protecting metal parts after cleaning?

[Pop Bumper Pete]

what do you use to protect metal parts after you have removed rust and/or polished them?

[BigTrev]

I've been getting the under playfield parts bright silver zinc plated or I guess you could clear coat them.

[Brunswick Brawler]

I thought Mill Wax was good for this purpose.  Seals the metal.

[Strangeways]

If you have removed the zinc coating as part of the polishing process, you should re plate. I use brasso or Autosol to polish parts and that's about it. I don't use wax on metal.

[Wiked]

I've used Autosol for many years also

[Brunswick Brawler]

May be worth listening to 'For Amusement Only EM and Bingo Podcast' Episodes:
- 128 De-rusting (8 minutes)
- 123 Cleaning Metal parts (13 minutes).

I think that is where I heard about the wax on metal.  The other suggestions here sound more complete though.

[Retropin]

You could CC but it doesn't tend to adhere to bare metal that well and normally requires some sort of "etch" base coat... it would also give you a deep high gloss finish which may not be what you desire.
Easiest way to protect is to have some sort of silicon/oil barrier between the metal and any moisture... wax will certainly do the trick. Apply and buff off.
A wipe with WD40 is also a method but the main component in this is fish oil and you can buy a whole tin of fish oil from the hardware store which will protect against rust

[andypinboy]

This is actually a great question without a simple answer. Some restorers tumble all the parts including nuts & bolts, & sure they come out clean - but usually a coating (nickel, brass, etc) has been removed - so once it's all back together it's anyone's guess how long they'll stay looking nice. I think autosohl is the go as it (shouldn't) strip the coat off & should also leave some protection from the product itself. For larger pieces if badly tarnished or with some surface coating missing I think it's worth replating.

[Slash]

I tried a few different coatings with the really bad bits on my recent restoration.

The metal on my drop targets was screwed, lots of heavy rust in spots and zinc removed.  So I got them back to base metal and they obviously looked great but I knew they would rust again pretty quick.  On a cheapy pin it was just not worth the cost to get them rezinced or chromed etc.

So I had a go at spraying them with Silver Gal but it wasn't quite the colour I was looking for.  So I ended up spraying them a chrome silver colour then spraying a clear over the top to try and seal it.  The clear changed the colour of the paint under it slightly when it went on, it had almost a slight green tinge (I guess zinc or nickel sometimes looks like that too). 

It looked ok tho.  It's under the playfield so you obviously don't see it unless you lift it.  The end result looked better than had I left them bare metal and allowed the rust and white shit to come back.  It could chip off too despite the clear on top, but it shouldn't get too much damage now my resto is finished.  I will try and post some pics tonight of the finish.  Some of you guys will probably think it's sacrilegious but it was a cheap effective outcome and my other option was really doing nothing which long term was going to look worse.

I'm interested in the Autosol and WD40/fish oil idea to simply try and protect the base metal once polished and leave it at that.

[Pop Bumper Pete]

Think I will just chrome everything