Ultrasonic joy

[Bill Graham]

The colors inside these 1887 locks are showing up, thanks to an ultrasonic bath. The weathered coin exterior is looking better as well. Gotta love the ultrasonic.

[wayne goerres]

Hope you don't mind a little unsolicited advice. You should consider removing the V springs before putting in an ultrasonic cleaner. One of these days your going to get a nasty surprise.

[edgarspencer]

I was thinking the same thing, Wayne.

[Bill Graham]

What kind of surprise? Not using much heat and not cycling for long.

[wayne goerres]

They brake for unknown reasons. There have been reports of several members on this forum with broken springs from using Ultrasonic cleaning. It might be best to just remove the springs.

[Bill Graham]

Thank you. I’ve done the same with several Smith’s and never had an issue. Better safe than sorry, now that I know the risk.

[Brian Dudley]

I personally completely disassemble anything that goes into the ultrasonic. Small internal parts and springs go into a can of carb cleaner. And case colored parts go into the ultrasonic. I have not personally had Springs break in the ultrasonic, but I have heard of it happening. So I don't take the chance.

Plus, I want to make sure that no moisture is trapped inside of things after taken out. If all is broken down, all can be dried off and well oiled before re-assembly.

[Bill Graham]

After cleaning and drying, I ultrasic again but in a thin oil, let sit for a while, blow off excess before reassembly.

[Richard Flanders]

I use a small sonic cleaner intended for drafting pens to clean gun parts. I stand a pnut butter jar in it that contains lacquer thinner then pour water around the jar to fill the cleaner tub. The thinner removes goop that takes forever for other cleaners to remove, especially if you let them soak for a day before turning the cleaner on. The jar is big enough to put a Parker action in and when I'm done I can put the lid on and store it. For a few small parts I use Dawn dish soap solution in the cleaner without the jar. There are generally surplussed larger sonic cleaners, big enough to hold a disassembled Colt 1911 and more available on Ebay for very reasonable prices compared to a new one. Some will hold 2-3 Colts at once.

[Dean Romig]

The springs when compressed are under under stress and the molecules are in high tension. The ultrasound waves excite the molecules and can cause fractures. (from a layman in layman's terms.)





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[chris dawe]

One more point I would like to bring up to avoid someone a costly mistake ... is that some liquid /gel rust removers can also destroy springs ...same thing ,they will leave them in pieces

[John Campbell]

I beg to expand on Mr. Dawe's caution:

Please include lacquer thinner in the list of liquid dangers. I've recently had a box lock mainspring break on its own accord as it was still installed inside an action. The unit was merely soaking in lacquer thinner for a day. But... the spring was compressed.

Beware of cleaning ANY compressed flat spring in ANY medium!

Your "joy" may be short lived.