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Restoring embossed brass plates?

G

Galane

Hot Rolled
Joined
Dec 6, 2010
Location
Idaho, USA
Has anyone done this? I'm working on a Wade 8A (serial 403) and would like to strip the partially gone black paint from the gearbox plate and apply new paint.

What I've found shines up the raised, paint free, areas of the brass while doing little to no damage to the paint is a siaair Velvet 3,000 grit, foam backed polishing pad, soaked in plain water.

The hardest stuff to get off is the oil and dirt concretion. It sticks hard in the recesses of the plates and I'd expect any really tough solvents would also quite happily remove the paint, if they'd touch the compacted crud at all. Repeated soakings in straight liquid dish soap and "chiseling" with a thumbnail is slow going but it does eventually get the stuff off.
 
I am slowly working on some plates off an old American. I found that there is no easy way but non-abrasive GoJo hand cleaner seems to soften most of the crud easier than dish detergent. I first soaked the plates in mineral spirits for a couple of days to get off the heavy stuff then went after it with a tooth brush and soap/hot water. Now down to the GoJo. I am using toothpicks, Popsicle sticks and disposable chop sticks as pusher tools. I just started with the GoJo so the final result is unknown.

I have not got to the polishing stage but will try what you used.

Walter
 
I think you're doing it right. A friend of mine did military vehicle restorations that were Smithsonian-quality and he used lacquer thinner to scrub off the many brass plates on a WWII vehicle, then he'd use double sided tape to fasten it to a piece of wood (like a paint stirring stick), spray on some black enamel, flip it over and rub it on a piece of old T shirt that he'd stretched on his bench to scrub off the surface of the plate. He'd let the plate dry, then he'd often bake it in his kitchen oven to harden the paint faster than air-drying. Then, he'd use about 1200+ grit wet or dry abrasive paper and water to clean off the surface - the W/D paper was taped on a piece of aluminum to keep it flat, then he'd polish any paint off the surface.

He told me once that he'd also tried using a rubber pad to scrape the fresh paint off the plate, but the T shirt worked better when a plate had fairly large areas without any lettering. He was planning to try a window squeegee when he passed on.
 
You can soak the plate in purple stuff, greased lightning or other lye based degreaser to dissolve the paint. I have a couple of ultrasonic jewelery cleaners form the thrift store that I use for this purpose, Put some greased lightning in the US cleaner, drop in the plate, turn it on and give it an hour. What is left can be wiped off.

Next, clean the brass plate real well, stainless brush works great. Shoot it with black spray paint and let it dry completely so the paint doesn't tear or peel off (which it will do if it is not completely hard). Tape 600# wet or dry to a flat surface (smooth benchtop, piece of glass, surface plate, etc...) with the grit side up and run the top of the plate on the paper until it takes the paint off the lettering. If you find there are spots missed (and you will) you can use SWBOs nail polishing stick to touch up the fine details. Not her nice diamond file, or one of the old tapered ones with sand on them, but the black ones that look like (and are) wet or dry.
 

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I've had excellent results using the precess as described by Mike C and have done this on my machines and on brass tags at lthe Nassau County Fire Museum. The higher the relief of the lettering the easier it becomes. For tags that have acqired slight bends or dings making them impractical to rub against a fixed surface, I've attached the wet-or-dry paper to a small wood block or round dowel, dipping it in water and then gently rubbing. This was necessary on some large copper extinguishers we restored that had large embossed instruction labels soldered to the round copper surface.

Tom B.
 
Hey;

I have been wondering about this very issue. I am restoring a Logan 200 lathe, and would like to redo the badge.
It was obviously screen printed, it seems to me. I'm not sure the abrasion method will work, as the embossing is exceedingly
shallow, but I'm unsure how else to try it?

Also, the riveting that holds them in place. What type of rivet is this and how is installing them accomplished?

AAImages~~element545.jpg
 
My wife let me in on the little triangular foam makeup sponges too. They are great for touching up the paint or sanding with some paper glued to them. Handy to have a bag in the shop.
 
RedlineMan said:
Hey;

I have been wondering about this very issue. I am restoring a Logan 200 lathe, and would like to redo the badge.
It was obviously screen printed, it seems to me. I'm not sure the abrasion method will work, as the embossing is exceedingly
shallow, but I'm unsure how else to try it?

Also, the riveting that holds them in place. What type of rivet is this and how is installing them accomplished?

AAImages~~element545.jpg
Click to expand...

You'd use the same approach, but you might have to do some touchup in places where the edges are mangled - use a small artist's brush, and maybe some masking tape to keep a sharp edge. The plates are usually held on with drive screws (check with McMaster's). They usually aren't too difficult to remove - you can often grab the head with a small Vise Grip and simultaneously pull and twist them. If that doesn't work, sometimes a Dremel can be used to grind a slot in the head so a screwdriver can get them started. If all else fails, use a very small and very sharp cold chisel to lift them enough so the Vise grip can get a grip - but if you use a chisel, always aim it towards the center of the plate and not to the edge (aiming it to the edge can break out a chunk of the nameplate).
 
