Strange Result from Anti-Pitch Substance
Hi All,
I have a Precision Router Lift (PRL) from Woodpecker, and I love it. This is one nice piece of equipment that I could never be without.
Occasionally, I remove the PRL from the table for cleaning. Usually, I just get a cotton rag in the various parts to push out the bits of compacted sawdust, then I treat the surfaces with anti-friction spray. It’s amazing smoothly the crank turns after that!
But last night I decided to try out a “pitch and gum remover” on the PRL. I waited about 5 minutes. When I wiped it off, wherever the remover came in contact with the base plate, it wiped away the brassy coating on the metal! Now the underside of the PRL is a splotchy brass and silver color. Also, after I applied the anti-friction spray, the PRL was still really difficult to crank. I got in there again and wiped the surfaces with the rag, but still the crank is difficult to turn.
Can anyone tell me if I have just killed one of my favorite tools?
Replies
Can anyone tell me if I have just killed one of my favorite tools?
I would call the Mfg.. And ask them..
It sounds very bad. Pitch and Gum remover dosent sound like much but unless it is the citrus based stuff it is actuall a powerfull solvent. You must have burned off the coating on the slides. Also that stuff wreaks havoc on rubber and some plastics. There may be some seals on the lifting mechanisim that were affected.
Mike
This doesn't sound good.
A number of the pitch removers are basically lye, sodium hydroxide is the chemical name. If the can warned that the material was caustic, and had dire warnings about getting it in your eyes, then it is probably lye based. Personally the stuff is way too dangerous for home use and has no place in a shop.
Lye will quickly eat into aluminum, in a matter of minutes, but usually doesn't affect most steels, plastic, and rubber in a short exposure. However if it has gotten inside of the lift mechanism where it can't be removed, it would probably do a fair amount of damage. The description of the damage to the underside of the table, presuming it was aluminum, certainly suggests that the cleaner was lye based.
Lye is a very nasty chemical, both to the skin and to machinery, and the spray was never meant to be used the way you used it, since there is no way to remove it completely once it got on the parts.
Probably the only way to solve your problem now would be to completely disassemble the machine, scrub everything with hot water, and then reassemble with new lubricants, and possibly some new parts if they were attacked by the lye.
John W.
John,
Thanks for the reply, although I'm not too happy to read it!
I should have stuck to the usual method I always used for cleaning my PRL!
It may simply be a case of removing the annodizing from the aluminum. Oven cleaner will do the same thing, so it may be that what is in the anti-pitch cleaner is of the same nature. The problem is that the aluminum can then oxidize but probably won't be a major problem. Not sure about the mechanism, but I'm guessing that stuff gummed up something plastic or rubber.
Edited 10/17/2005 3:57 pm ET by ohcomeon
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