1895 German Book Press Alexanderwerk Restoration

In this video I m going to restore a very rusty, broken and completely stuck antique german book press. After a bit of research I was able to find out that this book press was made by Alexanderwerk in 1895. The disassembly was quite tough. All the threads have been very rusty and only got loose with a lot of heat and penetrating oil. The feet and top plate had rivet connections. Removing the heads of the rivet wasn t enough to get them loose, I had to drill them completely out. I ve soaked all the threaded parts in rust remover and sandblasted the remaining parts to get rid of all the rust. The holes of the feet and top plate have not been very accurate at all, for that reason I decided to close them all with welding and remake them all. I also milled and filed all five feet clean, parallel and to the same height. I ve polished all the parts that won t get painted and nickel plated them for rust protection. I applied bluing liquid on all the other parts, maily to have rust protection where the paint doesn t c