#bascinets

I’ve inherited a few repros which my best friend found in his attic; they belonged to his son, since moved out, and C thought these bits and pieces had gone too.

Nope. 

So there’s a bascinet, a tatty aluminium (!) mail-shirt with butted rings (!!), a “Colada” wall-hanger SLO...

...a rapier whose broken swept-hilt I don’t know how to weld together (though @dduane‘s suggestion of “ask at the pub” is a good one)...

and a US Civil War 1840 “wrist-breaker” sabre.

Trouble is, they were in the damp environment near the cold-water tank and are a mess. The mail-shirt only looks this good because it’s non-ferrous... :-P

So I’m turning a fault into a feature: rather than trying to polish them back to the way they were (no chance!) I’m going further down the antique-finish route.

This overall rust on the bascinet is after being sprayed with a salt-and-vinegar mixture; the masking tape is to protect a decorative brass trim.

After a while - it’s only been a week or so - I’m going to gently scrub off the rust and see what the steel looks like, then rinse and repeat if required. If rougher treatment will have a more interesting effect, I can always try wetted ash from the stove, usefully acidic if what it’s done to the ash-bucket is anything to go by.

The effect I’m hoping for, mild to severe, is like one of these. More info to follow.

Stained glass windows depicting four donors to Arnstein Abbey, German, ca. 1360-1365