Oxidation from winter storage?

grubsie · Post by **grubsie** » Wed May 28, 2014 5:28 am

Just uncovered my restored 1963 CA95 from it's winter storage and noticed oxidation on some of the parts. It almost looked like cloudy white salt stains. It cleans up easily enough though.
The parts were things like the carburetor, real wheel spacers, rear brake rod, brake stabilizer and brake arm. Same goes for the front brake stabilizer and brake arm. Also the throttle and horn/light switch and the clutch and brake clamps. (Not the levers) I am sure I will find more when I dig in deeper.

How do I prevent this in the future?

Sam Green · Post by **Sam Green** » Thu May 29, 2014 3:00 am

living where you do, I doubt you can stop it.
I had it after every winter until I moved my workshop indoors.

Sam.

rhodemon · Post by **rhodemon** » Thu May 29, 2014 4:26 am

I give my Benlys a good spray w WD40 before putting them away in the fall. That will protect the aluminum and chrome, and also protect the paint. The WD40 evaporates over the winter, and then I clean and wax the paint and chrome in the spring, and everything is ready for another season of riding.

grubsie · Post by **grubsie** » Thu May 29, 2014 6:52 am

Thanks for the tip with WD40. I thought about using it but wasn't sue if was safe for the paint. This was the first bike I painted myself and took such care to get it right that I was afraid to take any chances. Maybe I will spray a little on test piece that I painted before painting the bike to be safe.

frappy · Post by **frappy** » Fri May 30, 2014 12:21 am

Another product that acts like WD40 is Gibbs penetrating oil (see eBay or Amazon). A friend restored his mid-60's Lambretta bodywork "hot rod style" to raw metal and 5 years later (with garage storage and no rain riding) there was no sign of rust. The Gibbs product also claims to be friendly to metal if you ever wanted to repaint - can't say that about WD40!