Good Ultrasonic Cleaner?

[roeme]

So, anybody actually going to share their results?
Looking for a smaller one myself, but it's maddening trying to sort it all out.

What did you buy and how do you like it?

Getting late here, so just my experience summarily

- Don't have current results, some are buried in my rebuild thread
- Have a two or three liter unit, can't remember exactly. Can put one complete carb through in one go.
- Ultrasonic power is 150W (this is important in relation to bath size)
- Some local supplier, unit might've been quite well be manufactured in china...it's german branded though.
- Trick to get good results is to get the surface tension of the water down and heat (found 50?C to work well for me)
- Get surface tension down with dish detergent intended for manual dish washing (english eludes me atm) or simple soap. I just the day-to-day nondescript bog-standard liquid one
- Do use distilled or demineralized water. Tap water, depending on the hardness, will result in lime/chalk deposits. Depending on your location this may be a non-issue
- Haven't found the need to fiddle with pH or use anything aggressive, experimented a bit with a citrus-based cleaner that came with the unit, found none or negligible differences to solution described above
- Also experiment what works best for you
- Very satisfied with it, though I haven't had to clean super caked-up carbs yet, I guess...? Don't have much experience in that regard. Cleaned both of my banks, one of which was gummed up with decades-old (ex-)gasoline, the other one was in regular use by PO, but contanimated and full of various strange residues, possibly some spray-in cleaning products that didn't really clean.

Will update when I have some parts to clean.

Edit: Agreed as others said, they do not make your parts shiny, but clean.
Edit2: Frequency is 45 kHz, that's where industrial applications begin IIRC

 

[Andrew Vanis]

Doing a set of carbs and not confident in my elcheapo chinese ultrasonic; it makes a high pitched vibration noise sometimes and questioning how well it shakes. Took off the bottom cover and everything seems fine. Think the noise may have been some vibration from the cover itself. Found this nifty aluminum foil test and my unit pierces holes in it very quickly so think it's okay after all. Fingers crossed anyway...

Oh, and using Yamaha carb dip sauce inside. Cut it a little more than normal in order to fill up the tub. Not the ideal stuff I suppose but think it's going to work well.

Interesting to see how 1min eats aluminum. wonder what our repeated cleanings do to the Alum carbs

 

[roeme]

Interesting to see how 1min eats aluminum. wonder what our repeated cleanings do to the Alum carbs

...the process has not even remotely, absolutely and utterly _nothing_ to do with what kinds of metal you are cleaning. See Process/Operation Principle at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultrasonic_cleaning

 

[Nessism]

...the process has not even remotely, absolutely and utterly _nothing_ to do with what kinds of metal you are cleaning. See Process/Operation Principle at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultrasonic_cleaning

One thing I've noticed about ultrasonic cleaning is that the aluminum carb bodies come out quite bright. I believe the ultrasonic bubble action is removing oxidation along with an infinitesimal amount of metal as well. I know that zinc plating will get damaged by the ultrasonic so it stands to reason that the aluminum will undergo a little erosion as well.

 

[Guest]

I'm getting ****ed off because these units are 30% cheaper than I paid just a month or so back. Oh well.

I have no idea why anyone would try to clean a bank of carbs that are assembled. There is no way for the solution to get to where it's needed if you do that. Not to mention the various O-rings are going to be hard and brittle regardless so the carbs need to come apart anyway to change them.

Not all carbs are 30 years old. Some just need to be cleaned and not rebuilt. You can pull most of the parts and prop open the butterfly and enrichiner plungers, but leave the bank connected. I'm actually looking at a 30L unit on ebay, that they are asking $260 or make offer. I want one for when I open my shop. I offered $230 for it, but haven't gotten a response back yet.

 

[roeme]

(...)I'm actually looking at a 30L unit on ebay, that they are asking $260 or make offer. I want one for when I open my shop. I offered $230 for it, but haven't gotten a response back yet.

Sounds like one heck of a deal, considering we paid ~200$ for our unit some years ago.

