Ultrasonic Chip Cleaning (26 Viewers)

[RainmanTrail]

LONG day of chip cleaning. After 3 minutes in the spinner, the Nevada Lodge still looked dirty on the light blue spots. So I ended up taking a magic eraser to all of the edges, and all of the light blue quarter pies -- that would be 800 quarter pies on the 2 racks of chips!! But I'm happy with how they look in the end. These are the first chips that I've cleaned with this method that still had some ground in gunk that needed scrubbing after coming out of the cleaner. All other chips (Paulsons) that I've cleaned have needed no other cleaning measures, except oiling.

Anyway, here are some photos. First, the dirty chips. Then one rack clean, one rack dirty. Then cleaned and oiled, ready to go.

View attachment 5874View attachment 5875View attachment 5876

Doh!!!

I was all excited to buy an ultrasonic cleaner to clean my 600 Nevada Lodges when I saw this thread. I'm glad I read all the way through it first!

I've been soaking these in hot water with dawn, then scrubbing with a damp microfiber towel and finishing off the light blue and edges with the Magic Eraser.

Has anyone had success with the Nevada Lodges using this process? I'd be ok if I could get them 100% clean using the ultrasonic and magic eraser only on the edges.

Any advice with these @liftapint? My thumb is sore lol. I've cleaned one rack so far... This sucks!

 

[liftapint]

@RainmanTrail

@ski_ex5 , the ultrasonic cleaning master, is about to receive 2 racks of grimy Nevada Lodge. So I imagine he will figure out the optimal way to clean these. However, he's been very busy, so I don't know when he'll get to that chip cleaning project.

However, if you are thinking you'll get more used chips in the future, I'd absolutely recommend getting an ultrasonic cleaner. I have a hard time seeing how you'd regret it. Some chips just need 30 seconds or so in the ultrasonic, and they come out looking amazing. I'm going to fire mine up today, and clean about 600 Tropicanas. Or maybe I'll do it tomorrow, during that football game

So 2 things:
1) Nevada Lodge $1s are AWESOME. They'll be so worth the work, so keep it up!
2) I don't think you'd regret buying an ultrasonic cleaner, even if they don't get the Nevada Lodge completely clean. I've cleaned nearly 5000 chips in the cleaner that HAVE come completely clean, and didn't need additional scrubbing. It's an amazing little machine!

 

[acl1904]

Anyone used Lucky Charms (or other General Mills cereal) to clean chips? I was looking at the ingredients while picking up some cereal for my kiddos. I've used TSP to clean walls prior to painting and to clean chips as well, but trisodium phosphate (TSP) in cereal? WTF

 

[David O]

Yes it is a form of salt. Here is a quote from General Mills...

"TSP is used as a buffer to adjust the acidic nature of the cereal dough. In home cleaning products TSP is used in large quantities. In our food products we use very small amounts. Theoretically, any food grade base could be used: sodium hydroxide, potassium hydroxide, ammonium hydroxide, ammonium phosphate, etc. At General Mills we have found that TSP works best in our particular products, and has been approved as safe for use in food by the Food and Drug Administration." - See more at: http://www.seattleorganicrestaurant...roducts-kids-cereals.php#sthash.jiMU03GD.dpuf

 

[RainmanTrail]

@RainmanTrail

@ski_ex5 , the ultrasonic cleaning master, is about to receive 2 racks of grimy Nevada Lodge. So I imagine he will figure out the optimal way to clean these. However, he's been very busy, so I don't know when he'll get to that chip cleaning project.

However, if you are thinking you'll get more used chips in the future, I'd absolutely recommend getting an ultrasonic cleaner. I have a hard time seeing how you'd regret it. Some chips just need 30 seconds or so in the ultrasonic, and they come out looking amazing. I'm going to fire mine up today, and clean about 600 Tropicanas. Or maybe I'll do it tomorrow, during that football game

So 2 things:
1) Nevada Lodge $1s are AWESOME. They'll be so worth the work, so keep it up!
2) I don't think you'd regret buying an ultrasonic cleaner, even if they don't get the Nevada Lodge completely clean. I've cleaned nearly 5000 chips in the cleaner that HAVE come completely clean, and didn't need additional scrubbing. It's an amazing little machine!

