Cleaning Up Rusty Old Pocket Knife

[smoothshooter]

I have an old S & W (I think) folding pocket knife that is many decades old that I picked up at a gun show cheap. It has 3 blades. They all still open but have some rust in the hinge area and some on the blades . I want to clean it up and I think it needs to soak in some kind of solvent or penetrant for a few days before I start scrubbing at the rust on the blades.
The scales appear to be plastic or Bakelite.
Question is, if I soak in the popular solvent made up by mixing automatic transmission fluid and acetone 50/50 will it soften or otherwise damage the scales?

 

[weatherby]

Most likely a yes. ..I sure wouldn't try it.

 

[Mike SC Hunter]

Fitz works great on blade clean up.....DON"T soak those handles in anything.

 

[StrawHat]

Your answer is somewhere in here,

All About Pocket Knives - Knife Forum

Lots of reading, but interesting stuff.

Kevin

 

[smoothshooter]

Saw a video a couple of months ago posted by a guy in Germany that restores old Swiss Army knives. Demonstrated his methods on one that was pretty rough.
He removed the scales and soaked everything in some kind of fluid or cleaner for a few hours, followed by scrubbing all metal parts with a wire hand brush, and steel wool, I think.
After a complete drying he reassembled everything.
Finished product looked almost brand new.

 

[Stevens]

How did he remove the scales?

I have owned many over the years except for maybe some wear on blade from sharpening they usually looked pretty much like new.
Steve W

 

[chief38]

Acetone works well for some purposes but I would not put any plastic item in Acetone! As much as I do not use WD-40 as a lube, preservative or long term storage product, it does clean very well and can't remember having any issues from WD-40. After cleaning the knife with the WD-40 I would blow it all out with an air compressor and then use a quality CLP gun oil to lube and preserve.

Acetone can be a great product for cleaning, however I have also seen it damage stuff and would not take a chance on unknown materials.

 

[gwpercle]

I have an old S & W (I think) folding pocket knife that is many decades old that I picked up at a gun show cheap. It has 3 blades. They all still open but have some rust in the hinge area and some on the blades . I want to clean it up and I think it needs to soak in some kind of solvent or penetrant for a few days before I start scrubbing at the rust on the blades.
The scales appear to be plastic or Bakelite.
Question is, if I soak in the popular solvent made up by mixing automatic transmission fluid and acetone 50/50 will it soften or otherwise damage the scales?

Don't take a chance ... the acetone is very hard on plastic ...
Soak it in straight K-1 Kerosene ... this is on old school rust remover that may take longer but will not damage any plastoc or bone . I have used it on tools my children would leave lying in the dirt all winter ... long soaking got them usable again and leaves a "patina" on the metal that doesn't rust.
. Try It , kerosene will do no damage !
Gary