civil war atifacts

[bill gent]

I'm sure its been asked n answered B$ I have a large amounts of artifacts that are rusted particial;ly rh buckles dont wanna damage em any ideas and then what to preserve em as well as iron shells
I am also wondering the best way to clean minie balls (hollow) on the inside to possibly ID them aso can a bullet be cleaned enough to clearly display the teeth marks?? (pain bullets) thanks all

[Elvis]

Try a soft tooth brush and mild detergent. This should not hurt the patina. Good luck. As for the rusted iron items, try electrolysis.

[BuckleBoy]

Try a soft tooth brush and mild detergent. This should not hurt the patina. Good luck. As for the rusted iron items, try electrolysis.

I agree--except I have never had to use detergent on my CW lead. Just water and a soft toothbrush. Leave the white patina on them!

For rusted iron, electrolysis. I agree. There are many threads here on how to do it--and you should always experiment first. Thing with electrolysis is that the slower you do it the better results you'll have.

If these "buckles" are brass, then that's a different story. Feel free to upload photos of the items and I'll try to be of more help.


-Buckleboy

[bill gent]

thanks actually I got my answer when I reached a friend of a friend he works in the smithsonian in war artifacts as an asst curator see my post on what the pros use
i cleaned what I could some are rusted all the way through
had hoped to clean up the chewed bullets to be able to see the tooth detail he did say it was possible but alot of people would doubt the authenticy of it if you removed the patina