Nixie Tube grunge remover

[MichaelB]

Some of you may have already discovered this, but I was pleased to stumble upon this little trick. Over the years I have accumulated several tubes, especially 7971's with that time-hardened burnt in dust, I'll call it, that is almost impossible to remove. For the heck of it, I tried rubbing the grunge with some machinist 3M Scotch Brite pad...worked like a champ and took it right off! Even dry! and doesn't seem to attack the lettering either, if there's any still on the tube. I'm sure regular scotch brite will work to. Anyway, there you have it, a little known nixie tidbit

[Bill Notfaded]

I love this idea thanks Michael. I have some tubes just like that (7971). You want to clean them... but not too hard or so hard you take the lettering off.

Thanks,

Bill

[J Forbes]

Fine steel wool should work, also. It's not really an abrasive, either. I use it on old cars to get grunge off of glass and chrome and stainless parts.

[MichaelB]

Yep, I thought about trying 0000 before, but as you know, you get those really fine steel particles when you use it. Not good around electronic stuff. Scotch Brite is very clean to use and I can use it at my workbench.

[Mac Doktor]

On Sep 2, 2019, at 9:54 AM, MichaelB <badn...@badnixie.com> wrote:

Yep, I thought about trying 0000 before, but as you know, you get those really fine steel particles when you use it. Not good around electronic stuff. Scotch Brite is very clean to use and I can use it at my workbench.

Just don't use it on copper. A Scotch Brite pad is what I use to polish up an untinned PC board before I start soldering.

Terry Bowman, KA4HJH
"The Mac Doctor"