1944 17 Pounder Case - Extreme Make Over

[peregrinvs]

A friend of mine picked up this 17pr case for me recently. The price was good, but that was because it had been previously turned into a lamp or something and slathered in some sort of hard as nails grey-black paint...:tinysmile_cry_t4:



After two days on and off of scraping, blow-torching, citric acid dipping, wire-wool scrubbing, etc. I have finally got it back to a reasonable display piece. Gawd knows what the paint was - I made the mistake of breathing in some of the dust and I think Novichok would have been preferable...:tinysmile_cry_t2: Underneath the paint, the metal had gone a strange orange-brown colour, so I had to polish that off as well.



I know it's generally best not to bling up cartridge cases, but I think there are occasions when it is the lesser of two evils. Now on to getting a natural patina on it.

 

[SG500]

Great work. Its so nice to see something that has been wrecked having a second chance.
Thanks for the before and after pics.
Dave.

 

[peregrinvs]

Thanks. It required at least 3 extra large pots of elbow grease, but I got there in the end.

In case anyone has a similar problem, here’s how I did it...

An initial coat of Nitromoors on the paint did absolutely zip. I therefore went over it with a blowtorch and then gradually scraped the paint off with a blunt knife and some medium wire wool. As mentioned, the metal underneath the paint had gone a strange orange-ish colour, so I gave it a 30 minute soak in dilute citric acid and then scrubbed it again with medium wire wool. This finally got it back to bare brass and after that it was a matter of polishing: firstly with fine wire wool and finally with a cloth and some Autosol polish.

I next want it to patinate, so I’m thinking of wiping it over with white spirit to remove the polish residue and then may leave it outside for a bit.

PS. The neck was dented, so I heated it with a blow torch and then used the pointed end of the semi-restored AP-T shot shown as a mandrel to widen it.