Hi guys...

I just made a boo boo and now i'm not sure what to do about it.

I buy and sell a lot of engines and the old crock pot trick has made me a lot of money... but today i put a saito 40 in there and left it on high (which i have done many times... its actually boiling or just under) for about 5 hours. Came home and pulled the lid and popped it out... i just run them under warm water... but this one had oxidized horribly. It's a dark dark grey now. Even the thrust washer which was machined is now almost black.

1st problem... i had forgot that i had thinned out my last batch and this was most likely 80% tap water run through a softener. Secondly, there was a homemade header... i think it was copper tubing or maybe brass. It's hard to tell. It also oxidized to a darker shade of brown.

Any metallurgists out there? What caused this? Did the brass/copper "bleed" off? Was it cause of the water?

Biggest question... can i restore the aluminum back to the light grey again? Or perhaps get it to a consistant dark grey? Right now i popped it back in.. hoping it will "complete" lol. I am thinking i might anodize the thing. How about powdercoating? It's a perfect engine that i just decreased in value .. ugggh. Any other suggestions?

Thanks