To the experienced Evaporust users

[Roy Lindberry]

Does anybody know if evaporust affects wood in any way? I have an old broad axe with a good handle, but a very rusty head, and I want to immerse it, but I don't know if it will hurt the wood.

Thoughts?

[Mike Holbrook]

I ran a thread favorite restoration materials and tricks a ways back when I was getting into restoring tools. Your question came up in the second and third post...

http://www.sawmillcreek.org/showthread.php?124120-Your-favorite-restoration-materials-and-quot-tricks-quot&highlight=

I have used a rust remover called Naval Jelly that is, you guessed it, jelly like. You can coat a specific area without dunking the whole works. There are a bunch of other suggestions in the thread above and Evapo-rust gets discussed from all sides as I recall.

[Niels Cosman]

fwiw: probably cant be good. the only interaction i've seen is it turning plywood greenish.
at best it would swell the fibres in the handle like water (which isn't good either as i understand)

[Jonathan McCullough]

Naval Jelly's an excellent suggestion and works well too. It comes in a jelly form so that when you apply it to the underside of a steel hull, it won't drip back down on you. For most de-rusting I've been using white vinegar. One trick that works is to put the tool in question in a shallow basin. Then, cover the parts you want to be exposed to the vinegar with ordinary paper towel. Soak the paper towel with the vinegar so it sticks to the metal parts you want to treat. The paper towel naturally wicks up the vinegar, but you can prevent the vinegar from reaching parts you don't want it to touch. Never used evaporust but if it's liquid, it should work the same.

[Alan Schwabacher]

I don't know what effect the evaporust itself would have on the wood, but the water in it would ruin a soaked handle. Wood expands on absorbing water, but if that takes place inside the axe head the fibers will be crushed. When it later dries out the wood will shrink and the head will loosen up. The paper towel trick sounds good, or remove the handle before soaking the head.

[Scott T Smith]

I don't know what effect the evaporust itself would have on the wood, but the water in it would ruin a soaked handle. Wood expands on absorbing water, but if that takes place inside the axe head the fibers will be crushed. When it later dries out the wood will shrink and the head will loosen up. The paper towel trick sounds good, or remove the handle before soaking the head.

+1. Not a good idea.

[Mitch Barker]

When it later dries out the wood will shrink and the head will loosen up.

And that is where the phrase "fly off the handle" comes from - according to a Roy Underhill book (can't recall the title).

Mitch

[Andrae Covington]

And that is where the phrase "fly off the handle" comes from - according to a Roy Underhill book (can't recall the title).

Mitch

The phrase "fly off the handle" first appeared in print in 1843, but of course axe heads have probably been flying off handles for thousands of years.

In The Woodwright's Eclectic Workshop, Roy embarked on a cheerful rant about Thoreau's misguided attempts to keep the head on his borrowed axe by soaking it in Walden Pond.


Near the end of March, 1845, I borrowed an axe and went down to the woods by Walden Pond... One day, when my axe had come off and I had cut a green hickory for a wedge, driving it with a stone, and had placed the whole to soak in a pond-hole in order to swell the wood...