Rejuvenating a 200 year old ships wheel

[tubebender]

I’m told by the maritime museum that the wheel is approximately 200 years old but the previous owner painted it with lead paint and my thoughts are that a ships wheel that old should not have been painted just left in it’s natural state or a timber stain.

my goal is to strip all the paint off back to natural, turn 5 outer legs in the same design as the spokes to support the outside and another larger one to support the centre hub.

when I started to strip the paint off I found that, being lead based, I couldn’t use heat because it melted the lead deeper into the wood grain and a mild paint stripper discoloured the timber so I have just scraped the paint off with the edge of a wood chisel but then when sanding there is still some paint in the grain of the timber and so after all the paint is scraped off I’m going to have a go at sand blasting to see how that works out.

After all this is finished I would like to get a sheet of glass across the top and make a coffee table

[KatieC]

Hi @tubebender,

First, I'd like to welcome you to the Bunnings Workshop community. Thank you for joining us and sharing your incredible restoration of a 200 year old ship's wheel. You'll find that Workshop is full of inspiration and advice - many of which is about woodworking. 

You have done such a great job so far restoring this magnificent piece of history. Was the maritime museum able to identify which ship it belong to? How will you go about restoring the metal? Is it brass? 

Katie

[tubebender]

Hi KatieC, the metal on the wheel I believe is Bronze not sure though, I haven’t had a go at cleaning it but something like Silvo not to abrasive but then once it’s clean I’ve got to find something to keep it that way 

[Jason]

Looking forward to seeing it come together @tubebender. Please keep us updated and don't hesitate to post if you need a hand with anything.

Welcome,

Jason

[tubebender]

Hi Katie I don’t answer your question about, did the maritime museum know what ship it was off, when I first acquired the wheel about 40 years ago I then inquired about it and a chap came out and had a look at it he then told me it was between 150 and 200 years old then  but he couldn’t tell me much more, just recently about 3 months ago I emailed a letter to both the Australian and Queensland maritime museum asking that question, how would I go about finding out what ship it could have come off, so far the Australian haven’t replied and I did receive a phone call from the Queensland museum and the young Lady who called only said that it must have come off a larger vessel maybe a cargo ship because of it size 1 meter 550mm but other than that they weren’t very helpful.

cheers

tubebender

[KatieC]

How interesting that the size could mean it is from a cargo ship @tubebender!

Yes, keep us updated if the Australian Maritime come back to you as well. 

Katie