Hi all,
I did more work on my phase convertor project this evening (I'll post some pictures soon). I stripped a 230 V -> 110 V transformer in preparation for winding a new secondary to give me a 415 V output. It's amazing how many individual pieces of iron make up a transformer core - in this case it must be close to 1000.
Anyway, the laminations show a little surface rust. It's minimal but still makes a mess and it would be good to clean it off in order to do a really nice rebuild job. There are two sizes of lamination: approximately 3" x 1.5" and 9" x 1.5" (and a third size in the centre, which I can't yet measure). Both are about 1/64" thick.
Any ideas on how I might clean off the surface rust? They're too delicate for tumbling in a concrete mixer, and I don't have a blast cabinet. I've thought about electrolytic de-rusting, but haven't tried it before. Does it work okay with a whole bunch of little components resting in a metal basket? Cleaning 1000 laminations with steel wool seems like an endless task!
Any thoughts would be appreciated.
Best wishes,
Chris