I got my ultrasonic in the mail this week, along with the Landmark "TSP" and the salad spinner. I followed his directions to the letter, but am having the same experience as you did in getting these clean for my Nevada Lodge blue/black quarter pie $1s. They come out free of gunk and are about 98% clean, but I still have to finish them off with a magic eraser to get them perfect. I think these have probably been previously cleaned and or oiled at some point in their previous lives. The ultrasonic does fade these a little however when using "TSP" or sodium-metascillate. I also had 24 heavily used, super nasty grimy Pick Hobson yellow fracs that I decided to throw in there as well. I put them in for about 45 seconds to a minute. They came out EXTREMELY faded lol, but that's ok. But they're clean as a whistle. I then used the magic eraser on them which definitely helped remove some of the fading, and oiled them and they look great again. It appears to have brought back all of the color. Will see after they finish drying how they turn out.

Since the "TSP" doesn't get the Nevada Lodge's 100% clean, and it does fade them a bit, I think I might just try using dawn in the ultrasonic with them and give them about 2.5-3 minutes in there to remove all the grime and get them ready for the magic eraser. I don't think we'll be getting those chips 100% clean in the ultrasonic without severely fading them.

I will say however, this machine is fantastic! It's saving me countless hours of scrubbing and sore thumbs! Thanks again @ski_ex5 for the tutorial. And if you have any luck with these Nevada Lodges, I'd love to hear about it. So far, it seems like they're giving us trouble with this process.

 

[RainmanTrail]

OK, decided to write a post for those of you looking to clean your TRKs. Here is the process gamble I took with my 24 super dirty Pick Hobson fracs. I took some comparison pictures before and after, as well as some throughout the process. The pics show a barrel of the dirty ones next to a barrel of clean ones that I got from a different seller. I followed everything to the T in the OP, except I used filtered bottled spring water instead of distilled water. They started out looking like this:

Then, I ran them through the ultrasonic per the instructions in the OP, and they came out super clean, but after they dried, I noticed that they had been severely faded. They came out looking like this (they're on the left)

And here they are on the top...

So, I decided that since the magic eraser is a mild abrasive, it might be able to remove a little bit of the fading. So next I gave each chip a very brief and mild scrub with the eraser and set them out to dry. After they dried up, they looked a little bit better than before, but still needed quite a bit of work before they could be back to full health. So... off to CVS I went to pick up some mineral oil. I applied, very sparingly, some mineral oil to the chips, then immediately dried them off as best I could with a microfiber towel and laid them out to dry.

Here's how they turned out...

I think they actually look a little bit better than the other ones. They're on the left side of the barrel pic, and on the top of the rows pic. Not bad I'd say.

 

[liftapint]

Wow, they look beautiful!!

 

[RainmanTrail]

Wow, they look beautiful!!

Thanks! I'm in love with these fracs. I really liked the $5s and the $100s from the Pick Hobson set before, but I never even knew about these fracs until AfterTheFact posted them for sale. I wanted them so badly I didn't even care how much they cost. These fracs are the only reason I even put that set together!

Plus when I discovered how great those Nevada Lodge 1s go with this set, I was hooked.

 

[RainmanTrail]

I also did some work on these Nevada Lodge 1s this weekend. I'm planning to experiment with these in the ultrasonic a little bit this weekend. I'm thinking the reason they don't come out as well in the ultrasonic is because of all the decades of natural oils that have penetrated these chips (they are from the 70s).

I haven't studied chemistry, so please correct me where necessary, but it seems plausible to me that if "TSP" is a salt, that it might not cut grease as well as Dawn could? Or perhaps not without fading the chips first. But I actually got these slightly cleaner just by using a warm 10-15 min Dawn bath and good old scrubbing with a microfiber towel and a couple of sore-ass thumbs. I'm thinking that a really long Dawn session in the ultrasonic (might have to be a very small amount of soap), could do the trick with these. Going to test it out with one barrel first and see how it turns out.

 

[BGinGA]

High solution temperatures, long soak times in TSP, and solutions with a high concentration of TSP are all contributors to excessive chip fading.

Soap bubbles in the ultrasonic cleaner will neutralize any possible benefits of ultrasonic action, essentially making it a waste of time (you can get the same or better results by just agitating the chips in a bowl containing the same Dawn solution). Bubbles contain air, which will prevent the ultrasonic sound waves from propagating throughout the solution.

Also, highly recommend using only distilled water when using ultrasonic. You don't want any kind of minerals or other contaminants in the water, including those found in natural springs. Ultrasonic waves travel best from transducer to chip surface when there is nothing but pure H2O in the sound path, and contaminants will also negatively affect the cavitation process occurring at the chip surface.

