Restoring Worlds Smallest Lighter - Vintage Lighter Restoration & Repair

This mini lighter in missing some parts and it is in general very dirty and in need of full restoration. The lighter is very small only an inch or 2.5 cm tall. It’s the smallest lighter I’ve ever seen. It used to be nickel plated but the plating has worn off. The plating has to be restored. I also need to make a new screw for the flint because it would be very hard to find one.

I took off all the easy to remove parts and washed the lighter. Then it was put to rust remover. Rust removers basically work similarly to vinegar or other acids so they also work on brass. If you leave parts in there for too long they might dissolve so I usually do something else with brass. This time I thought the cap mechanism might unjam after treating it with rust remover. But it broke. Probably the spring was already so damaged the little acid broke it. Remember that I almost always put my lighter spring in rust remover and this is the first time something has broken. After the rust remover I washed the parts with water again to remove the rust remover. Notice what I did there? Remove the rust remover.

Brass can usually just be polished without sanding, unless there are some major pits in it. Brass is so soft the buffing wheel will wear it down pretty fast. This was the case with the lighter as well. So I polished the parts without sanding. I use a wool wheel with metal polishing compounds.

Then it was tome to make a new screw. I wanted it to have sort of knurling for better grip but I don’t have the tools to do “real” knurling. So I came up with a plan. I used a socket to create the knurling. I hammered a piece of brass rod in a socket which had number of “teeth”. The brass is so soft the teeth easily made nice evenly spaced lines to the rod. Then I drilled a hole to the rod. I made a thread on a smaller brass rod. The smaller rod was soldered in the drilled hole. Again my apologies for blocking the screen. I would usually re-film that but I didn’t want to remake the whole screw for couple seconds of footage. After soldering the screw was polished like the other parts.

The polished parts were electroplated with nickel in plating bath. If you want to learn more about this technique. Go check out my tutorial about it on my other channel, Odd Experiments.

Tip: a free way to support my channel is access amazon/ebay to do your regular shopping through these links. I will get a small fee from each product bought on amazon after clicking these links, whether it was the linked product or a different one.

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Tools used in this video :
MINI TORCH: http://rover.ebay.com/rover/1/711-53200-19255-0/1?ff3=4&pub=5575498514&toolid=10001&campid=5338525131&customid=&mpre=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.ebay.com%2Fitm%2FRefill-Butane-Gas-Pencil-Torch-Soldering-Iron-Mini-Welding-Solder-Refillable%2F190813616389%3Fhash%3Ditem2c6d60b905%3Ag%3ASeYAAOSw5wVdl-gS
SCREW DRIVER SET: https://amzn.to/2F3n6kO
RUST REMOVER: https://www.mc-51thebestrustremover.com/?ref=YbUD-0E4NKfV
ROTARY TOOL: https://amzn.to/2WF75I6
PRESS FOR ROTARY TOOL: https://amzn.to/2Uiv1Eu
2-AXIS TABLE FOR THE PRESS https://amzn.to/2WPkttl
POLISHING KIT: https://amzn.to/31w983l
NICKEL ANODE: https://amzn.to/2J62kTy
NICKEL PLATING SOLUTION: https://amzn.to/2oW0qOk
Other tools:
CHUCK NORRIS’ TOOTHBRUSH: https://amzn.to/2YfXUj2
CORDLESS DRILL: https://amzn.to/2Wois77

MY FILMING GEAR:
MAIN CAMERA: https://amzn.to/2JvtKox
MAIN TRIPOD: https://amzn.to/2OlpYgn
MICROPHONE: https://amzn.to/2I80iDz
VIDEO LIGHTS: https://amzn.to/2FpJDaB
MAIN LENS: https://amzn.to/2Fm8yMk
CINEMATIC LENS: https://amzn.to/2TmNdHH
WIDE ANGLE LENS: https://amzn.to/2U7iJha
GOPRO: https://amzn.to/2U3eqU3
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Видео Restoring Worlds Smallest Lighter - Vintage Lighter Restoration & Repair канала Odd Tinkering