Clean and paint with POR15 or similar (except for the threads of course)

Yep, after a good soaking.

Thanks!

If you have a nylon abrasive circular brush you can hook up in your drill press, you can use it to knock off any built up material.

Nylon specifically to avoid scratching the shafts Tony?

Remove clevises from rods. Clean all parts by abrasive blasting or wire brush. Mask threads and paint or powder coat. Scratching the shafts is not an issue as there is not sealing on the shafts. The outer rubber boot on the master cylinder is just a dust boot. The rust/pitting that already exists is worse than any scratching you might do in cleaning them up. If you have one of those nylon brushes with embedded abrasives, they work just as well as a wire brush.

My gosh these suckers are good and truly stuck together.... any special tricks here or just PBlaster, heat, dancing in circle backwards if the moon is full on a Tuesday sort of usual approach?

I saw recently that a 50/50 mix of ATF and acetone makes one of the best penetrating oils.

Heat??

I just scrubbed mine with steel wool and Brasso. Still pitted, patina matched the rest of the car. Came apart easy for me though. Not all these are the same length, just in case you get different ones.

Hi Simon - I've had good luck with using heat and FreezeOff in combination to help loosen really stuck bolts. Not sure how much help it will be of here, but works great on mistreated overdrives!

I use the plastic brushes because they don't eat up my finders like metal brushes.

If PB Blaster doesn't loosen them, use heat on 'em.

heat then touch a candle to the threads - wax will wick down and then cold water

My 2 cents: If you have a battery trickle charger, a paint bucket and some bicarbonate of soda,clean them off by electrolysis (details on how can be found on-line with a simple search), wire brush them (they will look black after treating and the wire brush will clean that up)and they will come out great and ready for powder coating/painting!

Yup! Our lad MickeyR posted data on that. It works!

use the electrolytic rust removal trick and the nuts will simply spin off. You won't believe it until you try it. Arm and Hammer Washing Sode available at Krogers or any chain where they keep laundry detergent. Google Electrolytic Rust Removal for more details.

Hi guys - I decided to give the electrolytic process a try and they are cooking away as I write this.

I'm digging the science project part of this - and that I can be doing other things while these are bubbling away.

Thanks for the suggestion guys.

Something happening here...

I put mine in one of those carburetor cleaner solution cans and they cleaned up nicely. A parts cleaner would do the same. Then took a tooth brush to it. I want to think those rods are aluminum and not steel

Mark

Steel from the factory for the normal cars, never heard of anything else.
BillM