However, check how much ultrasonic power the unit has, especially in relation to bath size.

Ours has between 50W to 75W per litre.

 

[Guest]

I bought a unit similar to this last year (I bought the 10L):



but I just used it the other day. Is any one familiar with model? It cleans fine and heats up, but if I set it to let's say 40?C it will climb past this temperature by more than 2 or 3 degrees. Is this normal due to having a lid on it and to the ultrasonic cleaning action? Also can the solution be preheated? I tried turning the heater on without the ultrasonic on, but the actual temp. of the solution never seemed to change. I set to 50?C for a 30 min. cleaning and it never got to temperature on the first cleaning. It took a second 30 min. cleaning before it got up to temperature (it also climbed past 50? C). BTW the "instructions" are useless.

No complaints on the cleaning. I used it to clean some Hydro Gear pump parts. It did a great job using the regular Simple Green diluted with water. Just wondering how the particular unit works or it's limitations.

 

[Guest]

Sounds like one heck of a deal, considering we paid ~200$ for our unit some years ago.

However, check how much ultrasonic power the unit has, especially in relation to bath size.

Ours has between 50W to 75W per litre.

This is the one I considering. My offer expired, but they wont get rid of me that easily. I resubmitted the same offer.

 

[roeme]

(...) but if I set it to let's say 40?C it will climb past this temperature by more than 2 or 3 degrees. Is this normal due to having a lid on it and to the ultrasonic cleaning action? (...)

2 or 3 degrees are negligible in this application.

Also can the solution be preheated? I tried turning the heater on without the ultrasonic on, but the actual temp. of the solution never seemed to change. I set to 50?C for a 30 min. cleaning and it never got to temperature on the first cleaning. It took a second 30 min. cleaning before it got up to temperature (it also climbed past 50? C). BTW the "instructions" are useless.

I don't have the same unit, but they're all very similar in construction.

- My unit operates the heater indepently from the transducer, so at least my unit can do it. I'd be surprised if yours can't.
- On my unit, the timer and heating knobs are mechanical, so I have no read-out anyway, but I suspect mine has similar temperature swings as yours.
- Mine also takes quite some time to get up to temp, but I don't mind.

The heating system is primitive on such appliances, just like ovens or stoves. Like cooking, the exact temperature doesn't matter all that much, a few degrees are essentially noise.
But since the primary job of the cleaner is to clean, and not to cook, it doesn't surprise me that (at least our homegamer units) it takes some time to get up to temp.

Doesn't bother me, I let parts sit in there anyway until I'm satisfied and usually clean them only superficially beforehand; my runs are usually 60 minutes. If a lower temp prolongs the runs, I don't mind it at all.

I use mine mainly at 50?C primarily because I can then fiddle with the parts from time to time without burning my hands immediately.

 

[Nessism]

My chinese cheepy ultrasonic doesn't heat unless it's running either. That's just the way some of them are designed.

 

[Guest]

2 or 3 degrees are negligible in this application.



I don't have the same unit, but they're all very similar in construction.

- My unit operates the heater indepently from the transducer, so at least my unit can do it. I'd be surprised if yours can't.
- On my unit, the timer and heating knobs are mechanical, so I have no read-out anyway, but I suspect mine has similar temperature swings as yours.
- Mine also takes quite some time to get up to temp, but I don't mind.

The heating system is primitive on such appliances, just like ovens or stoves. Like cooking, the exact temperature doesn't matter all that much, a few degrees are essentially noise.
But since the primary job of the cleaner is to clean, and not to cook, it doesn't surprise me that (at least our homegamer units) it takes some time to get up to temp.

Doesn't bother me, I let parts sit in there anyway until I'm satisfied and usually clean them only superficially beforehand; my runs are usually 60 minutes. If a lower temp prolongs the runs, I don't mind it at all.

I use mine mainly at 50?C primarily because I can then fiddle with the parts from time to time without burning my hands immediately.

