Thread: Restoring Razor with Mold

Here are the pics of the patient. You'll notice that the scales are bent inwards, and they're really tight.

Are you talking about rust? Looks like rust not mold.

This is a heavily rusted and pitted razor, to remove all the pitting you will have to sand. The pivot is heavily pitted as is the spine and the spots on the blade.

If you want to remove all the pitting and rust, you will have to remove the scales, then sand all the surrounding metal to the depth of the deepest pit.

If you just want to clean it up, scrub with steel wool, (000) and oil, sand with 600 and 1,000 grit wet and dry. Polish with any good metal polish, you will still have rust between the scales at the pivot and in the pin hole and have to live with some pitting. Test the edge first, to make sure it will take an edge before you invest a lot of time into restoration.

Scales look like Gutta Percha, a form of hard rubber, an early form of plastic, they used to make telephones and insulators from. It will bend with heat. You can run under hot water for a few minutes till they get pliable. Then shove some popsicle sticks between them a bit past where you want them to spread and let cool.

It may take a couple tries to get them to bend and stay where you want, don’t get too aggressive they can break, then there is no putting them back together. Nothing I have found will glue Gutta Percha.

So this is where I'm at. I used some 150 AlOx sandpaper and 400 SiC sandpaper. For the tail, I even used my small lansky hones.

How much should I try to get rid of those black spots? They look kinda deep.
How much should I worry about the scratches bringing rust back?

Ideally you should remove the scales.
You can clean the black out and leave the pitting. It is often better for the stamps that way. Steel wool and WD-40 or polish works pretty good to clean out the black. 0000 on the steel wool. It does take some elbow grease.

Looks like the standard rust that happens to razors. Not Mold. Do as Rez said, Cleaning well with polish or WD-40 and 0000 steel wool does wonders. You won't get rid of the pitting, but clean as much of the black off as possible. Unpinning can be a bit tricky the first few times you try it, but its best so that you can get in there to clean correctly.

Or contact someone around here that restores and see what they will charge ya. The rust still may come back. It happens. Just be sure it's completely dry before storing or even closing it up. It almost looks like a line of rust across the tang. This could be from it being a bit wet when you put it away. Just one of the signs to look for. Lines or many tiny spots. The multitude of tiny spots could mean its off-gassing, but I don't think you have that issue. Thanks for the pics. It helps a lot when trying to help others.

I really want to avoid removing the scales though... What's the consequence? The rust will come back quick over there?

Withour removing scales you wont get the rust out of the pivot area. With rust still on the blade it can spread quicker. To properly restore pull pins and sand. But this can be a lot of work and depending on if you habe a few razors or just two, you might just clean it up the best you can, know that rust will come back, but shabe just fine. As long as the rust doesnt get to the edge. Then you got issues.