I used vinegar and a ball of aluminum foil to clean a pretty badly rusted Tandy 1000RL chassis. Seemed to work fairly well, needed a little wipedown/cleanup afterwards but looks 10x better.

Consider it as Styling.

http://s251.photobucket.com/user/Simonsaysbak … gge078.jpg.html

The only way to save rusty cases is to clean the affected areas and apply some paint or coating but for the worst cases it is best to clean down to the bare metal then repaint. Don't forget the primer if painting cases, as for colors that is up to you. Some people do the same to the plastics are bad or just want a different color.

For light surface rust you can't go wrong with keenerb's suggestion of acid and rubbing with aluminum foil - the cool thing about it is that the aluminum is abrasive enough to remove oxide but not so much as to attack the plating or other features. Another suggestion of mine for light rust (especially on expansion card brackets) is to rub with a green sponge commonly used for scrubbing pots and pans, same deal as with the Al foil but it can end up stripping the plating/paint off if you get too carried away. Here's a sample of the sponge method:

For anything worse you might have to resort to sanding & painting, like I did with the back of this AT case:

i simply polished the rusted place and applied nail varnish.

Recycle. 😀

Here is what I got. it Doesn't wrap around the back much but does wrap around the sides. I might try the green sponge that 133Mhz suggested.

you can also try sand blasting with plastic pellets, its fairly gentle and quite effective

I have the perfect picture set for you , of what I did to a rusty packard bell case.

SAND THE RUST WITH SOME HEAVY GRIT SANDPAPER

PAINT WITH PRIMER (I chose automotive grey)

Since you don't seem to want to tackle this at the professional level, i.e.: sand, primer, paint, then why not just get a can of Rustoleum, mask what you don't want painted, off then bomb it. Like you said, it doesn't show.

Thanks everyone for their suggestions! That automotive grey looks exactly what I am looking for I think. I think thats what I'm gonna do. I might not get around to it for a while though. But when I fine time I will post pictures back.