Hi, I have this G1 Bee that's mostly okay except that it has rusted wheels: The rusting is worse on the other side: Is there a way to remove the rust without having to remove the rubber tires? The tires are ok and I'm afraid to remove them because they might crack or tear. What's also the best way to remove rust from such small parts? I'm also thinking of getting arms from a keychain G1 Bee to replace the current ones, and just switch the rubber tires. Would that be a better thing to do than cleaning off the rust? I'd also like to ask if there's a way to tighten the arms, they are rather loose. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance.
Its not just the rust, the chrome is pretty much gone on the wheels, and head too. As far as getting a keychain for parts, you might as well get a better original bee. The keychain molds are a little soft, and not the same quality as the original. You can get a clean vintage one for around $25, on ebay. But if you insist on fixing up this one, you can use WD-40 and a qtip to remove most that rust on the wheels, but you will need to repaint them no matter what. Unfortunately, there is not much you can do about repairing the chrome to its original glory. Chrome paint only looks so good.
Well... If he REALLY wanted to push it... He could try to remove the wheels and send them to chrometechusa.com. They did the chrome on one of my projects, and it's better than some of hasbro's stuff.
This is true, however, by the time he disassembles the figure, ships the parts out, pays for the chrome work and return shipping, purchases a set of reprolables to replace the head sticker, he has spent more time and money than the figure is worth. But if your restoring a rare figure, it might be worth the effort. I remember seeing a Octane restoration using Chromtech, it turned out really well. Found link:http://www.tfw2005.com/boards/transformers-toy-discussion/332308-octane-rechromed.html
Thanks for the replies guys! I'd either clean the rust off with WD-40 or get another G1 Bee for parts, or maybe I can try to have the metal parts chromed locally, I had some Tomica diecast cars chromed before.
two words my friend.....never-dull, you can find it at almost all auto part stores it not only removes the rust it repolishes the metal, i used it on my electric guitars all the time and i use it on my transformers who have metal parts as well