Three days of peering into a sandblaster cabinet and I end up with a frame, girder forks, mudguards and oil tank stripped of paint and rust. I wash the parts down with a power washer and hot water and then dry them with a Makita 1500 watt heat gun. I then wash down with a solution of metal wash to prevent rust prior to painting.
The Tank
I peer inside and realize that it is full of rust. I throw some small stones and old bolts inside and shake it and out spews a huge cloud of smelly rust. I then notice a number of pin hole leaks. That's about it for the tank. A new one from Stucchi costs around $700 - maybe this one can be salvaged?
I send an email to Ross Thompson Metal Finishing in Alisa Craig, Ontario, Canada. The tank is taken to the post office, the required form filled out and off it goes. Ross calls back with an estimate for cutting open, repaneling, pressurized leak testing and chrome plating the tank. It comes back in a month looking beautiful. The filler cover is just a threaded cylinder and so I get one from Stucchi which is a plastic lookalike with Super Alce embossed on it. I also get new taps.
[Note: at the end I have pdf parts drawing, English names for the parts, and the original Italian names and part numbers. These are from Patrick Hays who scanned and translated the original. Many thanks, Patrick!]
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