AirmetTango
Forum Supporter
Being a frequent field hunter, many of my finds come out of the ground grotesquely misshapen from plows and who knows what other forces of nature. In the past, I would sometimes cross my fingers and hope for the best as I gave some finds a quick whack with a rubber mallet in an attempt to bludgeon them back into shape, or even bend them back with my bare hands. As you can imagine, the results were mixed - occasionally it would work well, but more often than not, the find would suffer some sort of damage…best case, there would at least be a stress line in the metal where a bend was taken out; worst case, the find would flat out break.
Well, I’ve been meaning to start doing this the right way for years, so despite my wife’s fears that I’ll burn down the garage (which is directly attached to the house), I finally got myself a small, handheld propane torch and some insulated fire bricks. Then I dredged out some old, bent up finds that I’ve been meaning to fix:
I fired up the torch, blasted each piece individually, heating them each to a very vague glow, then quenching them in a tub of water. Like coin ring making, or any other metal work, this annealing process helps make the metal workable with much less worry for the metal to fracture. Once quenched it was a simple process to flatten each piece, using any number of methods…rubber mallet, bare hands, or pressed between wood blocks…whatever. Not a mark on any of the finds from the process, the only marks you see are from the original damaging bend underground. Some of the finds needed me to repeat the process a couple times - after a few minutes the metal starts to “harden” again - and you can see in the pictures below that I’ll probably need to do a little more work on the big sash buckle. But the whole process was super quick and easy - and the fire department didn’t even have to come once! I neglected to include it in the before shot, but the long strip with the decorative scrolling was folded almost completely in half - it was so easy to fix an amazing amount of damage worry free. Should have done this ages ago!!
I’m pretty sure the annealing process made the pieces easier to clean also - much of the oxidation buffed off fairly easily using a Dremel and a brass wire wheel.
Well, I’ve been meaning to start doing this the right way for years, so despite my wife’s fears that I’ll burn down the garage (which is directly attached to the house), I finally got myself a small, handheld propane torch and some insulated fire bricks. Then I dredged out some old, bent up finds that I’ve been meaning to fix:
I fired up the torch, blasted each piece individually, heating them each to a very vague glow, then quenching them in a tub of water. Like coin ring making, or any other metal work, this annealing process helps make the metal workable with much less worry for the metal to fracture. Once quenched it was a simple process to flatten each piece, using any number of methods…rubber mallet, bare hands, or pressed between wood blocks…whatever. Not a mark on any of the finds from the process, the only marks you see are from the original damaging bend underground. Some of the finds needed me to repeat the process a couple times - after a few minutes the metal starts to “harden” again - and you can see in the pictures below that I’ll probably need to do a little more work on the big sash buckle. But the whole process was super quick and easy - and the fire department didn’t even have to come once! I neglected to include it in the before shot, but the long strip with the decorative scrolling was folded almost completely in half - it was so easy to fix an amazing amount of damage worry free. Should have done this ages ago!!
I’m pretty sure the annealing process made the pieces easier to clean also - much of the oxidation buffed off fairly easily using a Dremel and a brass wire wheel.
