The kit for cleaning all Platinum material, mainly Saucers and Crucibles including portable milling machine, kit of tips for cutting, polishing, sanding, drilling, consumables specific for Platinum (paper, diamond paste, felt pads and cloths) and a manual of instructions with procedures.
For the maintenance and care of the platinum instrumentation, a kit with everything needed for cleaning was designed.
The 88Cleaning kit consists of:
- Portable milling machine (from 10,000 to 30,000 rpm) 220 V electric operation;
- Mixed bit kit (cutting, polishing, sanding, drilling, etc.);
- Sandpaper for removing large impurities and scratches;
- Diamond polishing paste;
- Felt pad for polishing;
- Cloth for mirror finish;
- Small manual with the procedure for proper cleaning.
Maintenance
Proper maintenance, the right care and the use of special tools to get the platinum products back into shape allows for better preservation and greater durability over time.
In addition to the use of the cleaning kit, we report some tips that we believe to be useful and important for the correct maintenance and use of platinum crucibles and capsules.
General Lines
Avoid placing crucibles on cold or dirty metal surfaces to avoid thermal and physical shocks,
Handle the crucibles with special pliers with platinum tips,
Use Teflon containers for cleaning and washing.
Avoid surface contact, especially at high temperatures, with other metals, Fe, Cr, Ni, Cu, Zn, Pb, as the latter may undergo a pre-oxidation process.
Do not cast with caustic alkali, nitrate, cyanide or nitride in Pt crucibles.
Use ammonium iodide to facilitate the detachment of the pearls.
Before melting, heat the crucible if using sodium borate to perform the analysis (When performing borate fusion on reducible matter, pre-oxidise first before fusing.).
Several cleaning tips
For routine maintenance, place the crucibles in a beaker with a hot citric acid solution of an appropriate concentration and temperature.
For a quick cleaning of a dry crucible, place 1gm of lithium carbonate in the crucible, melt, add a grain of ammonium iodide and then discard the mixture. (For a quick dry crucible clean, place about 1gm of lithium borate into the crucible, melt, place a grain of ammonium iodide and pour the melt to waste.)
Use diluted hydrochloric acid before boiling with the addition of water
If you need a more intense cleaning, boil the crucibles in nitric acid (without chlorine)
Rinse with plenty of water and dry the crucibles well at the end of each cleaning cycle, regardless of the type of cleaning performed.
