Reply To: Restoring Nickel Plating
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You didn’t mention pitting, so I assume there is none. You can’t put back lost metal.
There is probably a coating on the plane that is preventing the acid from working.
Make sure you have cleaned any wax and oil off the plane before the citric bath. I use acetone followed by Dawn detergent, which contains a mild petrochemical solvent in it ( it is often used to decontaminate wildlife oil spill victims).
Citric products might also work, but I have no experience with them.
Then try a SOFT BRASS wire wheel on the loose nickel before another citric bath, this time with a couple drops of the Dawn added. That should oconvert all the brown rust Fe2O3 to black rust Fe3O4′ which will wipe off with 0000 steel wool.
If you can’t find a soft brass wheel a suede cleaning brass brush will work with some elbow grease. Go easy around the rosewood bits.
The baths won’t harm the rosewood other than the acetone removing removing old finish and it will do well with a BLM finish at the end.
Follow up with a buffing wheel and green buffing compound to bring the steel and what nickel is left up to polish. You could even go first with a step coarser grit compound. It will be pretty hard to tell the difference between the nickel that’s left and the polished steel.
I have a 45 I did this with and you have to look twice to see there is nickel missing. I’ve done this on plated braces as well.
Be sure to wax and keep the plane oiled when you are done. Wait a few days for the rosewood to dry before refinishing that. I use a 5-1 walnut oil to beeswax finish. (I get walnut oil from the grocery store) for the entire plane and maintain the metal with any light oil.
( I’m allergic to the driers in modern linseed oil)
Here’s my 45, which is missing almost all the nickel from the Stanley logo and other parts of the plane. It went through all these steps maybe 20 years ago.