 

[kmccormick100]

I got my ultrasonic in the mail this week, along with the Landmark "TSP" and the salad spinner. I followed his directions to the letter, but am having the same experience as you did in getting these clean for my Nevada Lodge blue/black quarter pie $1s. They come out free of gunk and are about 98% clean, but I still have to finish them off with a magic eraser to get them perfect. I think these have probably been previously cleaned and or oiled at some point in their previous lives. The ultrasonic does fade these a little however when using "TSP" or sodium-metascillate. I also had 24 heavily used, super nasty grimy Pick Hobson yellow fracs that I decided to throw in there as well. I put them in for about 45 seconds to a minute. They came out EXTREMELY faded lol, but that's ok. But they're clean as a whistle. I then used the magic eraser on them which definitely helped remove some of the fading, and oiled them and they look great again. It appears to have brought back all of the color. Will see after they finish drying how they turn out.

Since the "TSP" doesn't get the Nevada Lodge's 100% clean, and it does fade them a bit, I think I might just try using dawn in the ultrasonic with them and give them about 2.5-3 minutes in there to remove all the grime and get them ready for the magic eraser. I don't think we'll be getting those chips 100% clean in the ultrasonic without severely fading them.

I will say however, this machine is fantastic! It's saving me countless hours of scrubbing and sore thumbs! Thanks again @ski_ex5 for the tutorial. And if you have any luck with these Nevada Lodges, I'd love to hear about it. So far, it seems like they're giving us trouble with this process.

I was just about to post and see if anybody in Cali had picked up a cleaner I could "rent" time on with beer or $ or chips haha. PM coming.

 

[Mr. Cheese]

@RainmanTrail

@ski_ex5 , the ultrasonic cleaning master, is about to receive 2 racks of grimy Nevada Lodge. So I imagine he will figure out the optimal way to clean these. However, he's been very busy, so I don't know when he'll get to that chip cleaning project.

However, if you are thinking you'll get more used chips in the future, I'd absolutely recommend getting an ultrasonic cleaner. I have a hard time seeing how you'd regret it. Some chips just need 30 seconds or so in the ultrasonic, and they come out looking amazing. I'm going to fire mine up today, and clean about 600 Tropicanas. Or maybe I'll do it tomorrow, during that football game

So 2 things:
1) Nevada Lodge $1s are AWESOME. They'll be so worth the work, so keep it up!
2) I don't think you'd regret buying an ultrasonic cleaner, even if they don't get the Nevada Lodge completely clean. I've cleaned nearly 5000 chips in the cleaner that HAVE come completely clean, and didn't need additional scrubbing. It's an amazing little machine!

Mel, if you don't mind could you pm me Tim's contact info? I'd like to get ahold of him

 

[RainmanTrail]

Here are a couple pics from the Hornady ultrasonic cleaning method described in the OP of this thread with the Nevada Lodges.

The barrel on the left is uncleaned, straight from Spinetti's. The second barrel is after a 2 minute ultrasonic bath and left to dry. The third barrel is from a 5-10 minute warm/hot Dawn bath soak and scrubbing manually using a damp microfiber cloth and left to dry (no oiling). The far right barrel is after an ultrasonic bath, then using the magic eraser on teh sides and lightly on faces, then a mild mineral oil treatment immediately wiped off with a dry microfiber cloth. Turned out pretty good, but it's a lot of work for sure. As you can see, the dawn bath gave better results than a 2 min ultrasonic bath, but it's not worth the effort and sore thumbs IMO. WAY too much work.

And here's a pick with racks...
Left is uncleaned
Middle is after 2 min ultrasonic only
Right is after 2 min ultrasonic, magic eraser, and mineral oil

 

[inca911]

@courage 's results on my Vineyards were so amazing, I decided to buy myself a birthday gift yesterday to re-clean the rest of them (including some recent additions that need a good bath). I'm sure @Mr. Cheese and @palindrome will be happy with my purchase too! The 6L, 180W ultrasonic cleaner is on the way from eBay. I agree with the previous paper assesments by courage that this one is probably the best value out there in terms of power vs. price:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/New-Stainle...126895?hash=item4869d3b2ef:g:~mwAAOxyNo9Sq~MI

The salad spinner to fit that tank size is in hand @ $20. And when I went to buy a lifetime supply of the recommended Lundmark "TSP-but-really-metasilicate" product on Amazon, I discovered that the PCF community has effectively paired salad spinners with Lundmark cleaner! Coincidence? I think not. By the way, a one pound container of this from Sears (shipped) is ~$10. Looking forward to posting pics and results....

