We ordered a $2000+ swerve drive from Rev and it came with rust removal instructions! Has anybody else experienced this?
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We opened our new set up last night too (ordered last week).
I was pretty disappointed when @Connour came over to show me basically every single steel part in the kits were coated in some degree of rust. Some parts had signs of oil being applied (presumably to try and prevent rusting), and some had basically no oil at all.
We were also extremely surprised to find the drive shafts now have a black oxide (or similar) coating on them, with a (relatively) rough finish. In comparison, our 8 kits we ordered last year had shafts that appeared to be either machined our ground, and were much “smoother” than the new kits (not to mention zero signs of rust).
We’re going to be taking time over the next day or two to try REV’s included instructions for treating the apparently known rust issue (we attempted to clean one part last night with mediocre results). If we’re still concerned with the quality of the parts after that, we’ll be reaching out to customer support.
I have to say, even if the rust can be dealt with after an acetone bath, I’m extremely disappointed that our parts showed up like this with no prior warning. As others here can attest, this is the busiest time of the year for us teams, and we’re now going to spend the better part of at least one build night attempting to clean rust off of our brand new swerve modules…
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Acetone removes rust?
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Hey @patrickmcgrory and @cad321 This is a known issue, and one that we are working to improve our process on. The corrosion that is showing up on this parts is surface level, and in almost every case you can ignore it and it will come off as the module wears.
I recognize that this is not as good an experience as we would like to present for any product, regardless of its price tag. We felt like adding these papers were better than not saying anything at all, although there should be a paragraph on the background added to that sheet.
The root cause of this was due to processing these parts before they got bagged, after they were black oxide coating was put on, combined with the shipping time on an ocean container.
If you have any issues with any of the the parts please reach out to us [email protected] and we will take care of you asap.
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@Greg_Needel thanks for the response.
Is this something perhaps that can be posted on the product page? Maybe a notice at the top?
While I have genuine faith in REV’s customer support should we need to reach out, it really would have been nice to know about this when purchasing (even that there was a chance of this issue occuring with our newly purchased kits), rather than opening our shipment to discover the issues (and now added time/labour) post purchase.
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How big are the affected parts that need the acetone treatment. Trying to plan ahead a little
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I’d be happy to take photos/inventory of each part tomorrow evening while at our school.
Going off memory of the parts I saw, all the drive/motor pinions, the bevel gears (small one for sure, possibly the big one) and the drive shaft that the 3in wheel spins on. I didn’t dig through each kit though, just didnt have the time.
I’m also working to figure out what an “acetone safe” container is. We very quickly attempted cleaning the drive shaft last night using acetone and a plastic dixie cup. By the time we were done (2 minutes tops), the cup was already dissolving… 
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Use a glass container
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And hence wondering about the size and if someone’s home baking dish will be big enough or if I’m off to a kitchenware or container store
Also a warning about fumes and advising they wear a mask would be a good call. Not like doing a whole rusted bumper, but still could build up in a small room with no windows.
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There’s debate on this. Definitely not deep deep rust. But it can be effective on surface rust or to remove anything left on some materials after it was machined and not processed properly (i.e. this case). If I’m understanding it correctly this is mainly a rust on the surface and would clean up pretty easily if all it needs is a dip and swish.
Upside of dip and swish is you don’t have to touch it with your hands if you don’t want to. Just use some needle nose pliers to drop the parts in and pull them out. I’d wear gloves just to prevent the issue of someone forgetting to wash their hands right after if you are touching them.
If you have to start to scrub it in then it’s probably gonna be too deep to help anymore. At the same time it all depends on the type of metal.
There’s some argument that Coca Cola and Aluminum foil is the fix for rust on Chrome… Thank mythbusters. The acetone thing is more well known and commonly done.
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You could use a chemical compatibility chart …
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Is Rev providing the acetone and other materials needed to clean the parts or do teams have to spend additional team funds to get the necessary items for the instructions?
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Acetone is probably considered a hazmat material so I can’t imagine they would want to ship this. If they are it should say something on the packaging to that effect so you’d know. Again. Planning ahead we haven’t gotten one yet to know.
One thing to also consider: many teams operate out of schools, acetone can be annoying to have at a school.
There may be a certain level of “don’t say anything” or a mentor saying “I’ll do this at home”. Not that acetone is inherently that dangerous in this application, cleanup and rags are probably the worst part (at least acetone doesn’t have the chance to spontaneously combust like boiled linseed oil…)
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A quick hit with a fine brass brush will do a good enough job as well and avoid having to deal with acetone. The rust on our maxswerve parts could basically be rubbed off with your fingers.
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This thread is wild to me. Where I live, we call surface rust “patina” and we like it
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Certainly easier to brush off some surface oxidization than unpack things from cosmoline. (No, they are not “pre-lubricated”)
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Long term storage is the biggest complaint and the school made us get a Flammables cabinet for anything we keep there. Especially over the summer when no one is around.
We have the same kind of cabinet but larger at work
Keep in mind anything strong enough to remove rust is also going to attack the black oxide coating which is also form of rust. Acetone doesn’t really dissolve firmly attached rust, but it is a good solvent. I like Kyle’s suggestion of a brush. Brass is nice, but whatever you have available along with a little WD40. WD40 has other uses than just a cologne :). Personally I prefer Ballistol for these sort of things.
Actually the are other Rust Preventives (RP) than cosmoline which is intend for long term storage. Hot oil dip applied at the end of the process is a common one.
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