Letter 14050

Cleaning a burned stainless steel surface [Hong Kong] 

My stainless steel ware have been burn to black by careless. Is there any method that I can clean up the carbon or black color to normal stainless steel surface?

Christo Chow
QBC CCCC - Hong Kong

Well, you can certainly abrade or grind the stain off. If you use steel wool, however, you risk imbedding small iron particles in the abraded surface which will hurt the corrosion resistance. You will need to remove the particles by acid etching (nitric or citric are most commonly used) or additional abrasion with a stainless steel pad. So you might consider using sandpaper rather then the more easily available steel wool, or wire brush.

Something I've never tried, so I don't know if it will work, would be to use an oxidizing flame- one with added air, to try to burn off the soot.

Good luck!

Lee Gearhart
- East Aurora, NY

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