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I've had this 21666 for a while now and decided it was time to bring it back to life. No paint job here! Most of the original Japan was intact and in good shape. Several friends have seen my other preservations of original finishes, so I decided it's time for a thread on my methods of preservation. I'm not going to get into how to take apart the fan, how to wire it, blah blah blah. There's a thousand great posts already made on those topics. This is just how to bring that original finish back to life along with a couple other topics thrown in along the way. This will be an on going post until the fan rejoins it's 6 wing brethren in the living room. But today I'll get into cleaning up the finish. Normally I do this with an air buffer, but as it's been cold out, I decided to try out a battery buffer by Ryobi. I like it. It's a bit heavier than an air buffer, with the need for a battery, but works pretty well. And it came with the 3 pads I always use for doing this. I used Meguiar's products on this example, but I've also used Chemical Guy's products with great results. After blowing the fan apart, I clean off any hardened grime with acetone. This works on the older, more durable Japan finishes. I avoid it on later fans. Starting with a wool pad, I start with the cutting compound. This does a great job at stripping light amounts of leftover grime, oxidation, and light scratches. On older Japan, you can get pretty aggressive with a low chance of damaging the finish. Newer paints you need to be cautious with. You can burn through the paint easily. Use a lighter compound, or just jump to the next step (which I usually do). One nice thing I like about the compound is that it strips rust and will leave you with bare metal. Here's the results of the compound: Next I'll load a foam correction pad onto the buffer and go to town with a cleaner wax. This is usually the step I'll start with on later painted fans. It gets rid of oxidation and fine scratches (and get rid of marks from the previous compound). It also works good as a cleaner for light grime. I'll also use the cleaner wax on a Dremel to get down in the vent holes. Getting there! The cleaner wax does leave a wax protective layer behind and it's totally cool to stop here. But I go one step further for added depth to the gloss. Using a soft foam pad, I apply wax. Here I use Meguiar's Black Wax for dark paints, but any good quality wax is acceptable. Buff that wax in and LET IT HAZE. This means let it dry! Go do something else. Go pick out your wire or look for that shrink tube you know you bought last weekend and now can't find... You'll come back to this: Now buff that out with a microfiber and you'll end up with a beautiful original finish that is well protected and easy to keep clean! You can see a spot of paint loss on the side of the housing. Some guys touch this up, I leave it alone. The camera makes it look whiter than it actually is. It's raw cast iron, it's a dark grey. But the main objective here was to bring back a beautiful gloss to totally original paint. You could do all of this by hand, but it'll just take a lot longer. Small parts I typically do by hand. Stay tuned to this thread... You'll see me buff the brass and rivet the wings back on the hub. I'll also show using liquid gun bluing on steel fasteners. I'm in no way calling all of these methods my own or even the best. They are just what I do to achieve the look I like. I've learned some of these methods from other people, reading former postings, and just trying new stuff out to see what the results yield. I just want to show others that my methods aren't difficult and anyone can do it! Edit: Apparently Meguiar's Black Wax has been discontinued. I've got some Chemical Guys Black Light Hybrid Radiant Finish on order as a replacement.