Since the antique ax is used very old (so to speak, “with experience”), for starters it must be completely cleaned of rust. Especially for this, a salt or soda solution is made, into which the "object" itself is then immersed. As a working bath for electrolysis, a plastic basin is suitable.
Next, the minus contact from the car battery is connected to the ax, and the positive contact is mounted on the anode (it is better to use a piece of stainless steel, but you can take another metal). After a half-hour “bathing” in the bath, the ax is easily cleaned even from deep rust. Then, from an extruded polystyrene foam, a mounting model on an ax is made.
The restoration process: the main stages of work
When the main details of the model are made and glued together, we put it together with an ax in a flask (wooden box), sprinkle it with sand and set the gates from metal. At the next stage, we melt the aluminum and fill its shape. The result is a cast mount on an ax.
On the tape saw, we cut off all the excess from the resulting “blank”, after which we proceed to machining the surface with a large file. Then, a wooden blank is inserted into the groove of the aluminum mount under the ax and fixed with rivets made of thick wire.
At the last stage of the work, we give the handle of the ax an aesthetic appearance, burn it with a gas burner, and then cover it with mineral oil. For a detailed process of restoration of an antique ax and the manufacture of aluminum mounts, see the video on our website.
