I wounder if the term 'spit and polish' reflects a dry powder mixed to a paste.

by the way, I was a paratrooper, dont spit shine boots, spit breaks down the wax and it does not 'shine'

I have a very old book of formulas from the late 1800s here some where. I will look up and start a new thread with some of the polishing compounds they have in there

I've been using a silicon cloth to wipe down my Albions - no rust so far. Occasionally, I'll wipe them down with BreakFree.

Speaking of Coji oil I make my own for Cheep

Go to GNC or a similar store where you can buy 2 OZ clove oil, go next door to the drug store or super market and buy 32 oz of light mineral oil.

You can be a lot more precise in measuring but I put a third of the clove oil in 32 oz of mineral oil. total cost is around 15 bucks for 32 OZ of Coji

BreakFree CLP or G96 oils. I have had a Windlass axe and Viking sword and a KC Viking sword for many years under not so constant care that were treated with these and they still look good.

Maybe its just you. I have a similar problem, though being in a dry environment, its not bad, but my skin oil is much more acidic than most people's. So regular handling can be a problem, and a full on session of florishes means a session of scotchbright and oil. And I know its me because wife doesn't have the same problems.

Nothing for it unless you use gloves.

As for what medieval people used, i'd guess various sedimentary rock. Fine sandstones, limestones, etc, have a variety of grains which could easily be used as sanding stones.

I'm in ultra-humid Houston, TX and have 8 Albions (my oldest a pre-owned Landgraf acquired in early 2008, most recent a pre-owned Munich I got in early 2012), all with steel hilt furniture, and have never had a spot of rust. I don't handle them often, but when I have, I've simply wiped them with a clean, soft cloth to remove any skin oil or sweat. I'm guessing it may be more a matter of the overall environment and frequency of use than an inherent issue with the steel.

Was thinking about this thread and I think some buyers do not really bother with doing anything to the hilts. I have bought some pre-owned Albion swords that had pristine blades but the hilts looked as if they had never had any preventive maintenance ever done. Guess some folks like the aged/patina look.

Plus, body chemistry will make a huge difference, I can handle swords and rust blued firearms and not have to wipe them down more than once every four or five times I handle them. My next door neighbour has to hose down every gun he touches with Rem Oil or he will have perfect fingerprints rusted into them.

I agree with climate and body chemistry making a significant difference. I live on the coast of Maine minutes from the ocean; often on an island. So it's very humid with lots of salt air, and as someone who has to clean up a metalsmithing studio at this location I am very familiar with the damage that can happen even just from leaving the windows open in the studio. Then we have this wonderful thing I call "salt fog"...everything in the studio can get coated with a film of rust literally overnight. Makes for a fun morning :\
If this is what was happening to my Albions I would understand the problem, and likewise with the skin oil rust issue. However, my newest Albion is the only one that has the problem of just the pommel rusting, and mostly around where the tang is peened over. It's not from fingerprints, and it's not an even coating from salt air. It could be some variance in the steel alloy being used by the foundry (even just variance within a batch of the same steel and not them changing steel alloys completely) I suppose, or it could be that I am repetitively missing just one area on just the Principe when I oil it (using Ballistol these days though I have used TufCloth and BreakFree CLP as well). I just sanded off the rust and re-oiled everything today, so I will be keeping an eye on it and see how it goes.

It might be my body chemistry. I'm the guy who leaves puddles of sweat behind every station at the gym, I have to carry a towel on me to mop up.

I probably just sweat more than most.

I used to work as a Gunsmith and a product I used for rust prevention was Birchwood Casey "Barricade". It used to be called Sheath, but they changed the name for some reason. You might be able to find it at your local sporting goods store.

Well it might be just a chemical reaction. Differences in the oxidation number, possibly in the steels being different enough alloys or a trace element, causing a reaction at the point of contact, probably in conjuncture with skin oil.

Seen more bizzare oxidations in the lab.

As far as medieval polishing techniques go, I believe the most common was simply a fine sand, coarse burlap, water and elbow grease... the latter being something they had in profusion! Oiling pieces to keep them from rusting is not impossible as a medieval technique, but I think it somewhat more likely that a.) they avoided it by using swords with gloves on-- this was probably a lot more common then than it is now-- and b.) they probably just didn't care too much about a little rust in between polishings. If they really didn't want it to rust, they would have it gilded or silvered.

For my part I've never really had a problem with rust except on one sword, an old Hanwei. The Hanwei/Tinker that hangs right by it is pretty much pristine still. So I think at least in this individual case it's the one piece being somehow 'off'... with the Albions, I suspect it may be individual circumstances (perhaps the room he stores them in is more humid than the rest of the house? perhaps he's got acidic body chemistry? who knows?) rather than the composition of the pommels.

I also use CLP (the commercial name of this is "Breakfree" - available at just about any good gun shop). I'm in the US - Michigan. My swords actually stay in their scabbards (poplar) on my wall.

In a good 6+ years? I have had not ONE spot of rust on blades, guards, pommels, or chapes. This, with a very LIGHT coat of CLP.

Worth noting: with time (couple of weeks), CLP gets "greasy" - it seems to thicken a bit. There is also STILL some debate as to whether or not it should be applied to chemically blued steel... some folks claim that it actually goes after THIS form of oxidation.