Our Mission
Dedicated Steel Experts
At Jon's Passivation Service, LLC, we specialize in on-site passivation services for stainless steel. With a focus on various industries including food/beverage, chemical processing and many others. Our goal is to provide top-quality solutions tailored to our clients' needs. Operating across all states except HI and AK, we are committed to delivering excellence and unmatched service.
What is Passivation
Chemical passivation is a two step process. The first step is to clean the surface of all organic greases and mineral or silicone oils. Specialty cleaners need to be used to dissolve these impurities. The standard alkaline products used to remove organic oils and greases are normally not suitable to remove mineral and silicone oils and greases. The second step is to remove and free iron or iron compound that is on the surface and to form uniform chromium oxide protective layer on the surface. It is important to remove iron impurities prior to chromium oxidation, otherwise this iron will create a localized site where corrosion can continue. Acid is used to dissolve away the iron and its compounds. The surface itself is not affected by the process. Furthermore an oxidizer is used to force the conversion of chromium metal on the surface to the oxide form.
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Some companies will choose to passivate processing equipment once per year as a scheduled maintenance procedure. Other companies will do it more frequently because they are processing foods that are aggressive on the stainless steel. Aggressive foods are those that contain high chloride levels and are acidic, for example salsa, tomato juice, etc. Lants that use water with naturally high chloride level may have to passivate more frequently since the chloride will disrupt the protective lay. Pharmaceutical companies that use ultra-pure water for injection are known to passivate 4 times per year because the high purity water itself is hard on the surface layer. Many times, companies will passivate when they notice iron deposits forming on the stainless steel and the source of iron is not the water. Testing the level of free surface iron will help determine if it’s time to passivate.
Citric acid is used for passivating stainless steel. It is a safer and less environmentally harmful than Nitric acid. Citric acid effectively removes iron and its compounds from Stainless Steel.