So, if its one thing your Late Bay is going to do really well its RUST! Almost every part of the van I have touched so far is rusty, has rusted and disappeared, looks like its about to rust or covered in rust remover! When I diligently decided I would remove all remnants of rust every time I overhauled anything it became glaringly obvious that my 400ml pot of Hammerite Rust Remover was not going to cut the mustard. That coupled with the fact that if you get it over your hands they go green and stay green. I literally looked like I had robbed a cash box off a Securicor Guard! So, I decided to turn to science and build an electrolysis bath. The pluses of this approach is that once you’ve built the thing all you need to buy is Soda Crystal – £5 a packet from Sainsbury and plug in your battery charger. No scrubbing, no mess (kind of!!!). So I thought I would share how I went about building this and show you the results. Get ready for some Blue Peter action.

So let’s start with the stuff you are going to need to build this thing:

1. Battery Charger (new £80, I already had one – so free)
2. Plastic Container with a lid (£5 – thanks B & Q)
3. Steel (can be anything – even an old engine part, I used concrete rods(£7 – thanks B & Q, and Vernon for showing where to look)
4. Copper Wire (Use the thick electrician earth wire – £6 B & Q)
5. Soda Crystals (£5 Sainsburys)
6. Water

TOTAL COST EXCLUDING THE CHARGER – £23 – bargain!

The HOW TO..

1. Start by making 6 holes in your lid large enough for your rods, for me 12mm.
2. Push rods through holes.
3. Join 5 of the rods together with your copper wire.
4. Drill nice big hole for your negative croc clip to go through.

1. Measure and mark water fill lines on the side of the container.

1. Pre-Measure your Soda Crystals.
2. I used 5 tbl spoons per 20 litres.

NOW PULL EVERYTHING TOGETHER – THIS IS ONE I MADE EARLIER..

So, how do we use this Bad Boy? Easy, fill with water and soda mix and connect your positive lead to the any one of the rods on the outside. Drop your piece of rusty metal in the water and connect your negative terminal to it – ENSURE THAT THE METAL IS NOT TOUCHING THE RODS!!! Turn on your battery charger and leave for around 6 hours. You should see bubbles appearing in the mixture fairly rapidly – this is good! After about an hour you should see that the rust from your object has begun to move to your rods – SCIENCE – GRRRREAT!!! Once you have finished, immediately dry your object and then lube or paint – jobs a good un! DONE! Remember to get rid of the waste responsibly, I wait until about 2AM and put it down my neighbours drain – thanks for killing the dolphins Chris!!!