Restored an old axe

[sobi1998]

I had some free time this morning so I decided to try my hand at restoring an axe head I had. I found it while pressure washing my shed. Must’ve left it there years ago.
It was extremely rusty, big chunks flaking off. I had some vinegar so I made an electrolysis setup to remove most of the rust overnight.

Before:

A very crude setup but surprisingly, it worked!

After:

From here I used an angle grinder with wire wheels, sanding discs and grinding wheels to clean it up

I’ll admit it was an amateur job but i can’t make it too nice...it’s gonna be used after all
Cleaned it and oiled it then hung it on a $15 hickory homedepot special

I’m gonna test it out on some firewood this weekend!


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[flgfish]

Sweet!

 

[Axxe55]

Awesome job! Glad to see someone take the time to restore it to where it can be used again, instead of just sending it to the trash.

Personally, I think it looks pretty good. I have restored some old axes and hatchets that belonged to my grandfather and my great grandfather. I do actually use them occasionally!

 

[sobi1998]

Thanks!
Hopefully I hung it right and it stands up to a beating! I have some old fire hose I wanna make a sheath with, for it
I have an old rusty hatchet-hammer head sitting in the car that’s up next. Gonna use the same process. Electrolysis works wonders on it. Made the restoration go much faster without as much effort


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[Axxe55]

Thanks!
Hopefully I hung it right and it stands up to a beating! I have some old fire hose I wanna make a sheath with, for it
I have an old rusty hatchet-hammer head sitting in the car that’s up next. Gonna use the same process. Electrolysis works wonders on it. Made the restoration go much faster without as much effort


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I have never used the vinegar method before. Looks like it works pretty good.

I just soaked mine for a week or so in a mixture of old oil and diesel. Then washed them really good before giving them a good scrubbing with a steel bristle brush, then proceeded as you did with the grinding and sanding.

 

[Axxe55]

If I can remember, I have a couple I have already done, but I need to get some handles for, that I will take some pictures of tomorrow to post.

 

[sobi1998]

You need a container with enough vinegar to submerge the piece. You add some salt to it to aid in the electricity passing through. Find an old 1 amp phone charger and strip the wires to get the positive and negative leads. Find a piece of sacrificial metal and attach the leads. (One to the axe head and one to the scrap metal)
When you attach the leads to the piece and the scrap metal, one will bubble up and fizz while the other one doesn’t do much. Without knowing which lead is positive or negative...attach the wire which makes the piece bubble and fizz, to the sacrificial metal and the other wire to the axe head.
I let it go over night and just brushed it off in the sink. If my explanation was confusing, I used YouTube myself lol

***if you look closely at the first picture of the rusty axe. That’s my electrolysis set up. I used the lid from a pellet tin as the sacrificial metal. You can see the bubbles on it if you zoom in


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[Moonpie]

 

[Dougw1515]

Awwww Hell.... I thought you were talking about Jonas! Lord know he could use some restorin'!

 

[seeker_two]

Nicely done!

 

[mroper]

I use washing soda (not baking soda) instead of vinegar for my electrolysis and a 1.5 amp battery charger. I did alot of very rusted car parts that way

 

[sobi1998]

I use washing soda (not baking soda) instead of vinegar for my electrolysis and a 1.5 amp battery charger. I did alot of very rusted car parts that way

How long from start to finish would it get them cleaned? Mine was overnight


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[mroper]

Some

How long from start to finish would it get them cleaned? Mine was overnight


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Some were over night some multiple days becasue I had to flip them over the container I used wasnt big enough .

 

[sobi1998]

Mine wasn’t deep enough so part of it was left exposed. Removing that rust with the grinder left a lot of pitting. All in all, I’m very surprised with how well the process worked


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[TreyG-20]

If you have a pool and some muriatic acid laying around it will eat that rust off in minutes. I restored a Honda 3 wheeler gas tank like that. Definitely need a respirator and ventilation(outside) to do it, but works like a charm. Also need some soda ash and water to neutralize it.

 

[Axxe55]

Awwww Hell.... I thought you were talking about Jonas! Lord know he could use some restorin'!

It's going to take a little more than vinegar to restore me!

 

[Dougw1515]

Muriatic acid 0% dilution! Straight up 24 hour soak - then it's a maybe!

 

[G O B]

Old axe heads get blunt from many sharpenings over the years.
My grandfather used to heat them to straw color and draw the edge out longer and thinner with a hammer and anvil and then re temper them in oil.

 

[majormadmax]

I have this old UH-60 Black Hawk rescue axe. Several collectors have recommended I restore it, but I think it has more character as is!

 

[sobi1998]

Here’s the hatchet head I mentioned earlier. I used a wire wheel on it and turns out it’s a “True Temper No. R25”

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