it down, leave it overnight, little water and vinegar to rinse off the lye and hit it with a good wire brush and repeat till it's bare metal. Once I get it down to bare metal I deal with any surface rust, sand smooth as possible on the inside (I go up to 1000 grit). Wash it good, bake it for at least an hour at 500 to get any moisture out of the iron, then start seasoning it. I actually start the seasoning over an open flame rather than in the oven, just a very light coat of oil while the pan is hot let it soak in, repeat for 4-5 coats and then go to the oven for longer heat time to set the seasoning.
 
cold1 said:
The electrolysis bath is a great way to clean most any iron or steel.

Do you clean the electrodes when they get caked up with gunk? They attract the junk from whatever your are cleaning and the junk reduces the current passing through which reduces the cleaning. That could be part of your issue with taking so long to clean.

The other issue with electrolysis cleaning is that it is "line of sight" .. The electrode needs to be in sight of the part that needs cleaning. If the back of the pan needs cleaning, but its no facing the electrode, then it can't get cleaned.

With those stubborn spots that won't clean up, try angling the electrode to the spot so that the electrode can "see" the side of the spot and can work on the under side of the spot.
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No, I knew it was going to be hard to clean when I started that pan, so I dumped out solution, filled with fresh water and Arm & Hammer, took my 2-18inx24inx 22 gauge plates out and hit them both sides with wire wheel and scotchbrite. My manual battery charger likes to turn itself off if I get too much Arm & Hammer in it. Amps too high? But I put it on 2 amp setting, and the battery charger reads 8 amps.

It has great line of sight with the pan, 2 plates front and back, and once they are clean and bare metal I turn it so sides are facing plates. Checking every 24 hrs and cleaning off what has turned loose, too 6 days in tank and a lot of elbow grease getting the small spots that didn't clean up. (Everything from the size of a #2 pencil eraser to a 2x2 area with clean spots in it.
 
Did lye with drain cleaner thats 100% lye.

24-36 hours in a tub and everything falls off. Wash well, season 1-3 coats, and right as rain.
 
JR-WNC said:
I was wondering if many of you guys on here have had any experience in stripping "caked" up cast iron pans? I have built an electrolysis tank and it works great for lightly caked pans.

It's made out of a 30 gallon plastic barrel with a manual battery charger (6v 2amp & 12v 2amp/10amp) I put around 17-23 gallons of water in it with 2 cups Arm & Hammer washing soda mixed well (none settling at bottom) I have 2-12x18? 22 gauge steel sheet metal attached with solid core copper wire and black anodized bolts. I hang the cast iron skillets with a piece of the solid core wire after roughing the hole in the handle up with sandpaper to get a somewhat good connection.

The tank will strip 90% of the old buildup off of the cast iron pans but leave spots of absolutely hardened buildup that I have to beat/scrape off with end of needle nose pliers. I have ready about the easy off method and got a couple of cans to give it a "lye" soaking but I heard it takes multiple times to strip it. And that stuff is more toxic than just washing soda and water.

The pans I'm stripping aren't mine and I would like to get the entire piece down to bare metal and not leave streaks of buildup. I leave pans in electrolysis tank 24hrs at a time, take them out to scrub off what buildup has turned loose with rough scotchbrite and wire brush. It took 6 days in tank and 2 hrs of elbow grease on last one.

Do you guys have any input that could help me figure out how to speed up the process a day or two or do I just need to let the electrolysis tank do its job. I'm still new(ish) at it and don't want to mess the pans up.

Also what kind of cloth/rag do you use to wipe the oil in the pan to season it to keep from leaving "lint" in the pan during seasoning process?
Click to expand...
I clicked on the topic thinking I might have some decent advice and in no way expected you to be on the "homemade electrolysis bath" stage of investigation. God bless.
 
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