Why do i suddenly have rust and what to do about it? Pallet fork staff and balance spring and staff covered in rust suddenly! (Didn't want to mix the two threads.)

[Birbdad]

So iv'e had the same procedure for watch cleaning since i started and it worked like a charm till now. For my shellacked parts I'd give em a little dip and swish in perchloroethylene and then puff them dry with my air puffer. I've yet to have an issue with rust. I've been struggling with a watch and had taken it apart, cleaned and reassembled it a bunch of times and got lazy about some thing, including inspection because I was so frustrated. On my last disassembly i noticed rust on a jewel hole. I check my pallet fork and the entire staff is coated in rust. Check the balance wheel and it is as well. 

1. Is there any tips or procedures to salvage these without destroying the shellac? If not it's fine, i got extras but it would be nice to salvage them. Would tossing them in evaporust work? Wondering what the move is here.

2. Any idea why this would suddenly happen? I have a mostly air tight but not perfect benzine jar i keep my perc  and it sat for quite some time. it got low so i topped it off. Is it possible moisture creeped in and that's what caused this? Wondering if anybody has any insight so i can prevent this in the future.

[nickelsilver]

In old texts they always say to dry parts in warm boxwood sawdust, the sawdust absorbs the solvent quickly and keeps the bulk of air away while the rest dries. Depending on your climate and humidity level, the evaporation of solvent can cause moisture to condense on the part, and that can cause rust. In modern times one would use a warm air stream to dry parts. Puffing with a blower will blow off the solvent, and cause rapid evaporation and exacerbate the condensation issue- and if you want to really see condensation blow on the part with your mouth!

 

In my climate condensation isn't a huge issue, but I do tend to use sawdust or warm air just to be sure.

[Birbdad]

2 minutes ago, nickelsilver said:

In old texts they always say to dry parts in warm boxwood sawdust, the sawdust absorbs the solvent quickly and keeps the bulk of air away while the rest dries. Depending on your climate and humidity level, the evaporation of solvent can cause moisture to condense on the part, and that can cause rust. In modern times one would use a warm air stream to dry parts. Puffing with a blower will blow off the solvent, and cause rapid evaporation and exacerbate the condensation issue- and if you want to really see condensation blow on the part with your mouth!

 

In my climate condensation isn't a huge issue, but I do tend to use sawdust or warm air just to be sure.

I figured...it also happens to be particularly hot and humid here this year. I know using a puffer is a pretty standard way to at least dry the balance and the pallet fork and i've not had issues till now. 

I know a food dehydrator is a pretty common way to dry watch parts....guess i gotta buy one now. 

So that begs the question...is it even possible to de-rust these tiny parts without destroying the shellac?

[Nucejoe]

1 hour ago, Birbdad said:

is it even possible to de-rust these tiny parts 

   Would a de-rusted hairspring not rust again  in matter of weeks/ months ? 

I guess some alloys are rust proof, yet I check all of them for  minute evidence of rust under high magnification. 

 

 

 

[mikepilk]

 

2 hours ago, Birbdad said:

I know a food dehydrator is a pretty common way to dry watch parts....guess i gotta buy one now. 

Or do what I do and use a hairdryer. Dries everything in seconds.

[Terrinecold]

I am quite afraid of blowing my parts away when using a hair drier, isn't it an issue?

[mikepilk]

2 hours ago, Terrinecold said:

I am quite afraid of blowing my parts away when using a hair drier, isn't it an issue?

No, I have the parts in the small mesh pots

[RichardHarris123]

39 minutes ago, mikepilk said:

am quite afraid of blowing my parts away

I really wouldn't want to blow my parts away. 

[nevenbekriev]

One good way to prevent parts blown by hairdryer is to hold the part in tweezers.

6 hours ago, Birbdad said:

...is it even possible to de-rust these tiny parts without destroying the shellac?

Why to be concerned about the shellac??? Save the part from the rust, then apply shellac. But my advice is not to use chemical way for rust removing, as this will for sure destroy the part. As this is only surface rust, use wooden stick and polishing paste

[JohnR725]

34 minutes ago, RichardHarris123 said:

I really wouldn't want to blow my parts away.

Actually from time to time I would like to blow up the parts preferably in the assembled watch. Or specifically I was thinking of the can it be nice to make my problem go away in a spectacular fashion but for a variety of reasons Debbie very very bad in my location to do that.

6 hours ago, Birbdad said:

shellacked parts

I'm always puzzled by why a different procedure for parts that have shellac? Because I run all of my parts through the cleaning machine and they come out nice and clean. Contrary to the YouTube gods to claim that ultrasonic alcohol cleaning fluids and probably just about everything else in the universe is bad for the shellac it seems to work just fine.

