DIY neodymium cleaning magnet

[nsamouroux]

Must have I was holding the box against my hip while unlocking the door without really thinking about it, and I felt a rather strong impact and a jolt. When I looked down, my pocket knife (a Leatherman folding knife, pretty basic) had come flying out of my pocket where it was clipped and stuck to the bottom of the box. It must have been about 4" away from the magnets themselves when it took the leap of faith :lol:. So far they've held together in pairs through about 2" of scrap wood between them. I'm pretty sure they'll be strong enough for my intended use through 5/8" acrylic

 

[artguy1]

Probably found it stuck to the inside of his truck heh.

Ya, ask here-fishy-fishy about magnets stuck to the delivery truck...I heard the story at the last PSAS frag swap...funny and true!

Make sure ya keep em away from software, hardware, cell phones etc! Yikes.

I like your leatherman story!!! How many did you buy?

Have fun with your project..post some DIY pix!

 

[nsamouroux]

I bought 8 of the magnets, 63 lb pull strength each They came in an 8" or so rod all connected together with 3/4" washers between each one. I will be taking and posting pics shortly, I finished (for the most part) the first cleaning magnet. It's strong! It should work for up to a 3/4" acrylic tank, mine is only 5/8 so it should be perfect. I'm also in the middle of setting up my sump for the new system and mixing salt in it

 

[nsamouroux]

Bah, photobucket is down for maintenance so I can't upload the pics of the cleaning magnet. Since I have enough materials for two of these, I think I'll try something different with the next ones and use a thin "face plate" piece of acrylic instead of messing around with cutting discs off this rod piece. The rod / disc plugs work to cap and seal the magnet holes, but it doesn't look as good as I think it could. I'll be flame polishing the cut edges of the blocks so the entire thing should be clear when I'm done. I'll use my router to give the edges some sort of bevel (haven't decided on design yet) to take some of the sharpness off of them. I'll also have to pick up some more Magic Eraser pads, since I seem to be out of them...

 

[nsamouroux]

Alrighty, here's some pics:

Where the heck are the magnets?

Looks like there's a drywall screw right about... there!

Strong magnets!

A pair of magnets pressed and sealed into each half of the cleaning tool

About 3/4" thick chair backrest

I still need to use a router bit on the corners to round them off, and then flame polish the whole thing, but it'll work as-is if I put a section of Magic Eraser pad on the wet side and some soft felt on the dry side

 

[artguy1]

One word for those magnets...GNARLY!

Love the ceiling shot...can use 'em as stud finders too!

Good idea all around!

 

[ciao]

so how much has all the parts cost so far? Just curious from a cost perspective.

 

[nsamouroux]

I spent $40 on the 8 magnets (four per cleaning magnet tool), a small bottle of weld-on 16 was about $4, $30 for the acrylic pieces for the two items (4 blocks plus the rod to cut disc plugs from), and about $9 for the forstner drill bit. Items for the actual scrubbing / cleaning surface material will be anywhere from $5 to $15 (DIY or kit). Basically for $100 I get two of these cleaning tools, or I could spend $300 for one of them with a logo. I still need to clean up the edges with a router and flame polish it, but that's primarily just a time investment since I already have router and decorative bits. If you had to buy the various tools (drills, table saw / band saw plus acrylic blades, etc) your costs would be much higher of course. I figure I have about 2 hours worth of time into each of them, not counting planning and waiting for deliveries

 

[akunochi]

Looks really nice.

 

[pat99016]

DO NOT put one of each of those in each of your front pockets!!!

 

[Chichas01]

DO NOT put one of each of those in each of your front pockets!!!

that could be painful!! My buddy actually snipped off the tip of his finger with similar magnets and ended up in ther ER. So, you really don't wanna snip the tip off yer....well ya know:lol:

 

[nsamouroux]

Owie. I had enough of an adventure trying to pry two of the magnets apart when I wasn't paying attention and they snapped together without the washer / spacer between them. I had to clamp one down in a vice and smack the other one across the basement with a rubber mallet to get them apart. I will however admit that I had four of the magnets (all together in the same pocket, seperated by 3/4" plastic spacers... I have SOME common sense! :badgrin in my pocket while I was at work. I had to edge past the maintenance guy's work cart to get back to the records center and had about 20 small bolts / screws lift off the cart and launch towards my jeans pocket from about a foot away. Scared the bejeezus out of me when they hit, and I got some funny looks while pulling a bunch of small metallic objects off the outside of my pocket. That could have gotten ugly if they were sharp!

 

[Madmike]

Thanks for the idea! I have some scrap 3/4 and 1/2" material laying around, so I just ordered 4 of the 79lb pull strength 1&1/2"x.5" magnets. I'm going to drill into the 3/4" about 3/8" and 1/8" into the 1/2 inch and sandwich them between the two layers and laminate them with weldon #3. I have all of the acrylic and tools, just needed the magnets, so for about $30 I can make a cleaner instead of paying a fortune for one.

Thanks!

 

[nsamouroux]

Glad to be of service These 63 lb magnets are plenty for my 1/2" acrylic panels but for thicker aquarium materials or if you're using it on a glass tank which can handle more scrubbing then the 79lb magnets will be even better. I'm using a 100% polyester felt on the dry side now and a thin layer of Mr Clean magic eraser cleaning pad material on the wet side, works great!

 

[Madmike]

Yah, I have a 3/4" acrylic tank and have a tiger shark and it just doesn't cut it when I put an acrylic safe pad on the inside and a microfiber cloth on the outside. Hopefully these will do the trick.

 

[golf nut]

Glad to be of service These 63 lb magnets are plenty for my 1/2" acrylic panels but for thicker aquarium materials or if you're using it on a glass tank which can handle more scrubbing then the 79lb magnets will be even better. I'm using a 100% polyester felt on the dry side now and a thin layer of Mr Clean magic eraser cleaning pad material on the wet side, works great!

How thick of a wall do you think you could clean with the magnets you used??

 

[nsamouroux]

They can shred coralline algae or that pesky green algae off a 1/4" acrylic tank without scratching, are plenty strong for a 5/8" acrylic tank. I would imagine that they would work fine for up to a 3/4" panel on an acrylic tank, but you'd probably want something stronger for glass. Perhaps double up the magnets, or just get two larger ones, for a glass tank or something with panels more than 3/4".

 

[golf nut]

You mentioned earlier that you would have a 1/4 plug between them and the surface, any reason you went to that thickness, was it safety to prevent them coming out?

 

[nsamouroux]

I was going to use thicker plug / caps partially for safety to keep them from breaking through the plug, but also to keep water from getting to them and to give the weld-on a surface along the circumference to bond together. I actually lessened the thickness of the caps / plugs to about 3/16" or 1/8", a bit wider than the width of my table saw blade and they're plenty strong. I have been using the demo model for a few weeks now and am happy with it, and still have materials enough to make a second tool that looks a bit nicer with routered edges / flame polishing

 

[golf nut]

If you need more power you could use a flux collector, simply a piece of metal that goes across the back of the two magnets, it almost doubles the strength, you would need to counterbore to within 1/8 th of the acrylic install two magnets then use a piece of metal to go across the two and find a way of sealing it all.