Free Anodizing!

I got the shipping details and the kit should get here on Friday. So I can set it up and hopefully do my first test pieces on Saturday. Hopefully I will have some awesome pictures to show off then.

Josh

p.s. Can you tell I am excited?

I doubt I speak for everyone, but I’m sure I speak for a lot of us when I say I’m excited to see how your anodizing skills progress!

I agree. There’s been a large Jason-Wong shaped hole that needs to be filled. This could be the start of something beautiful.

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Safe to say Jason’s presence is sorely missed and will be hard pressed to be filled even a little.

Will be nice to have another entry into the discipline though.

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There are a few of us who are getting rigs together and will be giving ano a shot soon…whoops, did I say that out loud! :wink:

I think my mind is slowly take a turn towards the “forgetful” side. It would not be my place to say you may be setting up a set of your own anyway but I did actually forget.

Double trouble!!

Whenever I read forum posts I always want to see pictures. So when the two huge boxes arrived today I took some pictures of all the equipment that arrived. I also went out and got 22 gallons of distilled water and 6 quarts of battery acid. I am hoping to try anodizing my first part tonight. But it depends on how long the set up time takes.
http://www.joshupdyke.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/Gear-1024x768.jpg

http://www.joshupdyke.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/Water-1024x768.jpg

http://www.joshupdyke.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/Acid-1024x768.jpg

And I also picked up some fabric dye to experiment with. Personally I think the actual anodizing dye is going to be much better. But I have seen some decent results with the fabric dye. So I thought for a few dollars it would be a good experiment.

http://www.joshupdyke.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/Dye-1024x768.jpg

Josh

Can you do a clear coat?

Here is a little update. I got all the tanks set up and mixed all the chemicals. I am not super impressed with Caswell’s directions. One page will say mix with 4.5 gallons water, the next page will say mix with 4 gallons water. I noticed that almost all the packages have slightly different amounts to mix than the instruction book that they sent. My guess is that it is probably not super critical. None the less, it is annoying.

http://www.joshupdyke.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/Set-Up.jpg

Yes. A clear coat would just be skipping the dying step. So it is actually less work. But you should keep in mind that whatever the surface looked like the anodizing will not hide it. Even with dye it does not hide much. So if you wanted a clear coat I would suggest polishing the yoyo first.

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I would mostlikly beadblast it.

Hi can you anodize in white? Not necessarily clear but dyed the ano white like the original Levi peak color white without the blue mountains.

I thought you can’t anodize yoyos white? I thought you could only do clear coat, which is like the color of a raw yoyo

No such animal as white ano. For those who want to say there is and point to the overseas white ano it is technically not anodization.

then how were the Levi peaks done?

or are these just painted instead of anodized?

Yep, that’s paint.

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The only two options for white are paint or powder coat. Send it to Italy, if memory serves, for an outrageously overpriced sort of white not really ano!

I think the white that’s overseas is really actually etching, best bet is a powder coat.

Here are my first results. I have to say I am pretty happy with them. I have several handles that I wanted to anodize for work. The top part is a raw aluminum handle with a glass bead blast. This is what the middle part looked like before I anodized it. The middle one and bottom part were both anodized at the exact same time with the same settings. The color difference is due to the bar not being bead blasted.

http://www.joshupdyke.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/Anodizing-First-Attempt.jpg

And here are the technical specs

Anodize Stripper - 5 minutes
Desmut - 5 minutes
Anodize for 120 minutes @ 0.6 amps, 70°F
Dye - Caswell’s ‘Fast Blue’, 15 minutes, 140°F
Sealer - 15 minutes, 200°F

I rinsed the parts in distilled water before changing tanks. I used a digital K Type 0-1300C Thermocouple Probe Temperature Sensor and a multimeter to check the temperatures of the tanks, except for the anodizing tank which I used a glass thermometer.

I want to build a nice wooden rack to hold all the buckets and I think I will use some of that spray insulation to insulate some of the buckets that need to be heated. If I wrap the bucket in plastic wrap for then I should be able to remove the buckets without any problem. I think I will eventually get some more temperature sensors and use an arduino to monitor all the buckets temp at the same time and have it display it to a LCD screen. Then maybe tie that into a control system to control the heaters to get very stable temperatures. But that might be over kill. I will start with building a shelf.

Looking forward to your comments guys,
Josh

What’s the size for the bead?

Damn I wish I had some raw yoyos for you lol