Reuse of Elma Red 1:9

[MariusJacob]

Hi, this is my first question in this amazing forum, I hope you can help me.

I use Elma Red 1:9 for cleaning watch parts. Ultrasonic bath for 3-5 minutes.

This is followed by 2 minutes rinse in ultrasonic with distilled water and other 2 minutes in IPA.

Balance and pallet fork go for 3 minutes in Essence Renata in the ultrasonic. 

I often do a previous clean by hand with lighter fluid.

All this is just context. So:

1.- Can I reuse my Elma solution? 

I know that with rotary cleaners is common practice to reuse solutions but I don't know if it is good practice to reuse Elma Red once It is diluted in water and used in ultrasonic bath.

2.- Can Balance and pallet fork go into the Elma solution?

Thank you.

[mikepilk]

3 hours ago, MariusJacob said:

I often do a previous clean by hand with lighter fluid.

I usually do this, especially on very dirty movements. I also peg the jewels at this stage.

I do 4 mins in ultrasonic cleaning solution, then 2x 2 mins in rinses*, and 30s in IPA. That's for ALL parts including balance (attached to mainplate) and pallet fork. 

* I have Rinse 1 and Rinse 2 jars. When I change solutions, Rinse 2 becomes Rinse 1, and 2 gets new solution.

The solution should be good for several watches. I use about about 200 ml of Elma (WF Pro cleaner, Suprol Rinse) solutions and clean about 5 watches before changing solutions.

It is generally considered that 30 seconds is the recommended time for IPA. That way it's safe for parts using shellac - balance, pallets.  

[MariusJacob]

2 hours ago, mikepilk said:

I usually do this, especially on very dirty movements. I also peg the jewels at this stage.

I do 4 mins in ultrasonic cleaning solution, then 2x 2 mins in rinses*, and 30s in IPA. That's for ALL parts including balance (attached to mainplate) and pallet fork. 

* I have Rinse 1 and Rinse 2 jars. When I change solutions, Rinse 2 becomes Rinse 1, and 2 gets new solution.

The solution should be good for several watches. I use about about 200 ml of Elma (WF Pro cleaner, Suprol Rinse) solutions and clean about 5 watches before changing solutions.

It is generally considered that 30 seconds is the recommended time for IPA. That way it's safe for parts using shellac - balance, pallets.  

Thanks Mike, your answer is really helpful.

Best regards.

 

[JohnR725]

2 hours ago, mikepilk said:

Elma (WF Pro cleaner

5 hours ago, MariusJacob said:

Elma Red 1:9

a solvent-based cleaner versus the original question of the water-based cleaner?

you didn't specify a time frame for when you're going to reuse your water-based cleaner? In other words weeks months years later you going to use it again might be a problem if it starts to evaporate but I doubt it's going to go bad instantaneously.

Although even though I believe it uses the word tap water for mixing with the cleaner I would use something that's not tap water it depends upon where you live as there may be all sorts of undesirable chemicals in the water.

then looking at the PDF of the product use guide there is an indication of this Should the solution become cloudy after prolonged use, the cleaning effect might be reduced. Prepare a fresh  cleaning solution  this does give the impression that it can be used multiple times it would seem rather strange that the solution only has a one time use.

5 hours ago, MariusJacob said:

2 minutes rinse in ultrasonic with distilled water

the actual description of watch cleaning is usually different than what people think. In the case of a solvent-based cleaner with a solvent itself will put things in solution like oils there other additives that speed that up plus make things right and shiny. Then the rinse especially when solvent-based will continue to remove things from the watch such as oils so it actually will continue to clean. The second thing that the rinse does its primary thing is to reduce the concentration of cleaning fluid on the watch itself. In other words you put all the bad stuff in solution and the solution is now covering your watch. So ideally should have more than one rinse to remove that bad concentration a stuff from the plates.

if you look at modern Elma cleaning machines that used water-based cleaner will notice that they do have four separate jars. With three of them listed as rinse. They do have another machine that's very very nice and exotic but it can't used water-based cleaner but it still does have four containers. Whereas older cleaning machines typically only have three jars.

2 hours ago, mikepilk said:

It is generally considered that 30 seconds is the recommended time for IPA. That way it's safe for parts using shellac

 

even Elma recommends IPA on their exotic cleaning machine because the rinse doesn't like to evaporate on a timely basis. So yes now it seems he is standard practice to use alcohol as the final final rinse if you want things to drive properly.

6 hours ago, MariusJacob said:

2.- Can Balance and pallet fork go into the Elma solution?

I always find this a really interesting question. When I was in school learning watch repair we didn't have any restrictions in fact it was never even mentioned at all. Then if you look at the Elma cleaning solutions for watches I've never seen a restriction on do not put balance wheel and pallet fork in our solution.  otherwise if there was a restriction they would make special cleaning products just for balance wheels and pallet forks conceivably even then making a special cleaning machine. Which definitely would not go over well considering how cheap watchmakers are to have to have two separate cleaning machines and fluids so as far as I know there is no restriction.

Then especially with anything vintage it's always best to check the shellac on the pallet fork and definitely on the roller jewel as somebody before you might not of used shellac or the quality the shellac disintegrated with time etc. as often times whatever was there before will go bad. Having a loose roller jewel does not make for good running watch at all.

 

[Paul80]

An interesting side note to this, we are told not to use Alcohol based solutions on anything with Shellac on ie Pallet fork and roller table as the Alcohol softens the Shellac and many promote the use of solutions that contain ammonia which is supposed to be safe for Shellac.

One of my other hobbies is wood turning and in that we use Shellac quite a bit and in the wood turning community what do we use to clean our brushes after applying Shellac, no not Alcohol but Ammonia.

So I do wonder just how safe our Ammoniated solutions really are? 

Perhaps waterbased cleaners and a quick drying cycle is not such a bad option after all

[MariusJacob]

@JohnR725

I really appreciate your help, I just started using Elma Red after some years of solvent based solutions.

I would use the solution for one or two cycles a week, and I really don't mind changing the fluid often since I have a local supplier who sells it, and the volume needed is not big.

I should have read the guide of the product before asking, somehow I didn't even think about that. 

So, I guess that:

1.- I can reuse the solution as long as It does look clean and bright and I change it regularly, lest say 3-4 watches and no longer that lest say a month.

2.- I should add at least one more rinse with distilled water.

3.- It seems safe to clean balance and pallet fork in ultrasonic bath with Elma Red.

4.- Final rinse just 30 seconds in IPA.

5.- Better dissolve Elma Red with distilled water.

I hope I understood right. 

Thank you a lot.

 

[MariusJacob]

16 minutes ago, Paul80 said:

An interesting side note to this, we are told not to use Alcohol based solutions on anything with Shellac on ie Pallet fork and roller table as the Alcohol softens the Shellac and many promote the use of solutions that contain ammonia which is supposed to be safe for Shellac.

One of my other hobbies is wood turning and in that we use Shellac quite a bit and in the wood turning community what do we use to clean our brushes after applying Shellac, no not Alcohol but Ammonia.

So I do wonder just how safe our Ammoniated solutions really are? 

Perhaps waterbased cleaners and a quick drying cycle is not such a bad option after all

Interesting information, Paul.

I always cleaned separately Balance and Pallet fork in Renata Essence. But it would be wonderful if I could clean all the parts together. 

Luckily I have enough old destroyed balances and pallet forks to experiment with the new cleaning procedure. 

Best regards.

[JohnR725]

38 minutes ago, Paul80 said:

Ammonia.

So I do wonder just how safe our Ammoniated solutions really are? 

the ammonia product for cleaning your brushes you know what the chemical properties are or have a material safety sheets?

