parts cleaning can

I've read all the excellent comments to "solvent in your parts cleaning
can". I'm still pondering which is the best type of part cleaning can?
What IS an economical, efficient, parts cleaning can? Should it have a
recirculating pump on it or can you get by without one for home/hobby use?
I have access to old sinks, because of remodels of homes, both porcelain and
stainless, and have thought that putting these to use in the garage would be
the way to go. I know that Sears has parts bins as does Harbor Freight and
have looked and looked but never knew the right one to buy.


Thanks for your reply in advance

Mike

 >From: "Mike" mthoffman DeleteThis @cableone.net

 >Should it have a recirculating pump on it or can you get by without one for
home/hobby use?

Hey, I had a stack of metal motion picture film canisters and plastic margarine
containers for cleaning tubs and a bunch of old instant coffee and pasta sauce
jars for a primitive cleaning system for years...

I would use those yellow plastic wash basins that hospitals use to give
patients sponge baths for tubs to clean larger parts...

Of course, everything was free, or recycled from the dumpster...

I would clean a small part, drain the dirty solvent into a jar and cap it off
and wait a few days (or weeks, or months) for the dirt to settle to the bottom.
Then I would pour the relatively clean solvent on top into a cleaner jar and
save it for the next cleaning job, and I would dispose of the jar with the crud
in the bottom...

How's that for low tech?

The heaviest solid material will settle to the bottom of any container, so a
submerged centrifugal pump that sucks relatively clean solvent from about an
inch off the bottom is very convenient to flush parts clean. Otherwise, you
wind up trying to immerse the part completely in the solvent or wind up using a
small container to dip solvent out of your large tank and pouring it over the
large part...

Having a stream of relatively clean solvent flowing over the part you're
cleaning is the way to go. That's what we had in our shop for a parts washer,
which was a steel tank with a reservoir containing about 15 gallons of solvent,
a shelf to set parts on, and a pump with a screen
to filter metal debris out of the stream...

 >I have access to old sinks, because of remodels of homes, both porcelain and
stainless, and have thought that putting these to use in the garage would be
the way to go.

That sounds like a great way to go. You should have a metal cover on a hinge
with an arrangement for the cover to fall down and smother any fire that might
somehow get started...

A sink has the handy? feature of having a large diameter drain on the bottom,
but I don't think a rubber drain plug will hold your solvent for very long. You
would need some sort of valve for that purpose, or seal the regular drain
completely shut and install a petcock for a drain...

 >I know that Sears has parts bins as does Harbor Freight and have looked and
looked but never knew the right one to buy.

Purpose-built parts cleaners may actually be more economical, when you consider
how much it might cost to rig up a pump and install a metal cover and a drain
petcock on an old sink, even if the sink itself is free...




# * 0 * #
^<!-- ~MESSAGE_AFTER~ -->