Homemade Frame Rail Cleaner

Wade

Detail Oriented
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Joined
Dec 9, 2015
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161
Location
Yazoo City, MS
My air guns have 1/8" NPT tip threading and attachments. (The gun itself is 1/4" NTO.) I searched Amazon for a grease gun hose with that size fittings that was two feet long. I also purchased a female/female 1/8" NPT coupler.

I put some teflon tape on both hose ends and screwed one end to the air gun and the other to the rubber blow-off tip.

This is a very handy homemade tool. I know they make stuff like this but this is *exactly* what I needed. None of the stuff I can find around here matches my need so well. I do not want to buy something that is only close to what I need.

The hose and coupler cost about twenty bucks shipped to my door and took me five minutes to put together. It works really well, too.

Hope this is of interest to some of you.
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Nice setup! Now we just need something to stuff in there to knock all the scale and crap loose.

I own a really nice electric pressure washer. (AR Blue Clean 390 SS - 2,000 PSI/1.4 GPM) It gets the job done for such a lightweight machine. I just devised another cool frame tool using that washer. (The company that makes this makes them for much larger machines, too, if anyone is interested but has a nicer, gas powered washer.)

There is a drain cleaner called the Clog Hog, and they make a 25' hose with a nifty head that goes around plumbing elbows and sink traps, so snaking through our frame rails from rear to front would be no problem at all, I think. With a $6 adapter it fits my Blue Clean machine. I plan on cutting access holes in the crossmember that are just large enough for this snake to fit through. I will set them so they open up right even with the "floor" of each rail, probably 5/8" or so - maybe 3/4" (but I am hoping smaller).

http://www.cloghog.com/categories.php

(Clog Hog takes PayPal, too, if anyone cares, and allow shipping by UPS ore USPS. I also got a $5 discount by entering FB55 in the promo box.)

Pull the rear bumper when you need to really clean out the frame. Fire up the pressure washer and snake this bad boy in from one end to the other a couple of times - ought to clean the snot out of those rails.

With my tool above and this guy my frame ought to be squeaky clean when I put in the Eastwood Internal Frame Coating. And I think I will coat the thing very heavily, too. I am guessing the three cans Eastwood recommends will go down fine. I will give that a month to cure (hey, it is cold outside right now) and then do it again after an inspection with the endoscope.

I have heard you can find a spray nozzle with a ten foot hose on it that is just about the same as the Eastwood ones (but with more nozzle holes for a better pattern) and that would allow me to make my Eastwood application in the same manner - insert from rear all the way to the front, start spraying while the wife slowly pulls the hose out. I will have all the holes taped off, too.

Wish me luck. This guy arrives sometime during the week after Christmas. We are supposed to have some fair and reasonably warm weather that week, so maybe this will get done very soon.

Merry Christmas if I am unable to stop by here on Sunday. Y'all take care!
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@Wade, I know this thread is a bit old but I was just wondering how you made out with the clog hog? If you had to pick only one tool to clean mud and gunk from the frame, would you choose the compressor with the tool you described in your first post or the clog hog? Great posts by the way and thanks in advance for your thoughts on this.
 
@Wade, I know this thread is a bit old but I was just wondering how you made out with the clog hog? If you had to pick only one tool to clean mud and gunk from the frame, would you choose the compressor with the tool you described in your first post or the clog hog? Great posts by the way and thanks in advance for your thoughts on this.

It was never an either/or situation. They both were needed. The air blew out most of the lighter, looser gunk and drove a lot of gravel out the larger holes. Anything larger than pea gravel was too heavy, though.

I started by breaking up caked stuff by ramming stuff wire down the rails. My rifle rods were too stiff to go around curves, of course. I used very heavy coat hanger wire.

After a quick breakup of sediment I let it dry out for like two or three days.

THEN I used my homemade air tool. Once all the loose, dry material that I could get was out I hit it with the clog hog.

I am convinced this combo did a solid job. I do not this one or the other would do a complete job. But, since you asked, of the two the clog hog moved more and heavier material.

Good luck!

Wade
 
Thank you very much for the detailed reply. That's what i figured was the case, but I don't have the clog hog or a compressor (I do actually have the same electric pw as you) and my frame isn't too gunked up so hoping to clean it out reasonably well without buying too many new tools and trying to decide which to try first, and if one doesn't work well enough I may just cave and get the other one as well. Thanks again - your posts on here have been extremely helpful!
 
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The key is to break up the crap coating the rail walls. That, in my case, took the coat hanger wire, the air and then the water. It was not thick or all that bad, but it was our fine river silt and some gravel and stones, and that fine river silt dries very hard. It was not hard to shatter and knock loose, but it did take some thought. I used a USB borescope/endoscope I picked up off eBay for like $20. It is not a good one, but it did allow me to carefully look at where my actual rust issues were and how bad they might be. I was really lucky in that regard, because our fine river silt that dries so hard also happens to fully dry in a short time, so that stuff had not been coating the metal and then staying wet over a week at a stretch like for many of us. It dried really fast, each time, probably within ten or 12 hours, which is really great for me.

But again, it was really hard and I had to break it up. Imagine a Heath Bar versus a Snickers Bar. That is what I had in my frame. Most guys seem to get the thicker, wetter stuff like a Snickers Bar.

Either way, I managed to diagnose my issue and figure out a decent way to clean it up and treat it. I think My frame will be good for another decade if I keep cleaning it out twice a year or more.

Wade
 
I don't have the scope attachment yet (ordering one tonight) but I think I've just got a bunch of dried mud thanks actually breaks off pretty easily, if I can get to it. We'll see once the scope comes. Again, thank you very much for the posts, especially the last one you linked to with the full description, very helpful!
 
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neat idea you had there. while I don't have a cloghog I have had several drain cleaning/jetting equipment . you can purchase a rotary jetting head which may work better as it sprays in a 360 degree pattern not just straight ahead. I got mine thru water cannon
 
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neat idea you had there. while I don't have a cloghog I have had several drain cleaning/jetting equipment . you can purchase a rotary jetting head which may work better as it sprays in a 360 degree pattern not just straight ahead. I got mine thru water cannon

The Clog Hog has four jets that point rearwards, which propels it along the frame rail under its own power. You have to hold on or it will shoot down the rail. It has one jet that points forwards.
 
i understand exactly what your saying but the rotary cutter has a disc which spins shooting a wal lof water 360 degrees as it goes thru. you had a great idea I would never have thought of
 
An idea for an air nozzle; what about making something like a duche nozzle out of small diameter tubing with holes drilled radially and a capped end?
 
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My thread was less about *my idea* and more about figuring out *my problem* and then cobbling together tools that would effectively fix them. This was how I did that, and anyone here is free to copy the idea riff on and improve it, or cast it aside.

I think your idea is just as valid if it works, and by your description it seems like it might be a winner. Give a try and post your results here.

Good luck!