The really lightly stamped tags are a real challenge to paint. For one the letters barley have relief and also the tags are so flimsy even if they are not dented the slightest flex results in loss of background paint. I found after straightening them I could paint the entire tag and scratch the dried paint off the letters with a sharp scalpel. Under magnification it really wasn't that difficult. A quick coat of clear will seal up the entire tag. Ed.

 
Would not (never) wire brush or use any abrasives on raised letter name plates. I would use soak and wash with, soap, gasoline (or the like) and then carburetor cleaner or acetone to the remove paint if you choose to do that. Put some baking soda in any water base soap for cleaning steel or iron. You want to remove all accumulation to get down to the remaining original paint then match that color paint and then after painting lightly sand off only the high paint to get down to the original raised top of the letters with not loosing any or much of the original plate material.
Lye base cleaners (I don’t recommend) may leave a residue so if used a soap-wash with a little baking soda to finish before painting.
For the machine casting area restore sand and fill, don’t try to get down to the casting because there is much filling that you should not remove. Machined faces, surfaces and shaft end areas should be scraped with a putty knife and wiped with no abrasives or spray cleaners that could spoil bearings allowed to get even near.
Some times a restored and fresh painted machine is a ruined machine.
 
I have used Oven Cleaner. To re-paint the background I use Dykem. Its a lot easier to remove than paint but the colors are limited. After I get all the raised areas cleaned I spray clear Lacquer or Urethane to protect the Dykem background. I'm going to try floor wax on my next plate.

Frank
 
Great scan of that Logan plate. That's going to be one of my projects to replicate as a large graphic. Best Logan logo I've seen, the others are so blah and boring.
 
Galane said:
Great scan of that Logan plate. That's going to be one of my projects to replicate as a large graphic. Best Logan logo I've seen, the others are so blah and boring.
Click to expand...
You mean...

Like this?

LoganBadgeVector.jpg


My 200 is a fairly early one, from 1942. The later logo was more tombstone shaped with the model number stamped in a window below the name.
 
Someone beat me to it. ;-) Do you have a vector version?

What's interesting about the original plate is the horizontal banding, unless that's a scanner artifact.

To make it look old, a scan of the back of an original plate could be used to replace the yellow color. See page 3 on my flickr, 3rd page, the Warning Notice plaque. I want to do a clean and a dirty version of the plate on top of a Wade 8A belt cover, but don't have an original plate.
 
Hey;

The horizontal lines are from the scanner. The previous rendering is a screen shot of a vector drawing. I would like to think a screen or stencil could be made, but the text font is not identical, so...
 
"Would not (never) wire brush or use any abrasives on raised letter name plates."

Stainless toothbrush like used for TIG welding, not a big scratch brush. Gets the flecks out of hte deep dings and corners in a millisecond and a lot safer than the flammables you suggest.
 
Galane said:
Has anyone done this? I'm working on a Wade 8A (serial 403) and would like to strip the partially gone black paint from the gearbox plate and apply new paint.

What I've found shines up the raised, paint free, areas of the brass while doing little to no damage to the paint is a siaair Velvet 3,000 grit, foam backed polishing pad, soaked in plain water.

The hardest stuff to get off is the oil and dirt concretion. It sticks hard in the recesses of the plates and I'd expect any really tough solvents would also quite happily remove the paint, if they'd touch the compacted crud at all. Repeated soakings in straight liquid dish soap and "chiseling" with a thumbnail is slow going but it does eventually get the stuff off.
Click to expand...

I realize this post is ancient. However, coincidentally I'm facing the same challenge on my Wade 8a S#407! I'd love to see how you made out Galane. While I'm not quite to the point of cleaning the plate up, it is on the VERY long "to do" list.
 
Darren McCarley said:
I realize this post is ancient. However, coincidentally I'm facing the same challenge on my Wade 8a S#407! I'd love to see how you made out Galane. While I'm not quite to the point of cleaning the plate up, it is on the VERY long "to do" list.
Click to expand...

I don't remember now. When the lathe was done it went back to its owner, who is now somewhere in Utah.

What would probably work is Tyme carburetor cleaner. Used that stuff for years on dismantled carbs, all the metal parts, brass, steel, alloy, would go into the basket and after soaking for a while, get rinsed off with water and usually be squeaky clean. Tyme has a pungent but not unpleasant odor.

Of course some of that info may have changed if CRC has changed the formula since they bought the product and renamed it Tyme 1.

Very little gets lost if you shake as much as possible off the parts before rinsing, and strain it back into a sealed can. I still have dad's old Tyme bucket and basket and some old Tyme in a can that formerly held acetone. It would cause steel to rust if left in *very long* or many times repeated contact with it, which is why it's in an ex-acetone can and dad had to braze holes in the Tyme bucket a few times. Just went out and gave it a shake, seems to have solidified. Would likely be usable by adding water, and replacing the can which has rust spots on its exterior now. I recall the instructions on the original can said to add water if it evaporated down from being left in the open.

Dunno why I didn't think of trying this when I did the Wade lathe.
 
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