I have had this brass blowtorch sitting on the shelf since last year with the idea of cleaning it up and bringing the shine of it’s former glory back to life. Last year I found a larger torch which I upcycled into a desk lamp. That touch and this was made by a company called Primus, in Sweden. After a little bit of research I believe this to be roughly from the 1950’s. the tank is made from brass along with the taps and screws. I love how brass cleans up. It turns a dirty brown after years of neglect and after a few seconds with a bit of Brasso it transforms into a beautiful shine. I also really appreciate the effort of design the makers of yesteryear took with their products. The engraving on this torch is really nice and I find you raretfind that on products nowadays unless you are paying for a top quality item. Anyway on with the restoration.

One of my first tasks with any restoration is to dismantle the tool. I often give each moveable part a squirt of WD40 before I attempt to unscrew anything just to make life a little easier. I had to use a little heat on a couple of parts to loosen the solder join, but one than that everything came apart easily and after a few minutes the blowtorch was dismantled.

Onto my favourite part which is removing all the decades of dirt and watching the tool come back to life. I don’t ever want to make a tool brand new again, I want to keep all the dink’s and scratches it has got throughout its life. It’s part of it’s history and I don’t see why anyone would want to remove that. This tool has been knocking around for the best part of 60 years, it may of had one owner or it could have had ten, it might of been used by a professional such as a plumber or maybe it was in an amateur DIY enthusiasts tool kit. Most of the time with used tools we pick up at boot sales or however they come to us, we will never know the story. This is part of the joy I have of bringing back an old tool to life.

I have a wire wheel which I threaded a bolt through so I can attach it to my pillar drill. This makes cleaning up metals such as brass really quick and as it’s a soft wire, it’s gentle on soft metals as not to scratch them. I use a metal polish like AutoSol to help lift the dirt and also bring up the shine.

After I have used the wire wheel, I use some Brasso on a rag and buff the metal to a nice finish. You can easily go to far with this, as with little effort you could bring it to a mirror finish. If it was a new tool that I was farting up then I would do, but as I said above, I want to keep the look and feel of an old used tool.

The original paint on the handle was red. Being steel, this was the only part of the tool with any rust, and a lot of the original paint had been lost. At the moment I don’t have many colours of metal paint in the works, but I do have a really old tin of Chinese Lacquer in yellow. This paint is over 60 years old!!! Roughly the same age as the blowtorch so it’s quite fitting really. The paint was produced by a long gone company called Starline, they was based in Southend, Essex, which is only 5 miles from where I live. It is an enamel paint and gives off a brilliant finish which really suits the tool. Once the handle was painted, I spray painted the nozzle and nozzle mount in black.

After a good hour or more, everything bar the tank was cleaned and polished. Again I used the wire wheel on the pillar drill to get the majority of the grime away. But I wanted a good even finish as this is the main part of the tool. Once I was finished with the wheel, I finished the rest off with a polishing cloth and Brasso. The only thing you need to be mindful of is fingerprints. When I was nearing the end, I wore some latex gloves so not to leave any prints. With the paint dry, it was time to reassemble to blowtorch. Awesome!!!

The black and yellow really sets of the brass. Everything is complete and restored, if I wanted to, I could fill it up with a bit of kerosene and use it as intended, although it will make it dirty again!! I’m happy to have this on display and look forward to looking after it for the next part of it story.