Cleaning an old grimy tap with a wire brush

Something else to keep in mind for future reference: Most people just sharpen the chamfer on the cutting end of a *straight* tap. That's easy -- you do it from the outside, not the inside of the gullets. They'll do that three or four times before going after the gullets.

But I try to sharpen them all the way up, because I do them by hand, and I'd rather keep them very sharp all the way along the edge so I never have much metal to remove.

I thought you guys in CA placed dull tools in a pyramid?

The brushes remove loctite or such. Then the bolts have to be re-certified before being put back in service. These bolts are thousands of dollars each and aren't allowed to be touched by anything steel. They aproched me to find a solution and they loved the method I came up with! I got to talk to some of the engineers that build the Blackhawks and they sent me some pictures and tech specs that were redacted...how cool is THAT!