I presume the main culprit are the oils from the hands of the operator.

If this section of the Curta was removed and soaked in a detergent solution is this likely to help restore the original colour or not?

Is it actually going to harm the crackle paint finish?

Has anyone ever stripped the paint off completely and resprayed one or is that sacrilege?

Not a sacrilege... but you have to do a difficult job.

Here is a sample (unknown "artist" - and not in my collection...)



Next week I will try some tests to remove the color from an old collar of a Curta Type II... (I recently bought some collars as spare parts at eBay...)

That looks really nice. I wonder how long that took to complete.

I have actually bought a Type II from ebay and am currently awaiting its arrival. I am very VERY excited.

I will be interested to hear your results on cleaning.

Cleaning the grey - mostly discolored painting - is nearly impossible. The brown-greenish patina stays.

But it's possible to remove the grey color. I used a nitro thinner - the collar was in a bath for three hours, then the color was easy to remove.





One collar was blank aluminium (the right one) and the other was anodized in a gray color.

So if you decide to remove the color of the whole Curta housing be aware for some surprises.

Thank you for your observations.

I don't think that will be the first task then.