About three years back I began working on a maille project. Nothing fancy, just a simple shirt. No sleeves, even. I expected to finish in no more than six months, but my progress was put on hold when I was about a quarter done due to a series of deployments that kept me busy for well over a year. I finally finished about a month ago.

Now, this shirt is made of galvanized steel, which darkens as the zinc coating oxidizes, protecting the steel beneath. The portion of my shirt that was finished before I deployed is now looks something like hematite while the rest of the shirt is a brilliant silver. I could play it safe and wait a year or two for the newer portions to darken, but Patrick's recent maille-epic has inspired me to fiddle with the thing instead. :D

Does anyone know of a way to hasten the oxidation process on the newer rings without damaging the rings that are already dark? I have some sacrificial links soaking in vinegar to see if that will work. Has anyone had dealings with this kind of metal? I have no desire to strip the zinc, just to make the whole thing match. Right now it looks really funny. Like it was made by a group of grandmothers at a quilting bee or something. :)

Hi Sam,

You could do what I did when I was back on the Mighty Midway - stick it out on the sponson overnight while at sea. Darkened the shirt I used to have up to a nice, dark patina.

Fair Winds, Shipmate!

Sam You can give it the old roll around in a barrel with sand treatment. The aggitation will polish it. Frequent wearing will do this to as the rings will rub against each other as the body is in motion having a polishing effect. Lloyds idea wins in the ingenuity catagory though. Lloyd whatya think the navy charges these days for an overnight ride to hang a maille shirt?

You had a mail shirt on the Midway? Did you do any MWR demonstrations?
At least the Midway got preserved, although it didn't fight in WWII like the Lexington. I've visited the Lex in Corpus. Really cool.

Brian M

That's a good idea, Lloyd! Some sea spray might be just the thing... so long as I could keep the BMs from painting the shirt haze grey while it was out there. :D

Right now I have several sacrificial rings--both new and shiny and old and dark--sitting in various solutions to see how each works. The first few to come out of the vinegar look great! A cold iron grey color with a shine that could almost qualify as a satin finish. And the old ones have been stripped of their oxidation, so they match the newer ones! The post-vinegar rings are currently sitting in bowls of water (one with sea water, the other with fresh water) to see if the process has made the rings more vulnerable to rust. I wouldn't want to go on deployment and find a pile of iron oxide where my armor used to be. They've been in for about 18 hours now with no apparent ill effect. I'm leaving a few others out in the grass tonight to see if a combination of moisture and air might prove more deadly.

Just as soon as I have enough experimental data to justify risking an entire mail shirt, into the vat it goes. So far I have a good feeling about it. But we're getting underway soon, so I think I'll get some more sacrificial rings and see what sea spray does to them. Not sure yet if I want the hematite-dark patina or the iron grey that comes out of the vinegar bath.

Thanks for the advice!