Inspired by the vintage bike thread. Mate gave me his 50s tourer to er..”have a look at” with a view to him riding it a bit.

He wants a sympathetic job so it all still looks original, just a service and tidy up. What is the best way to clean up the rusty chrome parts without being too abrasive?

Chrome polish and FINE wire wool?

If its badly pitted once you get the surface rust off painting the rims with silver paint then wiping it off leaves paint in the pits and disguises the knackered chrome

I have these two bikes which were both restored using some Autosol metal polish and a Dremel wire brush bit. Quicker and even more effective, but requiring greater care, would be an angle grinder with a wire brush but I’ve only done that on car parts.

[url=https://flic.kr/p/2jif1EY]DSC_3709[/url] by Luke Bradley, on Flickr

[url=https://flic.kr/p/2jihXbF]DSC_4053[/url] by Luke Bradley, on Flickr

Munrobiker – did that not scratch the existing chrome?

Cheers! for the tips. To be honest there apears to be very little chrome left so the silver paint idea might be a good one. It’s mainly just the quill stem the rims aren’t too bad actually.

Full fat proper Coke and aluminium foil.

Scrunch the foil up so the shiny side is on the outside, dip in the Coke and scrub away.

Do make sure you thoroughly wash the Coke off when you’re done!

TJ- no, the Dremel wire brushes are pretty weak. Brought up the chrome on the forks on that Coventry Eagle nicely.

The chrome was totally ruined on the bars and stem of the tandem (they were in a similar state to those on the bike in the Vintage Bike thread) and I sprayed them with chrome spray from Halfords which was pretty crap (it doesn’t look at all like chrome) but it looks better than it did.

Some of these metal sprays might work better-

Prep & Finish + Metal Plating