How to: Clean Chromated Aluminum & Plastic Parts

Q. We are starting a new cleaning process and are looking for recommendations as to what cleaner(s) to use for cleaning plastics and chromated aluminum parts in a lab dishwasher. We currently use deionized water with no cleaner and are having problems.

A. Thanks for your question on how to clean chromated aluminum and plastic parts in a dishwasher. Assuming this is a residential style lab dishwasher, we recommend you use Alcojet® Low Foaming Powdered Detergent as dispensed in the little cup designed to hold detergent.

Be careful with loading parts in the washer to avoid having any upward facing cups that will hold wash water that will contaminate the next rinse cycle.  This leads to water spots as dirty wash solution is spread around in the wash cycle and then evaporated on to the parts.

If these are heat sensitive plastics, you would not want to use the sani-wash or any extra hot cleaning cycle the machine may have. If these are not heat sensitive parts, then generally the hot cycle will clean better.

For washers that are more industrial scale liquid dispensing units requiring a liquid concentrate detergent, we would recommend Solujet® Low-Foaming Phosphate-Free Liquid.  The Solujet detergent will also be fine with your aluminum.

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