The Perfect Pickle

I have been experimenting with different types of pickle and wanted to share my discoveries. I wanted to try the more natural types of pickle so as to avoid more chemicals in my studio. The results I discovered are mixed:

Sparex: a chemical acid. I started my soldering journey with this pickle and while I liked it (it works well) I found it was very corrosive to fabric (it ate right through my wash cloths) and it’s just another chemical in my studio I was hoping I could avoid. I decided to compare it to the more natural versions, imagining I would prefer those.

Vinegar, salt and water pickle: a natural acid. I tried this pickle second. While it worked O.K. (Not as fast or as effective as Sparex) it made my studio smell pungently of vinegar and it severely and quickly rusted my tools and pickle pot. It also seemed to get saturated faster than the Sparex and so I found I needed to create clean batches much more frequently.

Citric Acid and water: a natural acid. This was my third pickle and while it has no smell and does not rust steel (plus it won’t copper plate silver if you accidentally add steel to it) in order for it to be strong enough to work efficiently I had to add a lot of critic acid to the mixture and that made everything very sticky. Agh!

When all is said and done you still have to dispose of your pickle in the same manner, regardless of if it’s chemical or natural as all of them contain hard metals. Therefore I am using Sparex again as I think it’s the least offensive (no rusting and no stickiness!) and most effective pickle.

To learn about pickle disposal read here.

Have you tried variations of pickle? I’d love to hear about it.