Anyone try electrolytic rust removal?

I have a 2 big W&B blades from a bay buy that are perfectly shaped still but seriously covered in rust. The scales are both bone - but trashed - so I want to rescale them both and get the blades cleaned up. My first complete overhaul. I'd normally go at them with a light touch with a wire or synthetic brush wheel on the Dremel and if that doesn't work, then use slightly more abrasive wheels. But on a fluke yesterday I went Googling for other methods and stumbled across the electrolytic technique.

Trying to match the instructions what I did was get the blade connected to negative post of a 9 volt battery and a few nails to the positive (surrounding the blade), in water with baking soda. I tried it on the worst blade and immediately the hydrogen gas started rising, and after about an hour all the rust was floating on the top with some dirt on the bottom - but it left a lot of black deposit (as expected) which I've been removing by a long soak in lemon juice for the last 12 hours.

My question is does this process damage the integrity of the blade at all (i.e., make the edge brittle?) and is this a good way to remove rust? It sure has been easy so far and without removing any underlying metal that I can tell. If this is a good way to go, I'll rig up a container that's all set to surround a blade with metal as well as with pre-connected electrical leads to a battery. It's way more clean and less damaging than a wire or abrasive from what I can tell.

If you do a search in the forum for this, you will see that this has been discussed a few times. I don't think there was a lot of success with it, as it removes rust but doesn't touch the pitting so it doesn't really eliminate much, if any, of the drudge work.

I kind of like the pitting as long as it doesn't hinder the edge, But I'm kind of weird that way.

I have done it to several razors. I like it for the simple fact that you can completely de-rust a razor without taking it out of the scales.

It will destroy horn though, so watch out.


I used a battery charger and some lye in water for teh free electrons. Piece of cake.

As far as I can tell, no change in edge quality or anything like that.

I didn't realize people are using this method!

Here's another thread I remember from awhile back: Electrolysis - Straight Razor Place Forums

(I searched the forums for thread titles which included the word electrolysis)

Thanks for the link Hoglahoo - I did a search but used the wrong term.

Anyway the W&B wedge I'm working on is about to come out of the acid bath (100% lemon juice) and we'll see what it looks like. I guess I knew the pitting would not go away - just the rust - but that's what I'm looking for.

The point of the light acid is to remove that black coating left over after the electric rust removal. The issue I have is that I go right to sanding the rust and I'm afraid I'm removing a lot more metal than necessary. Hopefully this process cleans it all off and I can see where exactly I need to sand or grind o get rid of small pits without removing too much good steel.

Also it's good to know that the solution left over can be toxic! I'm not totally sure what the big nails I used for the positive side are made of, but I'll assume they're the wrong material the therefore the water (blue now) is toxic.

The absolute fastest way I have ever found to actually remove rust, is a razor blade, you just slice it right off there.... Then you can decide where to go from there.....
Whether you are going to sand ,tumble, buff, or God forbide dremel :fim: the blade.....

I use it quite extensivly, it works great. Check out my other thread on http://straightrazorpalace.com/works...-projects.html You can clearly see the difference.