Cleaning a Gillette Fat Boy

My first razor was the DE89L and a lovely one at that. I found an F2 Fatboy on eBay for a super low buy-it-now price and took a chance. The auction had 1 cruddy picture which is probably why no one snagged it quickly. After I cleaned it up I tested it out and found that I need at least a setting of 4 to get a good shave and more like a 5 to match the EJ.

Mine had the screw off end cap so I was able to easily do a disassembly, soak it all in dish soap and then began scrubbing. I used some metal polish and a tooth brush followed by a rinse and more soap. I then used some high quality auto polish followed by my Wife's jewelry cleaner. I am happy with the results!

Here is the cruddy auction pic..

fatboy1.jpg


and after the cleanup..

fat1.jpg


fat.jpg


fat2.jpg
 
A good thing to do with the vintage adjustables is to give them a good long soak in hot tap water with some washing up liquid added. Allow the water to cool and leave it soaking overnight. Maybe repeat this a few times. You'll be surprised at the amount of crap that will have found its way into the inner workings of these over the years and this is a good way of loosening it up without damaging the razor finish or removing the paint from the numbers.

You could consider having it replated so it looks like new, Dave at safetyrazors.co.uk charged £15 to replate my Fatboy.

Can you let me know how to contact Dave, I have a fat boy in need of a re-plate and don't fancy sending it off to the US.
 
Dave now lives in New Zealand.
Nice guy. Has done some work for me.
Contact details etc...
http://restoredrazors.com/
I have had some replating work done in the USA before I found Dave.
The USA work was absolute crap. The Nickel plating just basically 'fell off'.
Dave rescued a couple of razors for me. Good guy, great service.
Don't be scared about sending your gear to NZ.
We promise to be nice (but won't talk about the cricket!).
 
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