Thanks, pinkCastleDH. I'll let you all know how it worked,Mawluv

Ammonia ..... not for me. My sinuses are extremely sensitive to that stuff. I'll be using Denatured Alcohol.

Muwluv,
Between all these suggestions we'll get 'em all cleaned up and spiffy.

Joe

power steering fluid for a car works good to loosen up things,, and its oil based too.

Well, I ran out of denatured alcohol and went to the Hoppe's #9. Over a week soaking in kerosene and the gunk was untouched. 10 minutes in the Hoppe's and it's coming off by itself. Got some of the outer things cleaned of gunk and in the Evapo-Rust.

Found some parts I need for the 127 at Sew-Classic so as soon as I can make an order I'm gonna be in business.

Not that I have any idea what I'm going to do with the 127. But it will be cleaner and usable.

Joe

I use lighter fluid, it works well and does not harm the paint.

Lighter fluid, acetone, benzine, and other light weight extremely flammable vaporous fluids worry me. I have some of them, but don't really like to use them for cleaning if I can avoid it. Perhaps in this case I'm just being paranoid.

I do use the denatured alcohol and that is also flammable. But at it's rapid rate of evaporation the vapors don't pool in an area as bad. And I only use a cap full at a time. When I use a q-tip and clean a part it's dry by the time I reach for another q-tip.

Hoppe's #9 is a heavier oily chemical and although it has a distinctive odor it's not near as vaporous as the others. And it works.
It's job is to cut through oils, grease, carbon and to a lesser extent metallic fouling. I've used it for many years.

Joe

Joe, when I had a machine like that, I turned it upside down in a big box with large pieces of styrofoam holding it in place. Then I soaked some cotton (you could use rags) in kerosene and laid them over the gunky gears. I put a lamp over it with a regular, old school lightbulb and left it on for the small amount of heat it produced. I checked on it often, and eventually the gunk loosened up.

Stephanie,

That is one idea that never occurred to me.

However I got it under control now. I'm gonna build a big bon fire and put the machine in it and burn the crud out. Just like you do cast iron pots and pans. Then a couple coats of Rustolium and some oil and it will be good a new .......


Bwahahahahahahahahahahaha ............... :D

I'm just kidding. I have most of the removable parts cleaned now. Tomorrow I'll bring in the machine and start on it.
Hoppe's #9 does wonders for this kind of thing.

Joe

A couple of my machines were so gunked up that I wasn't sure what to do. They were dirty, rusty, seized and yucky. My DH brought in his PB Blaster (he has encountered some bad stuff in his former work as a GA mechanic) and it was what Skip had previously suggested to me. It took several applications over the period of a few days and on the appropriate parts I used a grill screen. My fingernails took a few days to get the black out but the machines look better and they work great. Just a note to the ladies, I found out that not dish-washing, food-handling or surgical gloves even triple layers don't protect the nails. Any suggestions from any of you to clean the nails after working on the machines? Nail brush and Dawn helps but the black color remained for several days.

Anytime I've used OxiClean to clean a machine's parts, my nails have been the cleanest, clearest things you'd ever see.

Ok,.. the clearest part is more the "eggshell nails" I have, but previously, they would always be black from crud and oil and grease on the machines.

I sincerely doubt that Oxi is great for your skin (probably not worse than kerosene though, that really dries the hands and makes the skin feel awful), but if you were to use a scrub brush with a weak solution of that and Dawn, perhaps it would be OK once rinsed really well? Test on an area for any sort of irritation first, I guess, but it's never bothered my eczema.

ETA: The other thing is, a Car Detailer once told me "that which you ruin it with, you fix it with".... perhaps a greasy sort of hand cream,... or cleaner grease that you can wash off? The SuperLube that I've been trying on the machines lately is food safe, so I'd think it shouldn't irritate the skin too badly.