Preventing and/or Dealing with Aluminum Oxidation and Rust

[BusyLittleShop]

Originally Posted by natas

You win.


We want to win against mean old Mr. Rust because he never sleeps so
you don't want to loose the battle by riding your prize in the rain or
hitting it with a garden hose... both acts promotes corrosion in all
the little nooks and crannies hidden from view... The pitfull is that
metal is etched for life... examples...

 

[natas]

There is some rust forming on the bottom and inside (towards center of bike) of my muffler/pipes. I was going to attempt the aluminum foil and wd40 method and follow up with some chrome polish. Can anyone vouch for this method? I also found some rust on the exhaust clamps, edges getting rust with a whitish hue around it. I was going to use fine steel wool to try to clean that up.

 

[sunruh]

natas you have to actually find and use REAL steel wool and not the volcanic wool (which looks the same)

 

[natas]

The wool I have is an old bag of this Formby's Steel wool. Used for furniture refinishing. It looks very fine. But it's old enough not to have any numbers on it (like 0000, etc.).

 

[natas]

 

[natas]

I went ahead and got some Nevr-dull, and it seemed to clean up the affected areas real nice. Didn't trust the foil/wool method.

 

[wpod]

Extreme measures my friends go to protect their prized bikes from the elements...

That is a work of art.

 

[wpod]

Think of the corrosion as patina.

 

[Chris Meutsch]

There is some rust forming on the bottom and inside (towards center of bike) of my muffler/pipes. I was going to attempt the aluminum foil and wd40 method and follow up with some chrome polish. Can anyone vouch for this method? I also found some rust on the exhaust clamps, edges getting rust with a whitish hue around it. I was going to use fine steel wool to try to clean that up.

Glad I searched first before starting a new thread.

Yes, foil and saltwater clean chrome nicely. I just found this out yesterday. Highly recommended. Dry thoroughly after. I applied spray wax to it (chrome hitch cover.)

 

[gmac]

put the plastic UNDER the plywood. plywood is a water sponge. 3 mil and thicker can be quite slippery when dry so BE CAREFUL of slips, the ply can skate on it also.
plastic or any material impervious to water migration on top of the bike will hinder evaporation,
(gore-tex seems to be advertised for this but I wouldnt use it if any other measures were available.
waterformed corrosion is usually the product of LONGER exposure to water on the surface so fastest evap is better.

anticondensate heaters in elec and mechanical outdoor gear are very common to defeat condensate, it usually happens when the air near the cold metal is trapped and the outer surrounding air warms (and gains relative water content) and then it incidentally contacts the cooler metal. bingo- the 'dew point' of the higher humidity air is reached and the extra water comes out on the cold metal.,
any conventional outdoor storage area is hard to keep free of waterformed corrosion so if thats the only $ compatible way - think protective chemistry, and it may not be pretty ( cosmoline history?)

you could do the zipper-balloon-bag thing. get a big zipperbag ( they do make them really big) and put it on the ply, push the clean/dry bike onto it, zip it up, ( can fill with DRY nitrogen or DRY air,) that keeps transient high-humidity (high water vapor content in the air) away from metals because there is very limited condensate potential if the INTERIOR air is dry.
zip it closed on the coldest day you can ( in times of no rain recent, its often the dryest air).
probly too extreme for budget but science can find 'catskinning' techniques in many procedures.

google car-storage-bags and zipper-bag-vehicle-storage and you can see them. this may be much faster ( but more $) than all the work to apply and remove antirust surface protectants (lots of investment in elbow grease there) .

 

[gmac]

Glad I searched first before starting a new thread.

Yes, foil and saltwater clean chrome nicely. I just found this out yesterday. Highly recommended. Dry thoroughly after. I applied spray wax to it (chrome hitch cover.)

you can make rust form on chrome by scratching with real steelwool and then air/water exposure. rust on chrome forms where the iron particles (in the steel) are exposed to free oxygen (edges, cracks, pits, scratches), the chrome itself is not the rust. cleaning rust off and then using chemical protectant is best way to limit rust and wasted elbow grease. very hard to get all rust out of pitted metal ( must use chemistry or electrochemistry) so remove as much as can first, then preventive treatment. you cant put the iron atoms back on there but you can slow down the rate they are leaving.