Ultrasonic Carb Cleaning

Has anybody had any takes or experience with the ultrasonic carb cleaning. I have guy in my area who does it and his pitch is that it is the best type of cleaning. He wants me to strip down my carbs completely and he charges $60 to put it through the wringer. In Canada that sounds really cheap. Especially if it works well.

 

Ultrasonic cleaning is nice, but cleaning them yourself is better. Even an ultrasonic cleaner cannot get the smallest passages clean because of the way that the passages are drilled at 90º bends. Consider ultrasonic cleaning to be one step in the cleaning process.

 

I've got one of those ultrasonic cleaners at my work, tried it on my carbs but it wasn't very good, cleaned them by hand with much better result....

 

Are all these sonic cleaner equal? Are there specific ones for specific parts? Are there better quality over poor quality?

 

Think they are pretty much the same even if there's different prices....
The one we have at work we mostly use for parts to steamturbines, its pretty large but think the smaller ones does the same..

 

I worked with one when I made contact lens. We cleaned the lens with kerosene.

i would think its using the correct fluid for the job.

 

Not really making an argument. I don't understand how sound waves clean anything anyway. I would just love to turn up the volume of my stereo and my house get cleaned. I accept that there is a science behind it. I just hope it is not pseudo science.

If sound waves cannot travel through angles then what is the point of them at all. Unless one has a series of channels directly in line with the sonic cleaner, then there is no point. Any angles, especially reverse angles, would not ensure a proper cleaning. However, if it is sound waves at a particular frequency, then wouldn't they simply ricochet off the walls?

 

The waves will make tiny bubbles in the fluid thats the point.

 

Oic. The item sits in a solution and the sonic waves create bubbles. And the bubbles like soap bubbles clean.

 

Here is an excerpt from wikipedia. In an ultrasonic cleaner, the object to be cleaned is placed in a chamber containing a suitable solution (in an aqueous or organic solution, depending on the application). In aqueous cleaners, the chemical added is a surfactant (e.g.- laundry detergent) which breaks down the surface tension of the water base. An ultrasound generating transducer built into the chamber, or lowered into the fluid, produces ultrasonic waves in the fluid by changing size in concert with an electrical signal oscillating at ultrasonic frequency. This creates compression waves in the liquid of the tank which ‘tear’ the liquid apart, leaving behind many millions of microscopic ‘voids’ or ‘partial vacuum bubbles’ (cavitation). These bubbles collapse with enormous energy; temperatures and pressures on the order of 5,000 K and 20,000 lbs per square inch are achieved;[6][7] however, they are so small that they do no more than clean and remove surface dirt and contaminants. The higher the frequency, the smaller the nodes between the cavitation points, which allows for cleaning of more intricate detail.

 

think of it as vibration, it knocks off the crap the fluid is in constant motion

 

No, not soapbubbles but airbubbles like if put an broken innertube from the bicycle in water but smaller.

 

I use one regularly on small engine carbs and it does a very impressive job, especially on chainsaws and blowers, etc.. You can hand clean these using solvents, air and fine wires till you think you have it done and then put it in the ultrasonic cleaner (I use white gas as a solvent) and you will be amazed at the additional debris that comes out. I am a big believer in their effectiveness.

 

I have one at home. 150W or so. It did a nice job on my carb bodies (Berryman's dip in the machine). I cleaned the smaller parts - jets and such - in a watchmaker's ultrasonic. That worked really well.

 

Maby smaller washers is better for small parts? The one at work is for cleaning jets in a turbine but theres pretty large holes in them, we use a degreaser (dont know if thats the right word) as a solvent.

 

seems like the liquid and temperature are as important as the machine. my HF does much better with hot water/simple green than cold. Dawn/water seems to leave a better finish on aluminum.
I'd be careful with anything flammable in them because you just never know. a tank of fire in your shop just isn't any good

 

Not sure what to tell you on that. Berryman's said their dip should be fine in an ultrasonic, and the watchmakers' solutions are flammable. http://www.lrultrasonics.com/msds/566 Ultrasonic Non-Ammoniated Watch Cleaning Solution.pdf

 

all i'm saying is be careful. the risk/reward is kind of lopsided for my Harbor Freight 50$ cleaner.
i've shot a ABC extinguisher at a pan of burning kerosene, it ain't something you want to do in the shop

 

Sounds like fun! Tell us more........

 

fire training at a nuke plant. turns out you want to start back 10 feet and kind of bounce the powder at the base of the flame or hit something close and let it fall on the flame. if you get to close and shoot right at it the liquid, it and fire splash all over. then you find the nearest door and use it.

 

thats why you find most fire extinguisher by the door

 

Oops FIRE!! is you fire insurance paid up ?
sounds like an excuse to have new shop built or even whole house if you are too far from the local fire hall...

 

I could see the fire dept from my house where i lived before. when the alarm rang it still took them 8 minutes to go past my house. It was a maned station.
after 8 minutes there is very little that FD can do for your dewelling except control the rest of the burn

 

I used an ultrasonic & Berrymans on my carbs and was warned by an old-timer to avoid using carb dip for the same fire concerns. Then again he may be hung up on the old toxic carb dip that actually cleaned carbs adn not the modern neutered stuff. At any rate, I dumped the Berry and switched to simple green after that. Two days soaking while repeating the cleaning cycle every few hours (or whenever I remembered to restart it) with heat in the cleaner and they looked great, but I had the luxury of time so I put each carb body in separate from the others, so overall time was just over a week for the entire rack & small parts.. There's just no "fast" solution for cleaning carbs.

 

The Berryman's dip that you get today isn't flammable, but it sure is toxic. http://www1.mscdirect.com/MSDS/MSDS00009/08099855-20060628.PDF
It cleans just as well as the old stuff did. On average I have a clean carb body after 2 hours of immersion.

 

+ on the Berrymans. The carbs I get are usually so nasty, I will disassemble, take a toothbrush and carb cleaner, and scrub what I can of outside and inside, then blow out with compressed air. Then a soak in Berrymans, then more compressed air. Then Ill do the ultrasonic cleaner, and you guessed it, compressed air. I know it sounds like a lot, but i have *never* ended up with anything but a carb/carbs that worked and tuned the first time I put them on.