We have a bar here that we haven't used in a while, a standard Olympic bar, whose loading area is pretty rusty. It came to us that way and we've never cleaned it up.
Yesterday, we tried to put one set of plates on it that must be a little smaller than some of our others, and had trouble getting the plates on due to rust on the loading area. No work needed on the grip area, just the loading part.
This is bar my wife wants to use, and a specific set of plates my wife also wants to use, so we're not just going to use other plates or another bar. It looks like a pretty good bar, too - not as nasty a knurling as some of my personal favorite bars, but still enough to help with grip, and it's not the kind with bearings you need to tighten periodically.
Poking around, we found a piece of "emery cloth, medium J-WT", and made enough progress to get the plates on. You can see we cleaned it up somewhat towards the collars, since that's where the plates were getting stuck.
I'd like is opinions on what to do to restore this bar to most of its former glory.
I'm imagining that the piece of emory/sandpaper we happened to find might not be ideal, perhaps a wire brush is a better tool, perhaps a certain grade of steel wool? Perhaps we should wipe some WD-40 on the loading area to help with loosening the rust?
Thanks in advance for your suggestions.
-S-
Yesterday, we tried to put one set of plates on it that must be a little smaller than some of our others, and had trouble getting the plates on due to rust on the loading area. No work needed on the grip area, just the loading part.
This is bar my wife wants to use, and a specific set of plates my wife also wants to use, so we're not just going to use other plates or another bar. It looks like a pretty good bar, too - not as nasty a knurling as some of my personal favorite bars, but still enough to help with grip, and it's not the kind with bearings you need to tighten periodically.
Poking around, we found a piece of "emery cloth, medium J-WT", and made enough progress to get the plates on. You can see we cleaned it up somewhat towards the collars, since that's where the plates were getting stuck.
I'd like is opinions on what to do to restore this bar to most of its former glory.
I'm imagining that the piece of emory/sandpaper we happened to find might not be ideal, perhaps a wire brush is a better tool, perhaps a certain grade of steel wool? Perhaps we should wipe some WD-40 on the loading area to help with loosening the rust?
Thanks in advance for your suggestions.
-S-