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Are "ultrasonic cleaners" worth it or effective?

cstanton

I am no stranger from having to clean fiddly, awkward things, from electronics to jewellery to other items.

Often my approach to cleaning such items is a bit of good old elbow grease, a small brush, perhaps some form of polish, iso-propyl alcohol, and perhaps something stronger if the materials are not under threat of breaking down. Sometimes I resort to a bit of soap and water.

Which brings me to the appeal of ultrasonic cleaners, if youtube shorts, tiktok videos and the appeal of random adverts are to tell the truth, I can dunk an item that is ingrained with difficult to clean muck, and with a bit of time and the right liquids, I'll see all of that gunk shake off and result in something nice and shiny.

My experience with some models of these though, have been less than stellar.

I'm therefore looking for recommendations and anecdotal or evidence based experiences with these, and links of where to buy if anyone can advise. Ideally the budget would be sub £150 but frankly if this means you're "getting what you pay for" then I'd consider higher. Delivery to the UK would be necessarily possible!

Thanks!

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  • 0

    Hello Chris,

    I have a reasonable size ultrasonic cleaner that I use for pcbs. Much less now than I used to because I mainly use no-clean solderpaste.

    The results you get depend on the media in the cleaner (I use SafeWash on pcbs  - it does a not bad job if used with a brush !).

    The ultrasonics can help cleaning in small gaps and crevices.

    I occasionally use mine on other things but only with SafeWash (far too much hassle to empty it and re-fill.)

    If you have a test sample in mind that I can replicate I can try it for you.

    MK

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  • 0

    Hello Chris,

    I have a reasonable size ultrasonic cleaner that I use for pcbs. Much less now than I used to because I mainly use no-clean solderpaste.

    The results you get depend on the media in the cleaner (I use SafeWash on pcbs  - it does a not bad job if used with a brush !).

    The ultrasonics can help cleaning in small gaps and crevices.

    I occasionally use mine on other things but only with SafeWash (far too much hassle to empty it and re-fill.)

    If you have a test sample in mind that I can replicate I can try it for you.

    MK

Children