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Post by BogIrish on Jul 23, 2004 11:03:19 GMT -5
Can anyone provide me with a PROVEN formula for aquafortis? I'm building a new rifle, and I want to try it out on the stock.
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Post by Fatdutchman on Jul 23, 2004 17:51:40 GMT -5
Well, here it is: Take a quart glass jar and fill it about 1/3 full with Nitric acid (I got mine from Antec in Louisville... www.kyantec.com ). Put in a little water (or if you MUST "do as you oughta", add your acid to your wata) How much, I don't know, maybe a half a cup...not all that important. You DO NOT need to add any Hydrochloric acid. Water and Nitric acid are ALL you need. Add some true iron if you have any, or mild steel. Small pieces. Finishing nails are quite fine, just make sure you have real mild steel nails and not some weirdo modern alloy. Drop in a few and watch er bubble. Keep your face away from the thing as the fumes are quite unpleasant, to say the least. When those nails or pieces of steel are gone, put in a few more. Keep doing this until it will take no more. You can leave the little bits of undissolved metal in the jar overnight, and they will likely be gone by the next day. If they are, fine, and if they aren't, that's fine too. By the way, do this somewhere where you don't have stuff that you want rusted...the fumes will attack about everything. Now, sometimes I get a clear colorless liquid, and sometimes I get a clear yellowish/orange liquid. I don't know why. Both work just fine. By the way, avoid using steel wool. It will react VERY quickly and will put out an immense amount of toxic red fumes that will burn your eyes and nose and everything else. It will also get the mixture quite hot. It DOES work, but just stick with the nails... When you're all done with the iron pieces, you can then dilute the stuff down a bit. Say, a 4 or 6 to 1 water to acid ratio. I usually use 6 to 1 water to acid. Now, you can get Ferric Nitrate crystals. Ferric Nitrate is the end result of all this dissolving and fuming. Some of the guys on the longrifle board are using this. www.americanlongrifles.com it seems to work fine. I haven't tried it, but I have enough acid now to last me for years.
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Post by wcy on Jul 23, 2004 19:26:32 GMT -5
Fatdutchman's reply describes valid mode of synthesis, (as pure nitric will not dissolve iron, the water furnishes the needed "excess protons") and will work, ... but I have made gillions of gallons of the stuff for commercial distribution, and I prefer the formula of 5 parts conc. nitric acid mixed with 4 parts conc. hydrochloric acid, and 4d finish nails for iron source. And, yes, the NO2 fumes which are copiously liberated are dangerous, so this must be done outofdoors, downwind!! To make a manageable amount of the stuff, 300 ml (~10 fl oz.) of Nitric and 240 ml (~8 fl. oz) of the HCl with addition of ~2 oz of 4d nails, dilute after reaction is complete about to 40% solution, or 1-1/2 parts water to 1 part acid solution (product). This dilution factor is merely a compromise between reaction strength and safety for your hands, etc, when applying it. The reagents must be mixed it large, heat-tolerant container, as it will boil and spew about and get very hot!! Incidentally, a 12% solution of the product (one part product to seven parts water) is browner/bluer for rust process.
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Post by Fatdutchman on Jul 24, 2004 11:41:15 GMT -5
You know, there must be a way to blue with this stuff too. It will turn steel very blue color...before it rusts it.
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Post by Douglas Blair on Jul 24, 2004 13:29:20 GMT -5
I don't know about that but you can blue with the rust browning solution.
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