Originally Posted by
chico81
Thanks for your reply! I really had no idea what I had, I just knew that the components seemed to be pretty high quality. As you can see from the photos (Craigslist seller photos) the bike is in rough shape with lots of rust on the frame and individual components. I bought the bike for $25 and I knew that if the bike was unrestorable that I could at least salvage the crank, stem, and seatpost. I have since dismantled the entire bike to the frame, and I now have the rustiest parts in a vinegar bath to remove the rust. The frame has quite a bit of rust spotting, is this bike worth stripping down and restoring or should I just part it out?
If you look back on previous pages of the thread, I did a Sekai 4000 (different year) made
from Tange #2 that was about the rustiest project I've ever undertaken. It looked like
someone had stored it for thirty years in a storage locker near the beach.
Anyway, I had good luck with this stuff, but blocking the holes in the BB and frame on the
lower end so I could fill up the frame tubes and let it sit was major PIA.
After letting it sit, warm for about 24 hours, you drain the frame and rinse
(save the evaporust, it's reusable and a little pricey, but sold at Home Depot).
It's very easy to use on your components, just pour in an appropriately sized
and shaped container, and toss in your parts. It works faster when it is warm,
so right now in the summer is a good time to do it, outside, in the sunshine.
I would not do this unless it were my size and I planned to ride it. Like I said
it's a time consuming process, but not more so than a lot of the crazy stuff
we do in the name of bike restoration..........the good thing is the stuff is water
based and relatively non toxic.
After you rinse the frame interior, blow it dry, if you can (compressor or heat gun),
and then coat the tube interiors with something like this stuff.
It sprays into the tubes as an oil through the red plastic straw that should come
with the can, so you can usuall even get it into the stays through the small brazing holes.
When you get enough of the oil in your tube or stay, swirl it aroune and tilt back and
forth to coat the interior. Let it dry, do another coat, let that dry, and you should have
some success in making the frame outlast you. Unless it's already so severely rusted
in some place like the BB or stays that it is already shakey. Check for that before you
go to all this effort. Most steel tubing with the wall thicknesses of Ishiwata 022 have plenty
of leeway in terms of rust vs failure.