How to quickly clean rusty tables (w/pics)

[David Eisan]

Hello everyone,

I have moved most of my machines from their previous location to my new house. As some of these tools have sat for a while I decided to clean them all as I set them up for use at the new place. One of the worst pieces was an older Delta 6x48" belt, 12" disk sander. It was my intention to do a full restoration w/paint, but I don't have time for that. I will be pressing it into service in the next week or so as I still have *loads* to do at the new place. This machine has sat idle for many many years and the tables were quite dingy.

Rather than using elbow grease to clean the table, I enlisted the services of a Makita 9924DB belt sander. Now, I know what you are thinking, Ack! Only and idiot would take a belt sander to a cast iron table! And, you are right, only an idiot would. Unless of course, that idiot was using a surface conditioning belt rather than regular sanding belt. A surface conditioning belt looks like a Scotchbrite pad. This one was blue, and I have no idea what grit it conforms to. We have been using this on used equipment at work for a while and it does wonders, cleaning up quickly without leaving any marks.

The table was sprayed with "Top Saver", left to sit for a minute, and then I had at it for a short bit of time with belt sander and the blue surface conditioning belt.

You can see the table on the sander, halfway done, done, and back on the sander.









Very impressive results for a very small amount of work.

I also cleaned up my table saw, jointer and OSS as well. The bandsaws will have to wait until they make it over here.

Thanks for looking,

David.

Every Neighbourhood has one, in Mine I'm Him

[Todd Burch]

Great idea! Now you need one thin enough to reach into the miter slot!

Todd

[alex grams]

maybe for the miter slot you can get a polishing disc and put it on the end of a drill and just run it down there.

Very nice though.

Where did you purchase the refinishing belt?

[Noah Levy]

Electrolysis will also get every little "seed" of rust without removing any metal. If you haven't tried it, it's amazing.

Hello everyone,

I have moved most of my machines from their previous location to my new house. As some of these tools have sat for a while I decided to clean them all as I set them up for use at the new place. One of the worst pieces was an older Delta 6x48" belt, 12" disk sander. It was my intention to do a full restoration w/paint, but I don't have time for that. I will be pressing it into service in the next week or so as I still have *loads* to do at the new place. This machine has sat idle for many many years and the tables were quite dingy.

Rather than using elbow grease to clean the table, I enlisted the services of a Makita 9924DB belt sander. Now, I know what you are thinking, Ack! Only and idiot would take a belt sander to a cast iron table! And, you are right, only an idiot would. Unless of course, that idiot was using a surface conditioning belt rather than regular sanding belt. A surface conditioning belt looks like a Scotchbrite pad. This one was blue, and I have no idea what grit it conforms to. We have been using this on used equipment at work for a while and it does wonders, cleaning up quickly without leaving any marks.

The table was sprayed with "Top Saver", left to sit for a minute, and then I had at it for a short bit of time with belt sander and the blue surface conditioning belt.

You can see the table on the sander, halfway done, done, and back on the sander.









Very impressive results for a very small amount of work.

I also cleaned up my table saw, jointer and OSS as well. The bandsaws will have to wait until they make it over here.

Thanks for looking,

David.

Every Neighbourhood has one, in Mine I'm Him

[Brad Evans]

Electrolysis will also get every little "seed" of rust without removing any metal. If you haven't tried it, it's amazing.

Can you point to how this is done? Thanx...

[Tom Zielinski]

Can you point to how this is done? Thanx...

http://www.chip.com/buick/techtips/rustremoval.html
http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/andyspatch/rust.htm

For example, btw Google is your friend.

[Matt Day]

I'd be interested in where you got the belt too. I couldn't dig up much with google. Thanks.

[Richard Dragin]

Sounds like a good method. I always use an angle grinder with a wire wheel which is fast and lets you get the miter slots also. The wire wheel isn't the most pleasant thing to use as the wires do come off so gloves and long sleeves are required.

Electrolysis is great for smaller items but a machine top is rather large for most hobbiests to set up for and it's more effiecient to use a mechanical method, imo.

[Steven Wilson]

Nice job. I have a pad for my Metabo grinder that accepts the 3M surface conditioning disks. I also have a small 1/4" shaft roloc disk pad to use with a drill. What rust?

[Joe Melton]

I cleaned up my unisaw table using a random orbit sander and a scotchbrite pad. I sprayed the table surface with WD-40, laid the scotchbrite pad on the oil, set the sander on the pad, and had at it. It worked pretty well, and took about as long as it takes to google blue sanding belts.
Joe

[Bruce Page]

David, where do you find these creatures?

"A surface conditioning belt looks like a Scotchbrite pad."

[Richard Dragin]

Here is what a minute with a wire wheel can do.

[Andrew Thuswaldner]

I'm not expecting the technique is going to be similar but do any of you have suggestions for how to clean up my Forrest table saw blade? It has never been the same since I cut some MDF for a cabinet I made last winter. I've tried the Freud bit and blade cleaner stuff but it' harder to get the teeth clean than I expected. As usual I have enough 'other stuff' to do so I'm looking at the easiest way to do a good job.

Andrew

[Ellen Benkin]

Try oven cleaner. Let it sit for awhile and then use a scotchbrite pad to remove the gunk.

[Todd Burch]

You can take it to your local sharpener, show them, and they will be happy to sell you a quart of whatever it is they use to get blades clean. Or, let them clean it.

I gauge my blade's performance on how they cut, not how they look!!!

Todd