T-16 S/N 5399 T.D. 97377 Restoration

[horsa]

Yep, I live by the wire wheel mounted on a 4” angle grinder as well. Even tried sections of the hull that way but found there were too many places it couldn’t get into and they were usually the most in need. Plus like I’d mentioned before, my floor was deeply pitted after air chiseling the top crust off and the wire wheel wasn’t very effective getting into the moguls without excessive pressure being applied which reduces the life of the wire wheel or wire cup, plus the motor on the grinder.

I experimented with phosphoric acid when trying to figure out a good way to get my tracks freed up. They had been rolled and stored for a long time before I got them and required a breaker bar to force unroll them due to heavy rust. I broke them into sections and made my own chemical bath to test two sections. Results were visible after a few days but it was going to take a lot of work to free up each link since they would need to be moved back and forth a bit and then soaked again. This would need to be repeated over and over until the section was good again.

After getting the two test sections done, I looked back at the stack of waiting sections and decided to seek out a more cost effective solution. The molasses trick is an old one that most people have had good results with. But I couldn’t find an affordable source for bulk molasses here in Texas, even checking with the cattle feed and supply stores. Basically it was by the gallon like the phosphoric acid and wasn’t cheap. Space and a way to deal with the mess was also a concern for me working in a residential neighborhood. The ideal thing would have been a large galvanized metal horse trough for placing both tracks in with the chemicals. Then they could be worked on and off while flipping them around inside.