Then there is a universal concern of Rust the way you describe by you didn't mention something? I've seen several references to using epilam can lead to rust. There used to be a website that had pictures and I was at a lecture once with a described the exact same concern. The solvent used with the earlier batches of epilam well basically think of it like Freon it wasn't Freon but it was something else. So what happened is as it was drying of that operating it would produce a chilling affect and depending upon your location humidity in the air you would get the moisture in the air to condense on the steel parts the pallet fork and escape wheel. Then ultimately that would lead to rust and on the website the person showed the rust damage and the damage it was doing.

This is where I was at a lecture in some I was concerned about this so they had a hairdryer and yes you can hold the parts in your tweezers it works fine they would put it in The epilam and immediately warm air dry. The newer epilam is supposed to be less volatile so I don't think that's as much of an issue. I suppose it's conceivable though whatever your solvents is if you blow what sort of apparatus really fast could produce a chilling effect I think basically when anything evaporates it produces a chilling effect and if you have enough humidity in the area will have condensation

 

 

[VWatchie]

12 hours ago, Birbdad said:

Would tossing them in evaporust work?

If evaporust is like pure vinegar it should not affect the shellac.

12 hours ago, Birbdad said:

Any idea why this would suddenly happen?

I don't follow how you do it but the following story might be helpful.

When I was new, I used an ultrasonic cleaner. I placed the parts in glass jars partly filled with a degreaser and lowered them into the ultrasonic cleaner partly filled with warm water. The glass jars had lids that were not completely tight. When I put the lid on the ultrasonic cleaner to reduce the noise from the motors, condensation formed on the inside of the ultrasonic cleaner and penetrated the glass jars. As water is heavier than petrol products, the water fell to the bottom of the glass jars and the parts were bathed in water, causing them to rust.

These days I use a 72-year-old antiquated ELMA cleaning machine (still going strong) with a heater and it has solved these problems.

[Neverenoughwatches]

13 hours ago, Terrinecold said:

I am quite afraid of blowing my parts away when using a hair drier, isn't it an issue?

No exactly as Mike said or run the hairdryer through a voltage regulator so the heat and fan speed are controllable. 

10 hours ago, RichardHarris123 said:

I really wouldn't want to blow my parts away. 

Me neither, still usable as far as I'm concerned. 

[Birbdad]

18 hours ago, Nucejoe said:

   Would a de-rusted hairspring not rust again  in matter of weeks/ months ? 

I guess some alloys are rust proof, yet I check all of them for  minute evidence of rust under high magnification. 

 

No clue, i sorta doubt it.
 

 

17 hours ago, Terrinecold said:

I am quite afraid of blowing my parts away when using a hair drier, isn't it an issue?

Yeah for all my normal parts they're still in the basket and i blowdry them. 

For balances though I"m not entirely sure what to do as at least i've been told you have to hold up the balance wheel with your tweezers while you dry and hitting that with a blowdryer would be a disaster....maybe this step isn't necessary...or maybe i could just put it on a mainplate and then blowdry. Never really thought of this.

 

13 hours ago, JohnR725 said:

 

I'm always puzzled by why a different procedure for parts that have shellac? Because I run all of my parts through the cleaning machine and they come out nice and clean. Contrary to the YouTube gods to claim that ultrasonic alcohol cleaning fluids and probably just about everything else in the universe is bad for the shellac it seems to work just fine.

 

 

So, perhaps i've been mislead but i was ALWAYS told ipa will destroy shellac, this is why onedip exists and why people use a bench solvent for those parts. 
My other watchmaking space told me the other day that it's only denatured alcohol that does it, and that ipa does not. But i also specifically remember a guy here who ruined a brand new chronograph with ipa and the hairspring came unglued from the stud. 

Can anybody confirm or deny this?

 

 

7 hours ago, VWatchie said:

If evaporust is like pure vinegar it should not affect the shellac.

I don't follow how you do it but the following story might be helpful.

When I was new, I used an ultrasonic cleaner. I placed the parts in glass jars partly filled with a degreaser and lowered them into the ultrasonic cleaner partly filled with warm water. The glass jars had lids that were not completely tight. When I put the lid on the ultrasonic cleaner to reduce the noise from the motors, condensation formed on the inside of the ultrasonic cleaner and penetrated the glass jars. As water is heavier than petrol products, the water fell to the bottom of the glass jars and the parts were bathed in water, causing them to rust.

