Wednesday, January 28, 2015

Helping Out a PAL

I found this pocket knife at the thrift store last night. It's in pretty sad shape, but I enjoy cleaning up old stuff like this. Besides, a guy can't have enough pals.




I usually attack rusted metal with my grinder's wire wheel, but sometimes that hand is too heavy. The rust is removed, but it leaves the surface in a brushed, grey tone. I was wondering how good of a job my brass shell tumbler could do. 

The bolster was so crusty I would have broken off my fingernails if I tried to force the blades open.


Instead of self-injury, I turned to Kroil. The stuff is pretty awesome.


After a 15 minute soak, the blades opened up. You can see how rusted they are.


I filled my tumbler with the crushed walnut shells I bought at Petco, tossed in the knife, and squirted in a bit of Flitz metal polish. 



Now all I have to do is turn it on.


I ran the tumbler all night, and this morning I checked to see how the knife was doing.




We're not there, yet, but you can see some progress. My plan is to run the tumbler for a few more nights, and I'll check what it looks like each morning.

The tumbler did a great job on my pinball parts, so I'm curious how much help it will give my pal.

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