Careful surface rust removal, not Porsche.

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911hillclimber
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Careful surface rust removal, not Porsche.

Post by 911hillclimber »

Nice and warm in the garage this afternoon, so decided to take a look at my new project, my 1938 Royal Enfield Model L push bike.

This bike is to be cleaned and preserved as it is quite rare, an oily rag approach.

The bike has surface rust everywhere, but also a lot of the original detail is still on the bike, so I am looking to ways to reduce/remove/minimise the rust that is there, enhance what chrome/pain/pinstriping is there from the factory in 1938.
I want a reasonably smooth surface that can be waxed to seal over what I have left after lots of cleaning.

Have tried today:
Wash down with a soft soap solution and a good toothbrush to remove obvious dirt which worked well (garage type hand cleaner used)
This exposed a surprising amount of detail, esp the super fine red pin stripes.

Dry that off and then carefully brush with fine brass brushes. This removed a lot of the surface rust but not all (I accept I will never remove it all)
T cut and then Autoglym resin polish.

Mudguards came up well.

This is very laborious, but still preserved a lot of paint detail. Anyone have other effective ideas?
Ideal would be a brush-on 'chemical' that will disolve the rust but leave the paint behind!

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73T 911 Coupe, road/hillclimber 3.2L
Lola t 492 / 3.2 hillclimb racer
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Nine One One
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Re: Careful surface rust removal, not Porsche.

Post by Nine One One »

Believe it or not Brown Sauce or even Ketchup spread liberally over the effected parts, leave on for 24 hours and should do the trick................try googling it you will be surprised!
Winston Teague
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Re: Careful surface rust removal, not Porsche.

Post by Winston Teague »

I think you have the correct recipe. the more you do that process, the better it will look. the original paint will be superb quality. I'd go as far as you can (face) and then beeswax it. W
Winston
'61 356 BT5 & a lot of broken chain driven stuff
911hillclimber
Nurse, I think I need some assistance
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Re: Careful surface rust removal, not Porsche.

Post by 911hillclimber »

Thank you for the help.
I was going to try Coke and aluminium foil next but that seems poor though popular on YouTube.
73T 911 Coupe, road/hillclimber 3.2L
Lola t 492 / 3.2 hillclimb racer
Boxster 987 Gen II 2.9
Bruce M
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Re: Careful surface rust removal, not Porsche.

Post by Bruce M »

Citric acid bath. Degrease thoroughly first to avoid contamination. Will take days but it works. Brush off the loose oxide every day. Wear gloves as it irritates in strong solutions. Protect immediately after a rinse & dry.
911hillclimber
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Re: Careful surface rust removal, not Porsche.

Post by 911hillclimber »

Thanks Bruce. I need to do the entire bike, bit by bit, but minimising the parts I remove. I'm trying not to disturb fasteners that have sat still since 1938, and on this bike that is just about all of them.
I don't want to strip wheel shafts out as all the axles/bottom bracket all 'roll' well
Wheel have to come off to have new tubes and tyres but they will be the only new parts needed.
Typical of these bike, the quality of the engineering design and manufacture is remarkable.

The original black paint that has survived in surprisingly large areas on the mudguards has polished up like new, but with a lot of patina which is irreplaceable.

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73T 911 Coupe, road/hillclimber 3.2L
Lola t 492 / 3.2 hillclimb racer
Boxster 987 Gen II 2.9
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Nige
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Re: Careful surface rust removal, not Porsche.

Post by Nige »

I've just concentrated vinegar for rust removal, I purchased 5lt from the local cash and carry, it was something 75% stuff for about £5. You need to be able to submerge it tho, stinks and will wreck your skin if you don't glove up.
sladey
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Careful surface rust removal, not Porsche.

Post by sladey »

What about evaporust? It’s water soluble and seems fairly gentle and you and re-use it quite a bit

Not cheap though
The simple things you see are all complicated
I look pretty young but I'm just backdated yeah
911hillclimber
Nurse, I think I need some assistance
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Re: Careful surface rust removal, not Porsche.

Post by 911hillclimber »

I tried that expensive stuff on my previous bike, very poor results, still had to murder the parts with a wire brush after.
I can't really immerse any parts as that will strip the ball races and it will all need a strip and rebuild, disturbing lots of the patina.
73T 911 Coupe, road/hillclimber 3.2L
Lola t 492 / 3.2 hillclimb racer
Boxster 987 Gen II 2.9
deano
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Re: Careful surface rust removal, not Porsche.

Post by deano »

Brush-on stuff always seems to be difficult to get off.

My preferred solution is to soak them in Bilt Hamber Deox-C, which is water-based and just rinses off.

It gently removes all signs of rust, over a period of time depending on the solution strength - its like magic !

It seems to leave paint alone, but I have a feeling that it might strip off or dull some plating's incl. zinc and possibly chrome.
Dean
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Bruce M
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Re: Careful surface rust removal, not Porsche.

Post by Bruce M »

Allegedly…. (Caveat emptor!!), deox-c is suspected to be citric acid with maybe a couple of extra ingredients to reduce surface tension etc.
911hillclimber
Nurse, I think I need some assistance
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Re: Careful surface rust removal, not Porsche.

Post by 911hillclimber »

Thank you to all who have given advice. I'm going to shy away from modern chemical methods as the paint/striping is far to fragile I think to tolerate a chemical attack!

Will stick with the soapy water to remove the years/decades of grime and a tooth brush, some steel wool (OOOO) where i think the paint will survive, T cut and Beeswax.

I think the beeswax helps the remaining rust turn 'black' so it doesn't stand out!

I think the trick here is to buff-up the bits remaining to outshine that corrosion. Fresh buff colored wall tyres will make quite a difference, though thinking of fitting white tyres (not white wall).
73T 911 Coupe, road/hillclimber 3.2L
Lola t 492 / 3.2 hillclimb racer
Boxster 987 Gen II 2.9
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