1-ingredient Way to Get Rust Off Tools

3 Materials
$2
1 Day
Easy

News flash: Metal tools and water don’t mix. Well, they do mix and then create rust! There is a scrub-free, easy way to remove rust from tools and make them look great again and it's already in your pantry.

Metal tools and water don’t mix. Well, they do mix and then create rust! And that is what happened to our hammer, screwdriver, and putty knife when they were inadvertently left outside overnight.

Here are my sorry screwdriver and hammer after spending the night outside in the dew-covered grass. (We found the putty knife a little later, so it wasn’t in the first pictures, but it definitely needed some TLC, too.)

Do you have tools that have seen better days, too? Well, here's my secret: Vinegar! (aff. link) Honest! It's a scrub-free, easy way to remove rust from tools and make them look great again. 

All you need to do is soak the tools in vinegar. Use a container deep enough to submerge the tools. I used a Cool-Whip tub. Simply use plain old white vinegar. Put the tools in the tub and pour on the vinegar until they are covered. The putty knife didn’t quite fit in the Cool-Whip tub, but it was close enough.

Really the only hard part about all of this is waiting! I set the tub out on the back porch and let the tools sit overnight. Here’s what they looked like the next day. Ick!

And this is what they looked like once I dried them off! I used a paper towel, and a lot of black gunk came off the tools as I rubbed them. I should have taken a picture of the paper towels, but be glad I didn’t. They were pretty gross! I couldn’t get in between the claws of the hammer very well, so I used an old nail brush to do that. The nail brush worked well on the edges of the putty knife, too. But, I PROMISE, I didn’t have to scrub with the nail brush. I just used it to reach where I couldn’t use the paper towel.

See all the steps and images in my full post: How to remove rust from tools the easy way.

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Pam Hoepner
Want more details about this and other DIY projects? Check out my blog post!
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