Ethnographic Arms & Armour - View Single Post

Lee · 7th December 2016, 01:11 PM

I will see if I can find the instructions that I used to stabilize a Viking sword that was seriously flaking away. I suspect it is on the extracted hard drive of my dead computer.

I remember that I had to alkalinize distilled water using Sodium Hydroxide to a certain pH (11 by memory) and would then would soak the sword for a few days until pH fell towards neutral. This needed to be repeated several times for over a month. Finally, the pH drop stopped occurring. At this point I dehydrated in a series of anhydrous isopropyl alcohol baths (just like tissue in the path lab!) and then finally into acetone and then finally coated with paraloid B-72 dissolved in acetone.

This does not give a great display surface and leaves much of the rust, but it does have the advantage that it removes the inherent vice of the salts. The coating can be removed later with acetone if needed.

7th December 2016, 01:11 PM	#11
Lee EAAF Staff Join Date: Nov 2004 Location: Upstate New York, USA Posts: 887	I will see if I can find the instructions that I used to stabilize a Viking sword that was seriously flaking away. I suspect it is on the extracted hard drive of my dead computer. I remember that I had to alkalinize distilled water using Sodium Hydroxide to a certain pH (11 by memory) and would then would soak the sword for a few days until pH fell towards neutral. This needed to be repeated several times for over a month. Finally, the pH drop stopped occurring. At this point I dehydrated in a series of anhydrous isopropyl alcohol baths (just like tissue in the path lab!) and then finally into acetone and then finally coated with paraloid B-72 dissolved in acetone. This does not give a great display surface and leaves much of the rust, but it does have the advantage that it removes the inherent vice of the salts. The coating can be removed later with acetone if needed.