Thread: Restoring an occupied Japan straight razor

I started cleaning up this baby last night, the picture doesn't do the corrosion any justice... it was far worse than shown:




I will post new pictures tonight showing the current state. Right now the rust on the blade itself is gone and there is just etching-like marks where the spiderweb oxidation was.

Did you remove the blade from the scales before starting to remove the rust?

I didn't disassemble it yet, but my jig is quite flexible and the blade was securely held during the sanding. My biggest problem with removing the scales is that I currently lack the hardware to repin it down the line.

The rust close to the pivot might have to remain until I order a pack of micro-fasteners. Then I'll need to make new scales, too, as the current ones aren't very good.

Best of luck making scales. I finished up my first real set last night, and they look great. It is definitely not as hard as I imagined. All I used was sandpaper, a pocket knife, and a little pen drill thing and I didn't have any real trouble.

Good luck
Drew

It has since been sanded some more at 280 grit and the stains are almost gone.

I would unpin it. I guarantee there is rust at the pivot pin.

Oh yes there is a lot of it in there no doubt... I'd like to test shave with it before deciding for a full restore, rescale, repin job tho.

You will for sure have to sand the pivot area after removing the blade from the scales. Helps you a lot later if you spray some oil (WD40, CRC, gun oil, HHS 2000 etc) and let it soak there. Softens the rust and makes it easier to sand away later.
Also using oil when sanding the blade is no bad idea.

The scales came off tonight, the shank has been sanded down to 220 and back up to 400. now I definitely need to order a pack of microfasteners