Re: Engineering advice required

The message <AinLf.15127$gB4.386@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
from "Paul Hendrick" <Paul@xxxxxxxxxxxx> contains these words:
"Lozzo" <lozzo@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:MPG.1e59805ca2929c00989afa@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

I have AP Racing calipers on the Gixer, on which the pads are retained
by two long R-Clips hich have corroded to ***. I've had a problem
sourcing new ones from AP because they don't make that caliper any more,
the replacement is 5mm narrower. I've managed to lay my hands on the
last 4 clips AP had, but I know they'll corrode as badly as the
originals I have.

Is there a form of metal treatment that will last in our weather and
still the keep required attributes of the original metal? Either black
or silver treatments will do, as long as the finish lasts better than
what these have to start with.

Some form of Galvanising will help.

I think you can get galv spray, although I've never tried any.

The stuff I tried was pretty useless. It amounted to aluminium paint,
but with powdered zinc instead of ally. Mind you, it might have improved
since the '70s.

Basically
you want to coat them with a metal with a higher electro-potential than
steel, like Zinc. This forms a sacrificial barrier which oxidises rather
than the steel, stopping the steel from rusting.

Galvanising is dead easy. Just passing a current from a zinc anode to
the (clean) steel pins through an electrolyte would do it.

I'd guess that zinc chloride would make a good electrolyte, and the
lower the potential difference between electrodes, the finer and more
regular (but slower) will be the coating.

I used to copper plate things in a similar way, and used what they now
call a 'D' cell.

--
Rusty
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