REstoration/ Preservation adivce please

[Older The Better]

I found this bullet mold this weekend and I am in the process if cleaning it, my favorite technique is apple cider vinegar soak, I'm confident I can get all the rust off and pretty sure I can get them moving again, I got old pliers in worse shape to move, after that I'm not sure what to do gun oil works great to stop the flash rust but leaves the shiny metal which I don't think these ever were, I tried baking on oil with a few other pieces of scrap and nails and all I got was a greasy terrible looking mess, maybe I did it wrong but I want that look over looking like a hersheys kiss, anybody have a better way that doesn't involve electricity to protect it after I clean it, also sanding seems to help the flash rust but I worry about damaging my mold, any opinions on a gentle sanding?

 

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[pa plateau hiker]

Soak it in Coca-Cola. It should get rid of the flash rusting.

 

[NHBandit]

Molasses. Soak it in a bucket of water with 1 or 2 jars of Molasses mixed in. It will remove the rust and help prevent new rust from forming and it's much faster than coke, vinegar, etc. It's the Phosphoric acid in the Coke that does this and Molasses is loaded with it. In fact it's the ingredient in Coke that gives it all it's miraculous cleaning properties..
Antique car guys have been doing this for years but for some odd reason when I mention it on here all I get is crickets.... I guess people are set in their ways and refuse to try anything new.

 

[Dug]

Molasses. Soak it in a bucket of water with 1 or 2 jars of Molasses mixed in. It will remove the rust and help prevent new rust from forming and it's much faster than coke, vinegar, etc. It's the Phosphoric acid in the Coke that does this and Molasses is loaded with it. In fact it's the ingredient in Coke that gives it all it's miraculous cleaning properties..
Antique car guys have been doing this for years but for some odd reason when I mention it on here all I get is crickets.... I guess people are set in their ways and refuse to try anything new.

I'm an old dog but willing to learn new tricks. Off the shelf store bought molasses or a specific kind?

I currently use white vinegar then soak it in baking soda water to stop the acid, then distilled water to reach a neutral ph, then heat dry it and coat it in Ospho that I understand is Phosphoric Acid.

 

[Dug]

View attachment 1446615

I found this bullet mold this weekend and I am in the process if cleaning it, my favorite technique is apple cider vinegar soak, I'm confident I can get all the rust off and pretty sure I can get them moving again, I got old pliers in worse shape to move, after that I'm not sure what to do gun oil works great to stop the flash rust but leaves the shiny metal which I don't think these ever were, I tried baking on oil with a few other pieces of scrap and nails and all I got was a greasy terrible looking mess, maybe I did it wrong but I want that look over looking like a hersheys kiss, anybody have a better way that doesn't involve electricity to protect it after I clean it, also sanding seems to help the flash rust but I worry about damaging my mold, any opinions on a gentle sanding?

Sanding is a last resort as it removes good metal. You have rust scabs on that relic that need to be addressed as they harbor active oxidation underneath. I use a dremel tool with Harbor Freight diamond bits to work on scabs that don't easily chip loose. You will have small craters left once a scab is removed but there was not any good metal left in the scab anyway. Leaving the scab on may only result in oxidation eruptions down the road. I have become a big fan of heat treating iron relics with a hot plate in the final stages of cleaning as it seems to halt any micro oxidation pockets that may be missed during cleaning. It will turn any rust from orange to red. I wire brush the relic then brush on Ospho which seems to return the iron back to it's silver gray color. After the Ospho is dry I heat it up again just to the point that I can rub a bar of microcrystalline wax on it to where the wax melts and seeps into the relic.

I am going to try the molasses method to see the difference between that and white vinegar for the soaking stages.

 

[NHBandit]

Regular off the shelf grocery store molasses works fine. Soak for a few days & then lightly scrub off the rust with 00 Steel wool. As an example here is a railroad lantern that was completely covered with surface rust.

 

[bill_wabo]

Cider vinegar?

 

[Older The Better]

Not sure Why I use apple cider over white, I picked up the tip a while back and don't remember the reasoning, I tried the molasses but it didn't work like I had hoped, this is an example of the results I get, these pliers were identical when I dug them out of a field and now the clean ones move freely but they just look a little unnatural to me