Frequently Bought Together

• 
• +
• 

 

[AfterTheFact]

Thanks! I'm in love with these fracs. I really liked the $5s and the $100s from the Pick Hobson set before, but I never even knew about these fracs until AfterTheFact posted them for sale. I wanted them so badly I didn't even care how much they cost. These fracs are the only reason I even put that set together!

Plus when I discovered how great those Nevada Lodge 1s go with this set, I was hooked.

A rash decision I will regret for the rest of my life...

I'm am however, very happy they went to a loving home...(y) :thumbsup:

 

[inca911]

So I fired up the ultrasonic this afternoon before the BBall games. The cleaner's inaugural flight was over @Mr. Cheese 's place, and I'd say he's definitely in love with the entire process. I'm glad @slisk250 will get cleaner chips, since he's got my Lakeshore Inns (chip Karma in full effect).

I used 4T of the "TSP-but-really-sodium metasilicate" cleaner per 1gal of Distilled Water. It creates a strongly basic solution. I got the temperature of my ultrasonic up to 42C, which is the same unit that @courage uses. I decided to do a test run on just a handful of Aviation Club (ACF) chips before running the full set. The ACFs are labeled hybrid chips, so I had some concerns about label adhesion. After one minute, there were no signs of any problems. I bumped it up to two minutes, and all was good. The salad spinner brand I bought fits my water bath very well, and the lid keeps the chips nice and contained so there was no need to use the plastic bowl. By skipping the plastic bowl, the cage was nice and submerged.

As you can see, this ultrasonic cleaner model comes with an extremely handy drain, which makes cleanup a snap. The ACFs I have weren't really all that dirty, but they had a bit of a smell from casino use so I decided to clean all of them. The salad spinner setup was very deep in the water bath, so I did a full rack at one time. I'll be testing full rack vs. half rack performance when I clean some new Vineyards that are much dirtier. That will probably be tomorrow. After running a full 1k set through the cleaner, I was very surprised at how dirty the water bath was. I'd probably change the water more frequently if the chips weren't already pretty clean from the start. It's really proof positive that only ultrasonic gets chips thoroughly cleaned. I'm convinced that all hand-cleaning methods just can't touch the performance of the ultrasonic.

After a clean water rinse, the chips went to the drying phase. I laid them out on towels, and towel blotted them to remove the excess moisture. I'm going to leave them out overnight, and then fire it up again tomorrow for a bunch of Paulsons.

The ACFs have a great look and feel, and now they are squeaky clean. As with all chips, I'm convinced I need more of them! Thanks a ton to all the chip cleaning pioneers who paved the way for this process, and documented it in this thread. Your work and experimentation has been immensely valuable. Magic eraser? Never again!

 

[Psypher1000]

After running a full 1k set through the cleaner, I was very surprised at how dirty the water bath was. I'd probably change the water more frequently if the chips weren't already pretty clean from the start.

Nah, no need. I've regularly put 800+ Paulsons through the cleaner at a time and have never had to change the water. My guess is that the "dirt" you observed from cleaning the ceramics is more dye than dirt given that the ceramics go through a dye sublimation process.

 

[inca911]

I ran a bunch of Paulsons today. I went with 3 minutes at 42C, doing a full rack each time. I turned the spinner about one revolution per 2 seconds to keep things moving in the bath. One of the salad spinner basket plastic mesh ribs broke where it was connected to the zip-tie tumbler bars, so the weight of a full rack is becoming a factor. I'll have to rig a turning arm if it happens again. Usually I warm the DI water in the microwave, but for kicks I decided to time it with the ultrasonic heater set to 50C. It took a bit over a half hour to reach 42C with the ultrasonic on, so preheated water is definitely the way to go. I changed the set point back to 42C once it was at temp. Like before, the water became very dirty after 500 chips, so I changed it out. I'm not a believer in cleaning things in dirty water, but I could have probably pushed it to 1k before changing. The first 500 weren't super dirty, so I think the previous results from the ACF weren't from dyes, rather from dirt. The water color was almost identical. The 3 minutes on the first rack didn't fully clean the edges as much as I would have liked. These chips have a lime green clay base, so even light dirt shows up readily. I believe the large inlays really keep the chips relatively clean, but the edges were just super soiled. I tried 4 minutes for the next rack and it still didn't fully clean it. Rather than extend the time, I did a quick Magic Eraser pre-clean of the edges, which did the trick. Another 1,100 ready for the next game! Two more cleaning events and everything that needs cleaning will be finished.

 

[Psypher1000]

I went with 3 minutes at 42F,

Sooo...almost freezing? You mean 42c, yes?