These days I use a 72-year-old antiquated ELMA cleaning machine (still going strong) with a heater and it has solved these problems.

So i'm going to toss that pallet fork into some evaporust and i'll report back. 

Your story about the water ingress into your solvent, i'm actually fairly confident that's whats happened. So i took a long break from watchmaking and my benzine jar just sat there for months, a bit of it evaporated off so i just topped it off. It never occurred to me there could be moisture ingress into it but i think that's probably what happened. Cautionary tale, lesson learned. I cleaned the jar and refilled it and i'll be more mindful of that in the future. Thank you for sharing that!

Edited August 6, 2024 by Birbdad

[Neverenoughwatches]

1 hour ago, Birbdad said:

So, perhaps i've been mislead but i was ALWAYS told ipa will destroy shellac, this is why onedip exists and why people use a bench solvent for those parts. 
My other watchmaking space told me the other day that it's only denatured alcohol that does it, and that ipa does not. But i also specifically remember a guy here who ruined a brand new chronograph with ipa and the hairspring came unglued from the stud. 

Can anybody confirm or deny this?

There are variables which is why different folk have had different experiences . Experiments have been carried out here and through the world of ytube mostly coming to the conclusion that IPA does dissolve shellac....... but to what degree and in what manner does it affect shellac would vary in folks opinions.  The cleaning and drying machine is probably a big factor in all of this, ultrasonic vs rotary, professional or basic use. Shellac age and type would be anoher variable.  Period of  contact,  length of drying time etc.  The views will be many and varied. 

1 hour ago, Birbdad said:

So i'm going to toss that pallet fork into some evaporust and i'll report back. 

I would try something trash first. I cant remember whats in evaporust. But vinegar is diluted acetic acid and turns steel grey, examined under a microscope looks to be etched. I've tried a couple of proprietary rust removers,  had phosphoric acid in them and ate the steel quickly.  If i remember the only solution that didn't seem to harm the steel was when i used lemon juice on a hairspring. The citric acid was mild, removed rust after a long soak but left a bit of a sticky mess between the coils which needed to be dissolved.

[Nucejoe]

Gut feeling 

one dip  dissolves shellac, if

" IN ULTRASONIC "    

Shellac is extracted from a live being,  so must be  dissolvable & degradable .

 

 

[JohnR725]

3 hours ago, Neverenoughwatches said:

There are variables which is why different folk have had different experiences . Experiments have been carried out here and through the world of ytube mostly coming to the conclusion that IPA does dissolve shellac....... but to what degree and in what manner does it affect shellac would vary in folks opinions. 

Always the interesting aspect of this is that at work are extremely expensive fanciest of Elma cleaning machines uses IPA as the final rinse as the recommendation of Elma because otherwise the L&R rinse will not evaporate at all. So basically the alcohol is a final final rinsing solution which will dry.

This is where at home I had the same problem and I just purchased a different kind of alcohol that 100% will dissolves shellac but I was only in it for less than 30 seconds and never had a problem at all and at least the final drying would dry otherwise the normal rinsing solution just won't evaporate anymore.

[Neverenoughwatches]

2 hours ago, Nucejoe said:

Gut feeling 

one dip  dissolves shellac, if

" IN ULTRASONIC "    

Shellac is extracted from a live being,  so must be  dissolvable & degradable .

 

 

I think we discovered a good while ago that one dip contained a high percentage of tetrachloroethylene a traditional dry cleaning chemical and somewhat hazardous to health with long term use. B dip which i gather is it's replacement is trichloroethylene, maybe this one is less harmful or its being used until its determined that it IS as harmful

[JohnR725]

4 hours ago, Birbdad said:

this is why onedip exists and why people use a bench solvent for those parts. 
My other watchmaking space told me the other day that it's only denatured alcohol that does it, and that ipa does not. But i also specifically remember a guy here who ruined a brand new chronograph with ipa and the hairspring came unglued from the stud. 

The problem is we end up with way too many variables here. For instance how is or was the original one dip marketed in other words what is its true purpose if anything? So advertisement from 1957 the basically has two purposes one to prevent rust and clean things like your hairspring. So in other words if you're cleaning machine didn't do a good job of cleaning in the first place this would be something you would use.

YouTube is always interesting I've seen two separate videos on ultrasonic is evil and bad it will destroy your watches. Yet both of the schools I went to had ultrasonic cleaning machines. The cleaning machines were cleaning all day long watches. It seems like we might and noticed the destruction of the evil ultrasonic but I guess we weren't paying attention. Then if the shellac was disintegrating I think we would've noticed that too. I think all the shops I've worked in except one had ultrasonic cleaning machines. So my experience in real world differs from YouTube.

