Removing Teflon from steel cake mold?

Sorry for posting this in this forum, but of the forums on which I can post here it's my best option, I think.

I have a Kaiser stainless steel cake mold that has unfortunately a non-stick teflon coating. I would like to remove the teflon coating altogether. How do I best go about it? I know that teflon coatings get damaged by acidic foods, so maybe boiling the form in vinegar, or even better, in acetic acid, might do the trick?

I am looking for a chemical solution, not for an abrasive approach.

He gazed longingly into her eyes and said, "Teflon is a registered trademark of the DuPont Corporation and, as such, should only be used to describe its products or services. Please refer to it as Polytetrafluoroethylene, or PTFE for short."

-From the Ouch International Book of Bad Poetry

I'd be happy to be proved wrong but I think you'd be better off simply buying a new, non-coated pan. PFA/PTFE is sometimes used in labware because of its very low reactivity/high chemical resistance. IME even high concentrations of acetic or nitric acid won't damage it. The pan itself may prove rather less resistant.

I've seen people pouring molten aluminum in these molds. Heat burns teflon leaving only metal behind. I guess this method is not very convinient for you.

Kaiser introduced the world to Teflon®™-coated baking pans back in 1968.

nevermind89 said:

I've seen people pouring molten aluminum in these molds. Heat burns teflon leaving only metal behind. I guess this method is not very convinient for you.

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I may be inconvenienced by death.

LostHighway said:

I'd be happy to be proved wrong but I think you'd be better off simply buying a new, non-coated pan. PFA/PTFE is sometimes used in labware because of its very low reactivity/high chemical resistance. IME even high concentrations of acetic or nitric acid won't damage it. The pan itself may prove rather less resistant.

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I had a bread machine once that started losing its anti-stick coating after baking sourdough loaves for a few weeks!

I got 8 pounds of citric acid I don't really need right now. Maybe I'll make a strong solution and keep the form submerged to see what happens.

I'd vote for buying a different pan. Easier by far.

BSAGuy said:

I'd vote for buying a different pan. Easier by far.

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But not as much fun for the investigative mind.

A quick search tells me that there is apparently no chemical solution. So just for kicks I took a green scrubbing pad and it works okay. I figure it will take an hour to remove the Teflon on both sides of the pan. Then I need to polish it. Maybe a soft wire brush wheel will be much easier. I'll have to try it out. Maybe bead blasting. I know, I know, I didn't want to go with abrasion.

That's the result of 5 seconds worth of scrubbing:

Since you have already started that, I'd say its the best solution. Unless it was flaking, I probably wouldn't have removed it. I have a nice bread pan from Williams Sonoma that has some sort of nonstick coating. It really helps release breads.

I butter the pan, sprinkle bread crumbs, and my cake doesn't stick and my two budgies won't get ill or die.

I used a die grinder with steel wire wheel and removed the anti-stick coating in about 15 minutes. Then I went over the whole surface with a green abrasive pad by hand. Washed the baking pan, oiled lightly with flax seed oil and baked it for an hour at 475°F. After repeating the process twice, I have now a golden layer of polymer that is very anti-stick. I figure I'll keep going with seasoning the baking pan until I get an evenly dark finish. I'll show the result when done.

Hmm, not so sure the baking pan is stainless steel. Stainless steel is generally not very magnetic, but this pan is pretty magnetic. I figured it was stainless, because the scratched areas were rust-free. Now I'm thinking the pan is made from tinplate (tinned sheet steel). That would not be much of a concern, since tinplate gets the tin coating nowadays with electrolysis. It's a very thin layer of tin that I most likely removed mostly along with the anti-stick coating. Also, tin is not really that toxic and furthermore, the surface is sealed with the varnish (seasoning). I'm pretty sure that cake pan won't kill me.

There are various types of stainless steel. Some are magnetic. I have no idea about your pan though.

Alacrity59 said:

There are various types of stainless steel. Some are magnetic. I have no idea about your pan though.

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Yes, there are many stainless steel alloys. None of them are as magnetic as my baking pan. Also, after I removed the coating, I washed the pan and got immediately rust in a few spots. So it's definitely tin plate. That makes sense, because tinplate is a btter thermal conductor than steel, and tinplate is a common material for cookie sheets and cake molds.

Anyway, I got a nice resinous varnish on that pan. Looks like under the valve cover of a GM engine after 500k miles: