So I've got this WE 20-AB that looked like somebody's unfinished project phone from decades ago. It was brassed out but the entire phone is well patinated with a few small spots of verdigris here and there. I got a regular 20 series hook to replace the railway headphone hook and a nickeled 277W transmitter for it. I thought I might just take a crack at Japanning the phone (except the nickel transmitter, of course), since it needs a finish on it. I am using the original transmitter cup for a test subject and if I like it, I'll take a stab at doing the rest of the phone.
For my Japanning, I used roughly equal parts of DAP Black roofing tar (contains asphalt and mineral spirits), mineral spirits, and spar varnish. I think the main departure from a more traditional Japan finish is that the spar varnish likely contains synthetic resin instead of natural. I have read that Gilsonite (asphaltum mined in Utah) was used for Japanning so I hope that the asphalt that DAP uses has similar properties. And I hope that my proportions are suitable.
Here is the cup after 1st coat, and then baked in a toaster oven at 250 for half an hour. I have the 2nd coat baking right now and after it's been in for 1/2 hour I will take it off the newspaper (which is in there baking with it) and turn up the heat to 350 and give it another 1/2 hour, then let it cool and continue to cure for a day or 2. After that, I will see if it needs any smoothing or buffing, maybe give it a 3rd coat, or jump right to a final coat of just varnish.
Looks pretty good, Cliff. Please keep us updated. There is a post here somewhere where someone did a japaning job that was much more tedious This seems much easier.
Quote from: HarrySmith on April 17, 2015, 08:03:24 PMThere is a post here somewhere where someone did a japaning job that was much more tedious This seems much easier.
I searched before trying this and searched again after reading your reply. I found posts by cihensley where he mentioned rejapanning parts, but no details on the process were given, and I don't think I found any other members posting that they had done any Japanning.
Here it is after the 2nd coat and baking 1/2 hour at 250 and another 1/2 hour at 350.
As an FYI, those who collect old hand tools prefer japanning when restoring them. I started browsing their forums the last time japanning came up on the forum. One of them posted a link to this book back in 2006. Seems to be the original or first book written on the process. It dates to 1901, revised in 1913, and does not match what I have read about the WE process but it is interesting background on the process. Some of the materials used and the methods employed to "cook" them are less than desirable today.
http://www.gutenberg.org/files/15622/15622-h/15622-h.htm
A pdf print out of this link is attached in case the above link goes bad.
There is a topic somewhere on the forum detailing japanning but I have not yet found it either.
Of interest might also be this article of 1918:
George J. Kirkgasser, Electric Heat for Drying and Baking, Industrial Management 56(6), 489 (December 1918)
Thanks, I think I've seen both of those documents linked in previous posts.
I am having trouble with runs that seem to occur after they go in the oven. Presumably, before the Japanning starts to dry, it flows somewhat which helps to smooth out brush marks but also seems to encourage runs. I tried switching to a foam brush and applying the Japan thinner to begin with and smoothing it over with a second round of brush strokes after initial application. It hasn't helped. Anybody care to offer an opinion on the consistency of the mixture being too thin or too thick?
I tried wet sanding with 220, then 400, then polishing compound before I put the 3rd coat on but wore the finish very thin in spots. After the 3rd coat I skipped the 220, went straight to the 400, polish, rubbed with conservators wax, 0000 steel wool, more sanding, polishing, and wax.
If it wasn't for still being able to see the runs, it would look great. It does look great from about 4 feet away, but up close the imperfections are obvious.
I finally had a nice day to work on this again (I've been doing it outside). Since the last photos, I had done a bit more sanding and polishing to smooth out the runs as much as possible. For today's final coat, I thinned out my Japan mixture a bit and also warmed up the cup in the toaster oven as it was heating up prior to applying the Japan. My theory being that the Japan went on too thick in the previous coats due to the cool temperature outside, then started to flow as it warmed in the oven before it dried enough to set. I didn't get any new runs this time, but I may have applied it too thin as it failed to cover the sharp edges where it got sanded bare, but it stuck well to the previous Japan coat and ended with a nice even coat which polished up nicely.
Now I have to work up the nerve to try it on an entire phone. :)
Very nice! Any plans to put another coat on the cup?
Quote from: TelePlay on May 01, 2015, 07:56:50 PM
Very nice! Any plans to put another coat on the cup?
I think I will just move on to doing the phone. I have a nickeled transmitter for it which looks in decent enough shape, so this is for now, a spare cup.
NorthernElectric,
I would love to see the final results of your Japanning Trial on the whole phone! Care to share?
Tina Loyd
Quote from: cloyd on May 11, 2016, 12:01:41 PM
NorthernElectric,
I would love to see the final results of your Japanning Trial on the whole phone! Care to share?
Tina Loyd
Well, I never got around to japanning the whole phone yet. I don't recall exactly why, but probably a combination of being distracted by other phones and getting busy with other things and next thing I knew winter had come. I didn't want to bake it in the house so was using an old toaster oven outside. Though I have more time on my hands in the winter, I live in Canada where conditions are not suitable for doing this outside at that time of year.
Also, my mixture was somewhat experimental and perhaps too thick which resulted in runs that required much sanding and polishing. My initial test performed on a rifle cartridge case seemed too thin and I could still see brass through the japan after 2 coats, so I thickened it up some. Maybe the right mix is somewhere in between. Sure wish I had made more notes on how much of each ingredient I used. I have not abandoned the idea though and may carry on with that this year now that spring might be here. I say 'might' because we had below freezing lows 2 nights this week.
I will post updates when I have progress to report. :)
The whole idea of painting with TAR is fascinating to me! I can't imagine anyone thinking of this application for the first time. You would think that someone would have had the idea to market a kit. Perhaps I should check that out.
Tina
I have read about japanning in some threads. When I restored my first OB05 (wood/steel German desk crank phone) I thought that these might have a similar coating on the metal parts. They can be polished using methylated spirits (denatured alcohol), not unlike chemical sanding Tenite. Bituminous (Asphaltum) products are soluble in alcohol and other solvents.
Now I received a pair of really rusty specimens (I'll show them in a different thread later). I looked for a suitable paint to restore them and found a factory made Bitumen Paint. I did some trials with it and it seems to me that it is much like the original. It might not be required to mix obscure ingredients at home to obtain acceptable restoration results.
There are many types of Bitumen products for weatherproofing roofs and other outdoor applications. They are not the same thing. The Bitumen Paint I tried is glossy, dries up fast, is easy to work with and is odorless when dry. A quick search found that similar products are available internationally. They might be close to what the telephone industry used back in the days?
I have not done the phones yet but the trials look good.
Thanks for the refreshing research on this type of coating.
This is a giant step forward in the jappaning topic and surprised how this commercially available, and relatively inexpensive, product has slipped under the nose of seasoned restoration and long time members on this forum.
Black Jack is available in the US. As for your use with phones, I see many ways to explore this product including the areas of thinning, multiple coats, surface prep and baking.
Thanks again for the heads up on this and will be waiting to see what you discover, including images.
Quote from: countryman on October 03, 2020, 01:02:46 PM
...I looked for a suitable paint to restore them and found a factory made Bitumen Paint. I did some trials with it and it seems to me that it is much like the original. It might not be required to mix obscure ingredients at home to obtain acceptable restoration results.
There are many types of Bitumen products for weatherproofing roofs and other outdoor applications. They are not the same thing. The Bitumen Paint I tried is glossy, dries up fast, is easy to work with and is odorless when dry. A quick search found that similar products are available internationally.
I use a bitumen paint, purchased for wood. I'd need to check the container as to it's suggested applications but on wood it paints on easily, dries to a semi gloss finish and is durable (I never found a product like this in the UK but they may have similar). The metal I have previously applied it to never gave me any concern so I never looked closely at it. It never occurred to me to use it for this hobby.
I'll make a note to do a bit of experimentation on metals, testing out various thinners and see what results I get (I'll be honest - I sometimes thin this kind of stuff down using oil from the tractor saved back after it gets a service, for my purpose works a treat and remains nice and dark).
Blackening metal is something I have been looking into lately. Thanks for the pointer.
Looking forward to seeing your results.
I have long thought about suitable methods of refinishing items that were originally black japanned.
Black paint can look OK but if the item is actually used, the paint soon comes off.
Products like Black Jack are bitumen based but not cured. Subsequent application of solvent will remove the finish - it is really only waterproofing. I don't know what the application of heat will do to the finish or how it might change its physical properties (if it will cure).
Black japan covers a lot of different finishes but as applied to metal - cars and telephones - it is cured producing a very tough finish. It is hard but does not immediately break or chip if the metal is dented.
I believe black japan uses asphaltum rather than just bitumen. It is a harder and less volatile form of bitumen.
Asphaltum typically designates a species of bitumen, including dark colored, comparatively hard and non-volatile solids; composed of hydrocarbons, substantially free from oxygenated bodies and crystallizable paraffin; sometimes associated with mineral matter, the non-mineral constituents being difficultly fusible and largely soluble in carbon disulfide; the distillation residue yields considerable sulfonation residue. This definition includes Gilsonite and glance pitch.
https://www.naturalpigments.com/artist-materials/asphaltum-bitumen/
Ford used Gilsonite in its black japan mixture (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japan_black).
Western Electric's formula for black japan changed - the B Handset Mounting was finished in "rubber finish japan".
The japan used at the present time produces a semi -dull black finish having the appearance of a machined and polished piece of hard rubber from which it derives its name. The name -"rubber finish japan " -is somewhat misleading, however, in that the japan contains no rubber.
(Bell-Laboratories-Record-1930-12)
There's always powder coating...
Jack
Totally agree about curing needing to be considered. My latest 'build' was trailing engine oil and heated metal which at the moment is my preferred method. Haven't quite got to the stage of chucking a No150 stick in there yet (which is where I was headed with this). Shame our place didn't have an old Forge, I could have put it to good use.
Powder coating (without sending the parts away) I have not looked into.
Never keen to send parts off, for me, not an easy service to find, and if the parts go missing.... :(
Christian was getting good at doing his own powder coating at home but it always seemed too complicated for me to get into and sending out is dicey including ending up with an off shade color. Always felt a paint like coating baked or cured on metal was the best solution.
Doing a bit of research, discovered some bitumen materials are used in roof work including patching but those are more tar like, not paints. But some bitumen paints do dry to a gloss like finish. Dry vs cure goes to baking in that all finishes "cure" to some degree as the volatile components, carrier solvents evaporate and the "paint" molecules link together and "cure." Controlled heating does have an impact on curing. Baked finishes are "harder" than air dried finishes.
They use bitumen coatings on steel pipe buried in the ground to carry crude to water, the coating they use is a tough, hard, smooth, rust proof finish so this type of coating seems to be similar to Asphaltium original Ford cars and WE phone coating.
Black Jack is not sold in the US and haven't found an equivalent yet. Now that I have reinstalled my baking setup with a larger oven, I would also be interested in playing with this stuff including the addition of thinners and agents that do cure, link together to create a hard, tough shiny surface. But I can't find Black Jack so that's now a back burner project.
Will be waiting to see what others discover.
I googled 'diy japanned finish'
there are some people experimenting with it
Here is a couple posts from the search
ASPHALTUM IS ALSO A PRINTMAKING SUPPLY. AVAILABLE FROM PRINTING SUPPLY CO OR FROM A GOOD ART SUPPLY STORE THAT SELLS ETCHING SUPPLIES. IT COMES IN A CHUNK AND MELTS TO DRAW LIKE A CRAYON ON A WARMED PRINTING PLATE. HARDENS WHEN COOL AGAIN.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Cold Mix Japanning Recipe:
Add 2 parts linseed oil, 5 parts turpentine, and 3 parts asphaltum powder to your glass jar jar. ...
Stir the mixture a bit and cover.
it dissolve for 2-3 days. ...
You may still have a bit of asphaltum on the jar's bottom that doesn't dissolve. ...
Test the mixture's thickness. ...
Check your test.
This 6 year old topic also has info on the "mix it yourself at home" recipes including a link to a Japanning Handbook published in 1913.
http://www.classicrotaryphones.com/forum/index.php?topic=11853.0
If this bitumen paint (with some additives, thinning and/or heating) comes close to the original Japanning mixture, that would be easier than finding all the original chemicals and melting them together.
I did find this distinction between bitumen and asphaltum on an artist site: "Asphaltum is pigment melted into turps; Bitumen is pigment ground in oil." Bitumen paint as such must then also have volatile carriers that evaporate leaving the pigment to dry like paint instead of an oil paint on canvas that never fully dries or cures.
I guess that's why to original japanning mixture was created by heating, to melt the asphaltum where bitumen does not melt.
As in the past, this is a very complex area of research using not so nice compounds.
Quote from: TelePlay on October 04, 2020, 10:37:05 AM
..."Asphaltum is pigment melted into turps; Bitumen is pigment ground in oil." Bitumen paint as such must then also have volatile carriers that evaporate leaving the pigment to dry like paint instead of an oil paint on canvas that never fully dries or cures...
This is my experience with the product I use.
Quote from: TelePlay on October 04, 2020, 10:37:05 AM
I did find this distinction between bitumen and asphaltum on an artist site: "Asphaltum is pigment melted into turps; Bitumen is pigment ground in oil."
I think that is artistic license, asphaltum is a naturally occurring solid hydrocarbon bitumen. The more general
bitumen is also naturally occurring but includes much more volatile variants.
Jack
The old recipes contain asphalt/bitumen, a solvent and linseed oil. The latter is often used for painting, as it dries and gives a glossy surface. This "drying" is more a polymerization, the oil molecules oxidize when exposed to the air and turn into a solid coating.
The paint will "dry" by the evaporation of the turpentine, leaving behind more or less solid asphalt, and by the polymerization of the linseed oil.
The original poster of this thread suggested to combine a building bitumen product and varnish - the idea behind it seems to be the same, and the result obtained wasn't too bad!
I hoped the "MIPA Bitumen-Lack" I accidentally found would be a ready-to-use compound acting in the same way.
After the earlier trials on small parts I now did a piece of steel plate. I failed to clean the sanding dust properly, please ignore the spots in the paint. Otherwise I like the result, one layer of the paint covers the metal well and has a good but not excessive "deep" gloss. The paint is not runny, dries within 2 hours and is easy to work with - I guess all these properties made it the favorite of any hardware manufacturer before synthetic resin lacquers appeared.
The trial has cured for 24 hours now and can be handled normally without leaving fingerprints or a sticky feeling. I went ahead and wiped over it with an acetone drenched rag. As expected, this will lift off some paint, as it also does on the old phone's original coating to a somewhat lesser degree. Baking the paint or simply a longer curing time might help here.
At the moment I do not have much spare time so the actual restoration of the OB05 will happen later. But I think the product I tried is acceptable to be used on them.
I hope the product is not a discontinued item, as I can't find it on the MIPA homepage ?!
Thanks for the progress update. Would you add a photo of the rear of can showing the list of contents?
In a hardware store today they had Black Jack, so I bought a can. I won't be joining you in experimenting for some time but I thought I would get it meantime anyhow.
Screenshot of front of can and content list (from rear) below:
side note regarding linseed oil and oil based paint.
My father decided to use linseed oil on the handles of his garden tools. He had a bit of leftover green oil-based paint. and decided to use that with linseed oil.
the paint never dried, we wrapped the handles in tape so you could use them without getting a green hand.
10 years later it was still tacky. It became a family joke .
Jim
From my experience I can confirm that mixing different types of paint does not always give the expected result :o
Linseed oil comes in different grades, raw oil dries slowly or never, or it may be treated to dry quicker, and drying agents may be added, often lead compounds in the old recipes.
The rear side of the can is more or less an extract from this PDF:
https://shop.farbenmorscher.at/pcsartikelobjekte/tm/tm_MIPA_Bitumenlack.pdf (https://shop.farbenmorscher.at/pcsartikelobjekte/tm/tm_MIPA_Bitumenlack.pdf)
Contents: "Special Bitumen, aliphatic hydrocarbons".
Seems to speak against my thesis about drying/curing/lacquer-like components being involved...
Quote from: countryman on October 06, 2020, 06:54:15 AM
The rear side of the can is more or less an extract from this PDF:
https://shop.farbenmorscher.at/pcsartikelobjekte/tm/tm_MIPA_Bitumenlack.pdf (https://shop.farbenmorscher.at/pcsartikelobjekte/tm/tm_MIPA_Bitumenlack.pdf)
Contents: "Special Bitumen, aliphatic hydrocarbons".
Teleplay, may I ask for your analysis/thoughts please. This is a bit beyond me.
We have mipa with 'special bitumen' (?) and 'aliphatic hydrocarbons' (??) and then bitumen and white spirit listed as the contents of Black Jack.
If you asked me, my guess would be it's the same.
Thanks for bringing this subject back into trial countryman, and thanks for sharing your projects.
All very interesting. :)
I now tried the bitumen paint to touch up chipped antique paint.
The condition of the old paint was not awful enough to strip it and repaint, but I tried to preserve the patina. I dabbed on the bitumen paint with a small brush on the damaged areas and let it cure for 45 minutes or so. It did not feel very sticky after this time, but still soft. I gently polished the object with a rag moistened with denatured alcohol. This took away much of the visible lines between old and new paint.