Playing Heavy Metal

Signs of Gold’s Francis Lestingi adorns a tombstone.

This adventure began when Janney, Montgomery & Scott, a Philadelphia-based investment firm, acquired an old safe that was built circa the 1890s. The safe was intact, though it was a little worse for wear — the paint had chipped from most of the surface, which had become rusted and pitted.

Though I was working with heavy metal, the only "rock and roll" on this job entailed maneuvering the safe onto its sides or top, depending on which side I was working on at a given time. Standing 3 ft. tall and measuring 2 ft. sq., the safe had concrete-filled walls, which made this a physically demanding task.

Tuning the instrument

I began the project by outsourcing the safe’s media blasting to Stoudt Media Blasting (West Chester, PA). This process is similar to sandblasting, but employs a milder, plastic abrasive that removes only the paint. Next, they used a slightly more aggressive mixture, comprising plastic media, coal slag and aluminum oxide, to remove the surface rust.

After removing the door, we masked the interior with 3M