DIY: How to clean up Bakelite

Todays post might be considered as a real no-brainer. The process is really simple and straight forward.

I'm going to show you an easy and quick way to clean up some bakelite parts, in this case a throttle handle, and some choke and mixture knobs.

Here are some pictures of the parts in question

As you probably see, the parts are cluttered with years of oil and dirt, and are overall just disgusting.

Here is what I used to clean them up

A dishwashing brush, a rough sponge and a couple of toothpicks, plus regular dishwashing soap.

Just clean them as you usually would, scrub the parts with the sponge and the brush until they are clean. Scrape the hard to reach-spots with the toothpicks. Dry them off, and you're ready to re-install the parts.

Here are the same parts after the cleanup. Note, you can not make them all white again, since the years in the sunlight (and oil contamination) has made them yellow. But they do look much better, don't they?