Ive had great luck with SnoBowl toilet cleaner which is diluted hydrochloric acid. It only takes a few minutes as I found out the hard way . I left a carb in it overnight and found that the aluminum had completely dissolved !!!
Well see, I'm not going to take chances with something not made for the job. How do you know what that's doing to the inner workings and passages? Not knocking what you're doing, I hope it works out. That would be cool. But there's just no way to know "for sure" since you cannot see it. My rule of thumb is, if it's possible for something to go wrong, it will. lol