[Vwdiesel] Citric Acid

[S. Shourds]

LBaird119 at aol.com wrote:

>Wont any acid prefer the Al in
>preference to crud;
>
>   Acids have their preferred meals.  Hydrofluoric likes glass.  Hydrochloric 
>
>likes various things but will go after lime(?), cement more quickly than 
>other things but it does like Al.  Sulfuric likes to suck the water out of 
>things or turn carbon based stuff into carbon.  Acetic acid likes lime 
>but I don't recall much of a tendancy toward Al. 
>

There's a reason they tell you not to make up vinegar dressings and 
marinades in aluminum bowls.  Aluminum gets eaten up pretty quickly by 
about anything.  Despite the fact that I was in the lab until 0130 this 
morning, I'm a little fuzzy on the exact reason.  Has something to do 
with the [H3O+], the Ksp of the acid, the Go of the metal, and some 
other stuff I can't remember well enough.  I can't say I know what the  
composition of heater core sludge is.  Usually, with organics, you use a 
detergent or a solvent.  We do use acids to clean organics from 
glassware.  Concentrated chromic acid--take a gallon of concentrated 
sulfuric acid and add 75 g potassium dichromate.  Then you leave it in 
an ice bath until the temperature doesn't scare you anymore and don't 
pour it down any drain you care about.  I always avoid using it if 
possible.  Mean stuff.  Needless to say, not something that I would use 
to clear out a heater core. 

-Shalyn