 

[inca911]

Sooo...almost freezing? You mean 42c, yes?

Absolutely! Can't brain, I have the dumb. Don't make me go Kelvin or Rankine on your ass!

 

[bivey]

Out of curiosity, anyone ever tried oxyclean and an ultrasonic together?

I've had mixed results with ultrasonic w and w/only Palmolive. Magic eraser doesn't seem too useful after either, especially with filthy chips.

 

[DrStrange]

There are likely diminishing returns as the number of chips in the tumbler increases. Maybe jumping from 40 to 100 degrades the effectiveness so much it isn't worth the time savings?

 

[BGinGA]

Out of curiosity, anyone ever tried oxyclean and an ultrasonic together?

Yes - ski reported worse results, supposedly due to the bubbles created by oxy interfering with the ultrasonic action.

 

[bivey]

Yes - ski reported worse results, supposedly due to the bubbles created by oxy interfering with the ultrasonic action.

Thanks Dave. On an iPhone while traveling - so difficult to read entire threads on wee little screens

 

[inca911]

There are likely diminishing returns as the number of chips in the tumbler increases. Maybe jumping from 40 to 100 degrades the effectiveness so much it isn't worth the time savings?

I did a half-rack for the same cleaning duration as a full rack. With the relatively low level of dirt on the chips I have, I couldn't discern any difference between the full and half-rack methods. That caused me to dump the whole rack in at once. Perhaps for very dirty chips that may make a difference. Mine was not exactly a definitive study, but the only thing that still looked dirty for me were the edges on my test chips. Those appeared the same between the two methods.

 

[courage]

Nice work, @inca911 and congrats! Chips are looking good.

I normally clean 40 chips at a time, maybe 50. imo the clean time is reduced and it's a good number to insure they rotate and get exposed, but good to hear you had success with a rack.

I'm also a rebel and use tap water. I've tried both distilled and tap many times and for my location there's been no difference. Tap may even do better, perhaps the small amount of minerals assist the ultrasonic process.

And yes, gotta preheat that water. I normally use a teapot and it will be the right temp long before it whistles.

 

[justsomedude]

Nice work, @inca911I'm also a rebel and use tap water. I've tried both distilled and tap many times and for my location there's been no difference. Tap may even do better, perhaps the small amount of minerals assist the ultrasonic process.

+1

I just cleaned my Orleans chips with tap water and the "TSP" product. Chips came out great!!

I also varied the method a bit, just because the salad spinner rack was too sloppy for my liking. The less crap I need to use (gloves, salad spinner, etc.) the better... For me at least.

I'll follow up with pics and details of my method this evening.

 

[justsomedude]

Here's my first pass with the Kendal 3 Liter Ultrasonic Cleaner.

Some changes I made from the original advice/suggestions:

• I used the salad spinner basket, but it just made a mess out of my kitchen, slopping TSP infused water all over the place evey time I rotated the damn basket (it also makes rubber gloves and eye protection mandatory).
• I gave up on the spinner technique, put 60 chips in the metal basket that came with the USC, and just slowly agitated them around with a plastic spaghetti spoon. Safety glasses are still encouraged with the TSP mixture and the slotted spoon method, but not necessary so long as you don't splash everything around.

This approach kept the slop to a minimum, eliminated the need for rubber gloves, and allowed me to quickly change chips in/out very quickly.

The results with my Orleans Buy-In chips...

From left to right: heavily soiled chips as received (left) - cleaned chips, fresh out of the ultrasonic unit after a 2 min. cycle (middle) - ultrasonic cleaned chips with a light oil application (far right)

Just waiting on new labels from @Gear to make a new set of 300 quarters for my SPM set. I have to say, I'm thrilled with the ultrasonic cleaning results so far!

 

[dickzapper]

I just snapped the cheapest ultrasonic on Amazon last night to go with two racks of dirty JB riversides I snapped on eBay. Did I just bamboozle myself? This thread is long so I will have to read it later tonight. But the reviews on the cheapy cleaner were good and at least for 27 bucks it seemed like a fun toy to clean my glasses with.

 

[bivey]

Looking for an ultrasonic cleaner to help with PBCL chips. The hornady is discontinued and only a couple on eBay. anyone have experience or comments about:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/281725340547?_trksid=p2055119.m1438.l2649&ssPageName=STRK:MEBIDX:IT

Quite a bit cheaper, but if it won't get the job done, then what's the point? It has 120W of ultrasonic power.

@inca911 what kind do you have?