The one we have at work is a SharperTek unit that will hold two disassembled carbs, it preheats.

 

[Guest]

Thanks for the replies. So far it I've been really pleased with it, I was just wondering about the heater. It doesn't appear that the solution can be preheated. Like I mentioned, the included instructions are useless.

 

[Big T]

I've been shopping and I'm confused

Are these things 120V or 240V?

Even the ones that say 120V have a 240V plug.

 

[Guest]

I've been shopping and I'm confused

Are these things 120V or 240V?

Even the ones that say 120V have a 240V plug.

Mine is 120. I bought this one on fleabay:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/New-Stainless-Steel-10L-Liter-Industry-Heated-Ultrasonic-Cleaner-Heater-Timer-/391329343424?hash=item5b1d0be7c0

 

[Nessism]

Bumping this back up to get some further feedback on how everyone's Chinese ultrasonic is holding up. Mine has all but died.

From the beginning my 6L jobbies performance alternated between working well and poorly along with either a shrieking noise or quiet. I've now come to realize that this traced back to one of the three ultrasonic drivers either turning on or not. Next, the unit wasn't heating, which I traced to burned wires going to the heater. I fixed the burned wires and that got heat going again, but that one sensor was completely dead now. While troubleshooting there is evidence of heat on the board next to one of the power transistors, and said transistor is blazing hot when the unit is plugged in. I think the heater wires were laying against the heat sink for the power transistor, causing them to short.

On top of this, or maybe the root cause, I noticed that the power feed between the two power driver boards was misconnected. Power comes into the main board, then it's jumpered over to a standalone board which is dedicated for driving the ultrasonic sensor what failed. Problem seem to be that this jumper was misconnected though; there is a "L" and "N" line, and they were mixed up between the two.

Where am I going with all this? Basically I'm trying to decide whether or not it's worth the hassle of trying to repair the unit I have or just trash it. A new ultrasonic sensor is $15 and I think the main power board can be repaired. Just not sure it's worth the hassle since these units brand new are selling for less than $100 these days. Mind you that will be $100 down the drain if they don't hold up long term of course...thus my reason for bumping this thread back up.

Update: going down the rabbit hole... Ordered a new ultrasonic transducer (it was only $11.69 shipped), and a guy at work is going to help replace a questionable diode and maybe that (hot) power transducer. Minimal risk so lets see where this all leads...

 

[Rob S.]

When I would suggest carb cleaning to my mechanic in previous years, he would say, "It's running so good, why would you want to clean the carbs?"

I saw him a week ago, told him the bike was hard to start after 2 or 3 weeks, and it had been sitting for 2 1/2 years. "Carb cleaning," he wrote. "Berryman's, 24 hours?" I asked. "They rarely need that long," he replied.

"What about ultrasonic?" I asked. He bought one, wasn't pleased, had some back-and-forth with the manufacturer, eventually got his money back.

So it's a soak and some compressed air, I guess.

 

[Nessism]

My preferred routine to clean carbs involves first soaking in Berryman's to loosen the crud, followed by the ultrasonic to get off all the oily residue and remnant cruddiness. Soaking in Berryman's for longer than a few hours will take off plating on the steel parts (on Keihin carbs anyway) so that's one reason I'm not a fan of 24 hour dipping. No question though, Berryman's does a much better job of cleaning than ultrasonic alone.

 

[Nessism]

My electronic tech friend found a bad diode on the board and also suggested replacing the power transistor nearby. I ordered enough diodes to replace them all along with a similar number of power transistors. Cost more to ship than the parts cost but it's all in the fun at this point.

 

[Nessism]

Unit is up and running. There was multiple diode and transistor failure on the boards, along with one of the piezo transducers. I don't want to say "you get what you pay for" since that's not always true, but I will say you can't expect too much out of a dirt cheap unit like this.

To check function I touched each transducer to make sure it was moving. And I also did the aluminum foil test. The unit pitted the foil fairly quickly but nothing like you see on youtube with better ultrasonic testors. At any rate, it works...for now.