Relic M35 rust removal, electrolysis or oxalic acid?

[don_kihotis7]

Good evening.

I've just finished my first cleaning with oxalic, a german gasmask container. Here are the before/after pictures.

I've took all the necessary precautions, as stated in the topic mentioned above. The ratio used was 100 gr to 8 liters of warm water, soaking was three times 15', each soak followed by rinsing with cold water and scrubbing with the green part of a kitchen sponge. After that, the item was soaked in a bucket of cold water to neutralize the remains of the acid and then dryed in a pre-heated oven. When it was nice and dry, i applied wd-40 allover, to prevent further rusting. In the "after" picture it looks wet because the wd is still fresh. It will dry in a couple of days.

I'm pretty satisfied with the result, but i think this method should be used only for items that could have paint left under the rust and the rust layer is be only superficial. For items that are ground dug and the rust is thick/lumpy an there is no more paint left, i recommend the use of electrolisys. For i've seen, the oxalic is too weak to dislodge thick rust and a longer soak/greater concentration only changes the paint colour.

My 2 eurocents.
M

Totally agreed. It would be nice to start a separate thread with your cleaning experiences as it would be easier to find it with the "search" feature.