Restoring nuts and bolts?

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billytuffnuts

billytuffnuts

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I've had a lot of my suspension parts either powder coated or painted and realized that now I need to do something about the attaching hardware.

I'm looking for ways that I can clean up the nuts and bolts and have some kind of coating that will not chip off when using a wrench or socket on them.

Any thoughts to this?
 
In the past I have used a wire wheel on a bench grinder or blasted with crushed glass (or whatever you want to run through a sand blaster).

Then I just hit the bolt heads with paint and /or clear after assembly.
 
I bought a 1 gal. can of Carb dip from the NAPA store. It has a parts basket inside. It cleans the nuts and bolts up good but only softens the old paint. I got a gal. of liquid (not jell) paint stripper and I will try that also.
 
I acid dip mine in a plastic tub then nuteralize in a backing soda bath.
Then finish up with a wire wheel on my grinder then prime and paint the heads.
Rub some oil on the unpainted areas because they will rust quickly.
This works real well with rusty bolts.
 
billytuffnuts said:
I skimmed through those posts and that stuff looks great.

Now the question is will those parts rust again, or does it leave some sort of protective coating.
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the website says if you dip the rust free part and let it air dry it will be protected from rust for just 4 hours.
 
I spray mine with WD-40 but those are parts that wont see water. If you dip it back in it will portect for quite some time I haeve needle nose pliers from 5 months ago that I dipped afterwards, still look great.
 
billytuffnuts said:
I skimmed through those posts and that stuff looks great.

Now the question is will those parts rust again, or does it leave some sort of protective coating.
Click to expand...

Anything that is steel will rust eventualy even if it has a protective coating. If you are in a rust prone area then I would go back with stainless steel as was suggested earlier.
 
just strip them down to bare metal and bring them to a plater, you could have them zinc and yellowed or blue, or even chrome
 
I run mine through a vibratory cleaner (mine is dual purpose - car parts and reloading - depending on media). Once they are stripped/de-rusted, if you want them black, just dunk them in blueing solution (cheap at any gun store). The blueing solution will appear blacker if the surface is nor polished smooth.
 
Billy, stainless is the way to go.

But if you want them to match your existing powder job, I can help you out with that for a great price. I'd blast everything clean and all the threads will be masked before I shoot it in a matching powder. (Most people use a flat or gloss black on their suspension so let me know if yours is a specialty color; that can be matched too.)

For what it's worth, I shoot all the related hardware at no extra charge if you toss it in the box with your parts.
 
Look into parkerizing. I glass bead my parts, then put them in a stainless steel 'kettle' and cook them on the coleman camp stove. Excellent results. Works especially good on hinges, latches, linkages, small springs, etc.. You can probably google 'parkerizing' and find out all you need to know. I've seen the necessary chemicals for sale on ebay but I got mine much cheaper at a chemical supply house. I haven't done this for awhile so don't recall the chemical names but I could get the dope in it if you can't find.

On a separate but similar subject, this forum once discussed derusting parts by placing them in a washing soda bath and connecting a battery charger. This worked great for me. Did my whole k-frame.
 
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