Topic: Underdash bare metal restoration

[1970 Snake]

Can someone advise as to the best way to clean, remove any surface rust and restore the natural metal finish on my steering column and brake paddle bracket.

[Bob Gaines]

Rust 911 concentrate to dip the part and remove the rust. https://www.ebay.com/i/202790150642. Others use evaporrust which is good too but can get expensive when needing a quantity large enough to dip a larger part.

[1970 Snake]

Great thanks Bob, surprisingly I have never used the 911 solution, although a fellow enthusiast in Maine has mentioned it to me, I will look at sourcing it here in Canada and give it a try.

[jwc66k]

Here's a link to an Evapo-Rust customer's letter about a "how-to" with pictures that give an alternative to the "tank" method.
https://evaporust.com/documents/Chassis.pdf
Jim

[bjf1992]

I used evaporust.
Make sure you submerge the entire part or a line will form.
I then cleaned the parts and shot them with a satin clear paint.

Probably not concours correct, but looked good enough for me and so far
has kept it from flash rusting

[Mike.Griese]

Actually, an inexpensive way to do this is to mix 9 parts water to 1 part feed grade molasses.  Handy when you have big parts to do.  Something in the molasses makes the rust water soluble.  It might take a few days or a few weeks to remove everything, depending on how rusty the part is to begin with.  You will need to coat the part with something when you take it out of the solution as it will surface rust pretty quickly.

[mtinkham]

Molasses works very well but slow and is inexpensive...however, the pedal bushings (pot metal???) do not stand up to the molasses soak...guess how I know...

[Mike.Griese]

Interesting - I have not had that problem.

[Mike.Griese]

And now I have.  Horns do not last long in molasses!