Son in law has just gotten a spiral staircase with quite a bit of rust. I've seen posts here before on rust removal, but don't remember the details. It's outside so that we can do most anything. Suggestions will be most appreciated. We don't have a sandblaster. Thanks, Walt
Needle scaler, if you have a good compressor.
If he's going to put it in his house, he should take it to a sandblaster and have it blasted and then primed, and then he should paint it. Or he can take it and have it hot-dip galvanized. Either way will cost a few hundred dollars but the fix will be right. This isn't a temporary lashup to hold firewood, this is something he's going to look at for many years, and one of the first things a buyer will look at.
Something that big is way too big to do a metal prep type solution on, or to do anything remotely like electrolytic derusting. It's like a small piece of a ship, and ships get sandblasted, period.
GWE
Depending on size you could make a temporary tank out of a large tarp and fill it with water and some washing soda and use electrolytic rust removal on it. I've done that on full sized car frames and even a 20 foot trailer frame. Or rent a large compressor and blaster unit and have at it.
Need I?
You could spray or brush on hydrochloric acid and wash off/dry and paint it quickly.
Need I say wear eye and breathing protection and even maybe a disposable painters suit.
b
I set up one of my neighbours to do his staircase electrolytically. It was a cast iron spiral bought S/H as salvage and already dismantled into segment treads. Tread-by-tread, this was easy. Four treads would just fit into a plastic wheelie bin, bolted together on lengths of threaded studding. Two days for a set of four.
For power we used the old Vax PSU I'd previously used to do a canal boat hull (polythene sheet and _lots_ of duct tape).
Pity that the waterways people would get pissed off if you dropped some scrap iron anodes in the canal :-)
Mark Rand RTFM
DO you own a swimming pool and a big battery charger?
Gunner
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