As far as I know ammonia or I believe ammonium hydroxide but I'm not a chemist here I might be wrong as been used for watch and clock cleaning for a very very long time. The only experiences or knowledge I have a bit being bad is it will frost brass if left on long enough and frosting means dissolving the copper into the solution which turns are pretty blue-green color. Or on one professional discussion group somebody went on vacation with the watch in the solution and came back and needed an entire new watch and it was a very expensive watch. The claim was that only the jewels were left but I found that unlikely I suspect some of the metal was left but not in a functional state

 

40 minutes ago, Paul80 said:

An interesting side note to this, we are told not to use Alcohol based solutions on anything with Shellac on ie Pallet fork and roller table as the Alcohol softens the Shellac and many promote the use of solutions that contain ammonia which is supposed to be safe for Shellac.

what I was cleaning watches at home and had a problem with the l&r rants not evaporating at all no matter how much heat and blowing from a hairdryer that I was using it just wasn't going to evaporate. A friend suggested alcohol. Going to the local hardware store I purchased a gallon of the same alcohol that's used to dissolve shellac it actually says that on the label. But the purpose of the final alcohol rinse is only to rinse off the prior rinses and I don't even think I was in their 15 seconds it didn't seem to be a problem at all

we do end up with other interesting problems like shellac is not necessarily one substance it can be a whole bunch of substances. Then of course alcohol you need to specify which one it is. I did see on a woodworking discussion group the referenced isopropyl alcohol as to whether it dissolves shellac or not and? I think some people said it did but it took a really long time and we do end up with lots of variables so rinsing in the alcohol is fine just don't leave it in there very long just enough to rinse off the rim's and then you can dry

29 minutes ago, MariusJacob said:

1.- I can reuse the solution as long as It does look clean and bright and I change it regularly, lest say 3-4 watches and no longer that lest say a month.

2.- I should add at least one more rinse with distilled water.

3.- It seems safe to clean balance and pallet fork in ultrasonic bath with Elma Red.

4.- Final rinse just 30 seconds in IPA.

5.- Better dissolve Elma Red with distilled water.

as far as the cleaning goes I don't know how many times you can use it. I think somewhere I have documentation of what Swatch group recommends for cleaning but I don't think the using the water base and unfortunately Swatch group has infinitely deep pockets so their cleaning procedures will not match ours. Although I do know that other people that are using the solvent-based cleaners will use them until well they use him much longer than I would I've even known a people to filter them except that stupid because you Filter out oil that's dissolved in the solution. So I guess what shall have to do is just keep an eye on the cleaning fluid of it starts to look dirty or it's not cleaning then replace it

46 minutes ago, Paul80 said:

Perhaps waterbased cleaners and a quick drying cycle is not such a bad option after all

I think if you look at the water-based cleaner it does have ammonia. But I think the key to cleaning with anything that makes things bright and shiny is minimalistic time is preferred versus something longer that will start to do bad things. Then typically anything other than the cleaner with the ammonia I don't know enough about the water-based but any of the solvent-based you can go much longer in the rinse because it's relatively harmless it's not dissolving or brightening things.

Oh and they even do make a non-ammonia non-water-based cleaning product but in another discussion group somebody said it's still have a smelled too much of course all solvents are going to have some level of smell and it still contained chemicals to make things bright and shiny so I assume ammonia or not anything that makes things bright and shiny you basically have a time limit of bright and shiny and then it will start basically dissolving things like typically copper out of the brass.

29 minutes ago, MariusJacob said:

I always cleaned separately Balance and Pallet fork in Renata Essence. But it would be wonderful if I could clean all the parts together

here's interesting video something dreadfully expensive. This is the cleaning machine that I use when I go to work. Let's look at all the things that we know for instance alcohol is bad but as per Elma's recommendation the last rinse is alcohol as the normal rents will not evaporate. Ultrasonic there's people out there that say that's bad this machine actually has two separate frequencies. Then just to make sure the fluid gets everywhere it even uses vacuum and yes the cleaning fluid really does go places that normally might have to disassemble. So we have alcohol to the frequencies of ultrasonic and vacuum that lets the fluid literally get every place and we clean all of our balance wheels pallet forks in this machine and cleans really beautifully is just a shame it costs such a huge sum of money.

 

[MariusJacob]

9 hours ago, JohnR725 said:

  I've even known a people to filter them except that stupid because you Filter out oil that's dissolved in the solution. 

 I have been one of those. 

Thanks, comrades, this is being very helpful.