Then the ongoing and listed debate of how can you dissolves shellac is probably just about everything in the universe if you leave it in their long can. That does appear to be that alcohol will dissolves shellac so it is forbidden under penalty of death of ever using alcohol except variables again. As I said I used alcohol that will dissolves shellac the can was very clearly labeled that it will dissolve in sin shellac and yet it never was a problem because I didn't leave it in there all day long I only used it for the final final rinse. As I said the cleaning machine at work at the recommendation of Elma you would think they would understand about cleaning machines after all they make them their recommendation was ipa once again as the final rinse.

Then as I said too many variables and too many stories. For instance the Chinese 6497 clone I think I cleaned it twice in commercial watch cleaning products and Of course the evil alcohol rinse and they hairspring cam free from the stud. So let's see the conclusion would be don't use ultrasonic cleaning machines don't use commercial watch products and definitely don't use alcohol as poorly glued Chinese studs will disintegrate.

We also don't know in your chronograph example which chronograph it was how long did it stay in the solution and whether was any other solutions involved at all too many variables.

12 minutes ago, Neverenoughwatches said:

I think we discovered a good while ago that one dip contained a high percentage of tetrachloroethylene a traditional dry cleaning chemical and somewhat hazardous to health with long term use. B dip which i gather is it's replacement is trichloroethylene, maybe this one is less harmful or its being used until its determined that it IS as harmful

Now we get to the peculiar problem of chemistry the formulas of course have changed. Then I suspect that probably all solvents that evaporate which is a nice characteristic unless we like wet parts probably are bad for our health. I know one of my coworkers was using of the one dip for cleaning off glue on a display case and it was definitely not good for her system at all. Although it she does seem to react way more to chemicals and things than most people. But definitely having it on a cloth breathing in the vapors and this would be the newest stuff was not good at all.

 

 

 

 

[Nucejoe]

My question was, providing a solution de-rusts, say hairspring, would then that hairspring not restart rusting ?  

Is part of the reason that  some watch cases are vacuumed not rust protection ? 

Are some hairsprings gold electroplated?  

Guess some springs are made of alloys that don't rust.

I wouldn't want to reinstall  a de-rusted hairspring specially not in a pricey watch.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[nevenbekriev]

The hairsprings in contemporary watches practically doesn't get rusty. If You see rust on such hairspring, it probably is due rusty water that has dried on the hairspring, but the source of the rust is something else, made of steel.

The old steel hairsprings (black or blued color) do get rusty, but... If you see real rust on such hairspring, then it is gone. The problem is that actually spring gets thinner in the rusted places and timekeeping is gone, the spring can 'breath' in strange manner.

[VWatchie]

14 hours ago, Birbdad said:

So, perhaps i've been mislead but i was ALWAYS told ipa will destroy shellac

This has been fiercely debated over the years. As a result of practical experience I’m in the camp of those never letting IPA anywhere near shellac.

Recently someone suggested that only dewaxed shellac is immune to IPA. I haven’t investigated that yet but will eventually do.

[rjenkinsgb]

5 hours ago, VWatchie said:

Recently someone suggested that only dewaxed shellac is immune to IPA.

Pure IPA is commonly used to dissolve dewaxed flake shellac to make varnish, French polish and stains. 

It does not dissolve as fast as in ethanol, and IPA evaporates more slowly, but it categorically does dissolve - I use shellac flake for woodworking & refinishing.

If the IPA has been open to the atmosphere for a long time & picked up water, or is lower grade containing water, then that may appear to not react with the shellac, though it will still have some effect.

Another reference:

https://sokolowskistudios.com/mixing-fresh-shellac-from-flakes/#:~:text=Solvents for Shellac,advantages outweigh this slight inconvenience.

 

[HectorLooi]

My mentor also puts everything through his cleaning machine with L&R cleaners and ending with IPA. He also says it's ok.

He believes that those jewels that do come loose in the wash were not properly shellaced in the first place and it's good that they did come loose in the wash. 

I'm not proficient enough in resetting jewels yet to put everything through the wash.

[Neverenoughwatches]

6 hours ago, VWatchie said:

This has been fiercely debated over the years. As a result of practical experience I’m in the camp of those never letting IPA anywhere near shellac.

Recently someone suggested that only dewaxed shellac is immune to IPA. I haven’t investigated that yet but will eventually do.

I remember that also from somewhere that wax content in the shellac makes it remain soft.

[oldhippy]

You have a cross contamination. You need to change all the fluids.