Nicely resilient.

guitarmasta12 wrote:

What do you suggest to restore the shine to the metal?

Very nice machine, the Corona 3 are definitely worth saving; they have a lot of charisma.

For what I've seen, the patina on old mechanical elements (typewriters included) is mainly made of grit, grease and dust, so it can be removed by washing and polishing the part.

With "Dali" I went completely overboard; I dismantled her completely and bathed all the parts in white spirits, brushed them with a toothbrush, and then washed them again. But this was necessary because all the mechanism was completely stuck; this machine had a broken drawstring and it looked like it had been stored in a closet (or perhaps used as a door stop!) for decades.

If you don't plan to dismantle your machine completely, you could use a solution of hot water and dishwasher soap, and scrub the parts with a brush. Rinse thoroughly and, while still wet, polish a bit with a cloth. Just make sure to let everything dry perfectly and then add a bit of oil to the mechanism.

 

I would assume that's age discoloration. I'm not sure about the Corona 3, but in my Remington 12 the keys were originally covered by what looked like a clear celluloid cover. It became brittle with age, and the keys whose cover was cracked yellowed more than the other, less used keytops. Maybe your machine was exposed to sunlight for a long time.

As far as I know, in the Corona 3 the key inserts are made of paper, sandwiched between the metal base and the clear cover, and held in place by the nickeled ring. You might be able to make new clear inserts using some sort of clear, rigid plastic.

Perhaps. I have two Corona 3 in my collection (plus a third parts machine that I cannibalized when restoring Dali) and they all have the yellowish-white keytops as seen on this example. The oldest is from 1914; the newest (the parts machine) was from the 1920s. I've never seen a typewriter with orange inserts on the keyboard; but I've seen machines with vibrant dark green inserts with white lettering on them, so maybe some machines did have orange keys.

I guess the only way to know for sure would be removing the ring and cover from one of the keys and see if the orange-yellow tint is in the clear celluloid or if that's the color of the paper insert below it. But judging how the lettering on the black CAPS and FIG keys also looks orange-ish, and that not all the keys have the same shade of orange (letters R and L look almost the same color as my typewriter's keyboard), I would think the clear covers yellowed over time.

Last edited by MikeChavez (09-8-2014 18:45:07)