I bought a Primus No. 01 S:or to take care of its baby brother a No.00. It was tarnished and I could see it had scratches in the tank that looked like someone cleaned it with fine steel wool. I cleaned it with Never Dull and then tried some 1500 grit sandpaper which helped, but I might have to drop down to 800 to take out the biggest scratches and then work up to 2000 grit or remove the top and put as much of it a possible to the cloth wheel. Any other Ideas? It won't be a showpiece, I'd like to take it Canoe Tripping without all the scratches.
It looks like a 30's-50's but you should look for the year stamp, most likely to be a circle mid bottom of tank with 1-2 letters and 1-2 numbers were the letters is the timestamp. https://classiccampstoves.com/threads/primus-dating-chart-1911-1964.11464/
On brass, I use 0000 steel wool with Mother's Mag and aluminum polish. After that, there will be micro fine scratches, but these are then easily removed by switching to just a soft cloth with Mother's. Even though you have very fine sandpaper, I would stay away from that except for maybe trying on a deep scratch. I suspect the sandpaper will just leave a dull finish like in your first picture.
I think Hz is instead of the former number code, seen it before on Primus of that period - seems to be a code for final check but there are no known evidence.
Here in Sweden we have a brand of steel wool named Swinto that include soap. It is used with hot water. The soap lower the friction and that leave not to much marks. The steel wool remove stains of different things like paint, old residue of food or fuel and other things. After the steel wool you can use Autosol to polish your stove. I should never use sandpaper because it leave more marks than steel wool. Personally I have stopped polishing stoves. They darken very quickly and you only polish away brass. I only want them to look good with the old patina but without stains that not belong there. Michael
