How the Union Metal Elixir Rust Preventative came to be

When Robert Porter of Union Mfg. Co. asked me if I thought I could develop a completely novel rust preventative solution for new and antique tools - designed with the user not collector in mind - I thought “sure, this should be fun”. I started thinking about what we as woodworkers really need in a rust preventative product. In my opinion it should not leave a sticky film or residue, it should be completely safe for finishes on handtools and it won’t show up as a blemish when finishing, even if some rubbed off a tool onto a ready for finish surface. I decided I would not be happy with anything that did not check these boxes, along with working at a bare minimum as well as the other commonly used rust preventatives.

There isn’t really a product out there that checks all these boxes, so I needed to get very creative. After doing some thinking I decided that I wanted to target antique tools more than the vast number of new tools. Grey Iron and O1 Tool Steel are both porous which would give a rust preventative a bit of a handle to stick to. It also makes these tools susceptible to rust because the water in the air gets trapped in the pores, allowing for oxidation of the iron leading to rust.

My idea was to find a way to get an extremely good natural rust preventative into those pores to stop the rusting all together. I chose beeswax because when dry it forms a completely solid film that air can’t even penetrate. At this point I had my major rust preventative substance, but I needed a vehicle to deliver it in such a fine amount that it would penetrate the microscopic pores of the metal. This is where I had to become inventive. At the time I was working with a liquid that was half as thin as water, designed to spread oils and waxes in ultra-thin layers. This chemical also had some super cool properties - even though it was a big polymer, it was cyclic. That gave it its best property which was a low enough vapor pressure that it will evaporate in small quantities. This means it will evaporate off a surface when spread thin which is fantastic for a wood worker because we all know some products can leave a blemish if left on a finish ready surface. So, using some formulation techniques and adding a plant derived oil, I was eventually able to formulate malleable wax beads as a micro-emulsion, ready to spray onto a tool.

I quickly realized that I had struck gold. Now I was ready to do some more rigorous testing on actual tools to see how it performs in real world conditions. I used it on a couple of planes in my collection to test how well it worked on a shelved plane. I also applied it on all my users. My user planes get handled almost every day so LOTS of fingerprints to initiate rust. The results were very surprising. In the spring in Indiana, my shop temperature can fluctuate by 30 degrees in a day and the humidity hovers around 70-80%. Basically, the perfect recipe for rust. None of the tools that I applied my new preventative on showed even a slight inclination of rust after 2 months whereas my control collection plane that was treated with a commonly used product was…well, not in a happy state. It has now been about 2 years since my initial testing and the planes in my collection have had zero rust emerge with no reapplication. I have only had to reapply it to my users two times.

About Chase, the author of this blog:

I have always been drawn to old tools, especially wood working tools. As a kid I would go to tractor shows with my father, grandfather, and great uncle. I loved looking at all the old equipment and was fascinated by the old tools. After I settled into my home with my wife, I had this bright idea that if I learned to build really nice furniture with these old tools it would give me an excuse to buy the old tools I had always been interested in. Luckily, I have an amazing spouse who was more than willing to buy into this idea. 6 years later I have built some very nice furniture for our home and continue to do so. The other thing that happened in that time was I caught the plane collecting bug. I became extremely interested in Union, especially the X plane. This interest introduced me to my good friend Robert Porter of Union Mfg Co.

My background and training is in synthetic organic chemistry. I did this for close to 10 years. Then my department got laid off, which happens a lot in the world of discovery chemistry. When I was notified that I was going to lose my job, I hit the job market. I took the first decent job that popped up which was a formulations scientist position for a soap and hair care company. I learned a lot in the few years I was there. During that stint in my career was when Robert asked me to come up with a rust preventative. This was very cool because I was able to combine my passion for chemistry and for old tools to help the tool community. I feel like the deviation from discovery chemistry into the formulation business was a good thing in that it taught me the skills to be able to invent something like the elixir, but it also reminded me how much I like discovery chemistry and creating medicine to help people. I am now back in the pharma business developing RNA medicines to cure diseases that as of right now have no cure.