Nope, if so I would have included the word "naked" ;)

Reviving this thread...
James, did you buy the bigger unit (9L, 240Watts) ?
If so, how does it work ?

I have a small one from HF and would be happy with more cleaning power.

-Guillaume

Does anyone have a "before" and "after" picture showing a spoon being cleaned with one of these units?

Yes, but I haven't really had a chance to use it much. I'll give you a report tomorrow when I do some bicycle gear cleaning.

You can't tell a difference visually. All the crap it gets out is in the nooks and crannies you can't see.

Funny, it did remove the coloring from an alloy pistol. It used to be black, now it is purple.

Yeah, you can't put anything painted in them. It will strip the paint right off. I learned the hard way with some of my Ruger Mark II magazines. Fortunately, I just blued them.

They do work with blued, parkerized, and other heavy-duty finishes.

Another common mistake is to use a case cleaning solution on spoons. This will end very, very badly.

Legion - Why is that?

Case cleaning solution will take off the heavy duty finishes and can discolor some metals. Some of them also contain chlorine (I actively avoid these solutions), which can make metal brittle and lead to fatigue/failure.

Thank you.

remember to spray something on steel/iron parts the second they are out of the tub and dry.
A totally clean part will start to rust in minutes.. and it will rust a lot faster now it's cleaned.

Especially in Houston!

I'm using heavy duty de-greaser "citrus" solution, full strength. The mini unit removed what I though was anodizing on the pistol. It now looks like it was possibly a dye. No cleaning solutions over the years, including Berrymans, stripped this color from the frame.

I used the small one to clean some coins. These are 90% silver content only coins which are not otherwise valuable. Some had some serious crap on them. I plan to use the big one to clean some similar coins.

This one had 6 high power ultrasonic transducers and heat. Again, later this morning I'll show a before and after of few things.

Very cool! I never thought much of the things, but the only ultrasonic cleaner I've been around was one my grandma bought from Sharper Image or somewhere that we messed around with. It wouldn't clean anything.

Are there any minimum requirements to meet to have a good one, one that cleans stuff?
Minimum number of thransducers? Frequency? is heat necessary?

I use the HF one to clean my motorcycle carbs. I use Pine Sol and water 50:50. It usually takes 4-5 cycles but they come out squeaky clean. I hate ethanol BTW; it's evil

Look at the power level of the transducers. And on heat, I doubt it is required, but it should help on most of the greasy stuff I'm cleaning.

good ones for bigger parts are great, but for the money they cost, it's pointless if you don't use em all the time.

the intermediate ones just ain't good enough for engine parts of decent size. You just sit and wait to long for it to clean... and they still cost quite a bit.

I had an intermediate one, used it to sell of a car i was parting.. sold it soon after at near purchase value..


Heat is important if you got bigger, really dirty/greasy parts to clean.. not so much for small things.

but it takes forever to clean big parts if you don't have a chitload of transducers & heat. And all the time you sit there with the annoying noise it makes... No good if you live in an apartment , ask me how i know.

Would 160W be enough for home use?

It would depend on the liquid volume. The one I purchased is 9 liters and 240 watts of transducers. If the volume is 6 liters or less, then it should operate similar to the one I have.

to do what? what do you want to clean with it?
How dirty are the things you want to clean?
how many transducers ?
how big is the tub (physical size and Liters)?

to put it in perspective, if you have a tub that is 20cm W x 30cm L x 30cm H
with 2 transducers

And you want to put in a part that is 28 cm long.. well.
You'll have a part that is somewhat clean in the middle.. and to clean the edges you'll have to reposition the end in the transducer range... then do the same for the other end.

Transducers don't clean throughout the tub, they mostly clean right where the transducer is.