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abalrogsbutthole t1_j6et60n wrote

Reply to comment by Alucard624 in LPT: If your home/car has an odor you can use white vinegar as a extremely effective cleaning solution. by Alucard624

yeaaaaa so vinegar will rust all the metal it touches if you just leave it there and don’t wipe it off. don’t do this to your car unless you want to rust it from the inside out. . and most essential oils will break down over time and will corrode the internal upholstery. OP, i know your heart is in the right place but overall bad advice for the car stuff

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Alucard624 OP t1_j6f80yv wrote

So keeping vinegar overnight is not enough time to negatively affect anything other than neutralizing bad smells. White vinegar is actually used to resolve rust not create it. Here’s a link explaining the process on the Home Depot website.

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Kind-Artichoke1367 t1_j6fqxuv wrote

And baking soda neutralizes vinegar, use either or not both.

Together you just made fancy salt water. Does nothing but leave a film from salt.

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Alucard624 OP t1_j6h1295 wrote

You don’t use baking soda to neutralize an odor in your car.

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relaxificate t1_j6g0mjq wrote

Incorrect again. All acids attack and corrode steel. Vinegar can be used to remove surface rust because it dissolves the iron and iron oxide. However, the steel must then be fully rinsed and the vinegar must be neutralized, or else additional extreme rust will be created. Vinegar absolutely accelerates corrosion. I’m an engineer with 15 years of engineering/metalworking experience. Moreover, the statements I’m making can be demonstrated as true with paper/pencil chemistry equations.

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nightraindream t1_j6g5zgt wrote

Out of curiosity, even if it dries on metal it's still corrosive? Or it more a case of, it'll dry, then when exposed to moisture it'll rehydrate and start eating away at the metal?

Or whatever the actual chemistry terms are.

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relaxificate t1_j6gdvu3 wrote

Most of the corrosion happens while the steel is exposed to the liquid vinegar. Once the vinegar evaporates you’d have a pitted texture with rust. Imagine that’s sample A and we have sample B that’s the same but after that first flash-rust, we rinsed and neutralized sample B. From that point on, I think sample A might corrode faster due to remnant vinegar but I’m not sure, and I imagine that if it did, the corrosion rates of the two samples would equalize after some time.

Edit - to explain further, what makes vinegar increase future corrosion is the rough surface finish it creates at initial exposure. The smoother the surface, the more resistant the surface is to rust. Sandblasting is exactly the same (it removes rust, but also primes the steel for increased future rust).

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Dogestronaut1 t1_j6gydub wrote

>vinegar will rust all the metal it touches if you just leave it there and don’t wipe it off

This is true, but only because the acetic acid in the vinegar can remove any initial oxidized layers to help rust form deeper within the metal. You would need to leave at least a puddle of vinegar on a metal to see an increase in corrosion. The amount of evaporated vinegar from an open container is not going to be significant enough to cause corrosion. Moreover, there isn't going to be much exposed metal inside your car for the acetic acid to land on anyway. It wouldn't be any more corrosion than you driving through a rainstorm.

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