Best tool for cleaning inside of long tube?
- Thread starter billdz
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You said fiberglass so how about a long brush with soap and water unless the motor mount tube is cardboard? Kurt
dr wogz
Fly caster
Take a good sized dowel, and wrap the end in foam, an old sponge.. Glue it as best you can to the dowel. Make it slightly larger than the 38mm. Glue a piece of sandpaper to this foam you only need cover half the foam. You should have a stick with a foam top, and some sandpaper on it. As you insert it into the tube, the oversized diameter of the foam & paper should compress the foam & sandpaper against the inside of eth tube. a lot of up & down strokes while turning it should help sand / clean the inside of the tube.
Soap and water works, but it tends to make a mess. You do need a cleaning agent and some water to clean it up. I suggest trying the pre-soaked chlorox wipes taped to a dowel. I use them to clean up motor cases and the soot on fiberglass tubes. Works great and even the heaviest stuff just wipes off.
Igotnothing
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I clean long motor cases with a drier vent dust brush. It has threaded fiberglass sections to reach 9 feet - which happens to be slightly* longer than any motor case I have at the moment. I chuck it up in a drill and spin it to scrub the inside of the cases. It has plastic bristles, so it doesn't harm the case.
Ace Hardware. *Slightly exaggerating.
Ace Hardware. *Slightly exaggerating.
https://www.csrocketry.com/rocket-motors/motor-cleaning-brushes/cleaning-brush-38mm.html Chris has these in 29-98, I think possibly even 150.
You're correct but have to have the time to let it dry or wipe it out by stuffing paper towels down it. Had a CATO with a 29mm motor seared through a forward closure and burned a hole in the side of a motor deploy rocket. Was going to trash it but the flame jet went 180 degrees from the kevlar cord and I thought, "What the hay?" The rocket was very dirty on the inside but was structurally sound otherwise. I used a hose, brush and dishwashing liquid to get the bulk of the detritus out and was able to epoxy and slide a coupler down to close the hole. Rocket flies and doesn't know the difference. Kurt
That's what I use and I'll even wrap the brush with scotch-brite pad to scrub the really tough stuff.
MikeyDSlagle
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And his 38mm is about as long as your leg, should be long enough.
Long 1/4" all-thread rod, run a 1/4" nut down about an inch on it, slip on a 1/4" fender washer, get two or three Scotch-Brite pads (green, Blue, or purple = different coarseness) poke a 1/4" hole in the pads and slide them on the rod, slip a 1/4" fender washer on top of the pads, run a 1/4" nut down and tighten. Chuck it up in your hand drill, put some Hoppes #9 on the pads and ream away, switch over to Dawn dish soap and ream again, rinse out with cold water.
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If it's all fiberglass, if it's fully waterproof, hit it with the hose. If you can hook said hose up to your hot water supply, even better.
Don't take a half hour doing it, at some remote point in time you might be softening glue joints, but you can totally hit it with scalding hot water for a couple minutes. I do it every flight on airframes that allow it. Cleans 'em right up.
Don't take a half hour doing it, at some remote point in time you might be softening glue joints, but you can totally hit it with scalding hot water for a couple minutes. I do it every flight on airframes that allow it. Cleans 'em right up.
I cut the loop (handle) of the end and stick it in my drill. The scotch-brite pad sounds like a good idea, I have one Loki 54\2800 with a persistent mark that I left on there too long before I cleaned it. Time to hit HD.
