Do you know this?

[Edgar Estrada]

I read in other forum about a product that was made for antic conservation: Renaissance Wax (Ren Wax). According to the information it can be used in any kind of surface. Could you tell me if you know about it? Have you used it on your KM badges? Can it be used on iron Crosses and Spanges? Is it okay to use it on helmets? I do not have a big collection but I would like to give the best care to my small one (one KM helmet, one Km dagger, two iron crosses and five Km badges). Please any comment will be of a lot of help.

Kind regards,

Edgar

[g_deploige]

I know that the Royal Army Museum in Brussels http://www.klm-mra.be use this sort of wax to conservate fire arms, blanck wapons and armory

[Paul L Murphy]

It is often used by collectors of ancient coins to preserve ancient bronze coins. Pure beeswax will also work.

[yank44]

The US Air Force museum also recommends it for use on leather items.

Edited October 23, 2006 by yank44

[peter monahan]

The US Air Force museum also recommends it for use on leather items.

Here's the distyilled wisdom of the extensive course - 3 Whole Days - I took last year from the Ontario Museum Association: never pt anything onto an artifact you don't know you can take off. That's capital "N" "Never" !

Pure beeswax is 1st choice: almost chemically inert, protects, comes off, etc. NO neatsfoot oil on leather!!! (U can't put the natural oil back into leather any more than you can make seasoned wood into green timber again by adding water. All you get is hard oily leather. Again, beeswax is the key and I'll bet if you check the 100 Euro a bottle "museum stuff" you'll find it's mostly beeswax with enoguh of something else to justify slapping a brand name on it.

My "quarter"'s worth.

[yank44]

Just to make you feel better about Renaissance Wax... it is not a natural wax, but created in a lab of microcrystalline fossil-origin products. This means there will be no acid created through hydrolysis or oxidation such as in beeswax or other natural waxes.

It is used by:

UK: British Museum, Victoria & Albert Museum. Royal Armories (Tower of London , London & Leeds, National Army Museum, Imperial War Museum, the Wallace Collection, H.M. the Queen's Royal Armorer (at Marlborough House), the Guards Museum (Wellington Barracks), the Gurkha Museum (Winchester), the Military Museums at Aldershot, Royal Green Jackets Regimental Museum, the Gunsmith at Chatham Historic Dockyard (Kent), the Johnny Armstrong Gallery, and Museum of Border Arms & Armor (Scotland), National Museum of Antiquities of

Scotland. Belgium: Musee Royal de l'Armee et d'Histoire Militaire-Brussels.

USA: Gunsmith at Colonial Williamsburg, The Smithsonian, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Academy of Art-Honolulu, Texarcana College-Bladesmithing & Metallurgy, Rockfeller Restorations, Colonial Williamsburg Conservatory, Abraham Lincoln Residence, Vicksburg Military Park and Museum, Henry Food Museum, Academy of Arts, Metropolitan Museum of Art, NRA Museum, Rockefeller Restorations, Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, Hilton Hotels, BYU Museum of Art, National Ornamental Metals Museum, and more.

I think if these experts feel comfortable using Rennaissance Wax, then you can too.

[KeithB]

Renaissance Wax is great. I use it on nearly everything I own. The one caveat is that it has a really, really strong smell. It doesn't bother me and I would neither describe it as unpleasant or pleasant, but my wife gets headaches every time I pull it out so I have to use it when she?s not home. Just something to think about.

[peter monahan]

I stand corrected, gentlemen! Sounds as if Renwax is great stuff! "Chemically pure" is good! See below.

It occurred to me after I wrote re beeswax that it probably has trace elements of pollen init and in some distant future an eager archaeologist will find 21st century pollen traces on 19th century military artifacts and construct all manner of fantastic theories!