Posted by Greg Gilman on December 10, 2001 at 07:26:14:
In Reply to: Sirchie II + Cleaning II posted by Atame on January 12, 2001 at 16:30:29:
Dear ATame: HI, I'm pretty new on here, but I've worked many types of jobs with many types of metal, and will try to give a few suggestions. First, if the discoloration is in a kind of neat pattern, to a lot of us metal lovers, it can add to the finish and I have once or twice been VERY sorry for changing that "slihtly deep, slightly unusual pattern for a clean too new look. OR removing those beautiful and slowly changing patterns in ancient oil or cosmoleans grease coming to the surface in spots,"Patina," that seems best left only, and only polished off to "just dry,"lightly with a very clean soft cloth when a little too much of it seems to seep up to the surface. This type of finish can be quickly discarded as messy, but it is highly valuabe in some fields, certaint swords, and certain gun metals to name a few, and collectors who love and who ave worked with metal many pay a REAL premium that looks like Gand Dad's early grey blued Winchester, before he gave it to that guy who had it refinished. I love many of these hphazard, "Patinas," and they are hard to recreate or evenly remove without hating what you've done. If I hade say some thumbcuffs with the original factory packing oils, like causmoleans, andsome acidic onse, I ecognize, but cannot spells, such as the very finishes that used to coe as short term protection from the factories or high grade iron Padlocks befoe the turn of the century, like anything, if I absolutely HAD to, I'd try a spot. What you have souds so reminiscently cool o me, I'd keep it aside, and find a similar fiish on something else. Then I'd experiement with oil rubbing, grease removal with alcohol maybe followed by a hand applied wipedown with clean Q-Tips. If you have something small enough, I'd recommend taking them to my friendwho isa watchmaker, and at first, test running something else, just a test strip of similar metal, through the watchmakers standard wash and rinse formulas, and let them go hrougha complete hot dry cycle. If you really want to see the metal at its most excellent "no oil finish," Best. "Simichrome Polish," and Q-Tips, and time plus several other closely guarded polishing secrets from my life with metal might do very well on some older finishes. If you have several surfaces, very accessible, and you want them brought to a machine shop level of "It looks like a piece of clean mirrored glass reflecting back to me, some time and some precision grinding can turn good steel into something almost worth worshipping. Hope this helps, ask me more if you like, Best Regards, Greg.