Restoring Matal objects and surfaces

While looking around on the web for a tannic acid based rust converter recipe for ferrous preservation I stumbled across the Canadian Conservation Institute website.



They have a site dedicated to links to PDFs on the preservation of a wide range of materials including metals.

The focus is on authentic preservation for a museums environment but there are lots of goo ideas there for general use.



see

• Metals
  
  
  
  
  • N9/1 Recognizing Active Corrosion (2007) (PDF Version, 2.01 MB)
  
  
  • N9/2 Storage of Metals (2007) (PDF Version, 166 KB)
  
  
  • N9/3 The Cleaning, Polishing and Protective Waxing of Brass and Copper (2007) (PDF Version, 163 KB)
  
  
  • N9/4 Basic Care of Coins, Medals and Medallic Art (2007) (PDF Version, 161 KB)
  
  
  • N9/5 Tannic Acid Coating for Rusted Iron Artifacts, formerly published under the title Tannic Acid Treatment (2013)
  
  
  • N9/6 Care and Cleaning of Iron (2007) (PDF Version, 157 KB)
  
  
  • N9/7 Silver - Care and Tarnish Removal (2007) (PDF Version, 265 KB)
  
  
  • N9/8 Mechanical Removal of Rust from Machined Ferrous Surfaces (2007) (PDF Version, 227 KB)
  
  
  • N9/9 Care of Objects Made of Zinc (2007) (PDF Version, 146 KB)
  
  
  
  

I'm going to give their tannic acid coating recipe (N9/5) a go.

Last year I used commercial tannic acid rust converter on a Band saw mill and I am really pleased at how it has worked out even when left outside.

The problem with the commercial converter is it costs a bomb and the recipe provided in the above link ends up working out at less than 1/10th of the commercial price.