Vintage Bench Capper

My father-in-law recently dug out an old bench capper that used to belong to his grandfather that he's had stored in his crawl space. It's seen better days and is missing the handle but it still works. Before I can really get to cleaning it, he asked that I reach out to the community to find out a little about it. While he has no plans to sell it because of it's sentimental value, he wants to know if it would be worth more with the existing paint job, or if I can strip it and repaint it.

It's heavy like it's cast iron with a hint of green paint still on it. It really needs a good cleaning. Stamped on one side is "G&P GEAR CAPPER" and on the other side is "GREIN & PAHLS CHICAGO".

How should I go about cleaning it? Steel wool to strip it to the base metal and put a new coat of rustoleum on it? I plan on picking up a metal rod to make a new handle.

Here are a couple pictures of it:

Disclaimer : I'm not an appraiser/restorer, so take what I say with a grain of salt.

Usually vintage items aren't better off when people who don't know how to properly restore things "clean them up" as far as market value goes. The right thing to do would be find someone who knows how to properly restore it. Well, get it appraised first, that'll tell you whether you should even bother

That said, if it's just a cool item you are keeping in the family, and you don't care about all that, clean that sucker up and have fun with it. Good item to have on the bar!

You can find them on ebay for about $20.00 or less plus shipping.

http://cgi.ebay.com/Vintage-Antique...tem&pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item335f3cc13a

http://cgi.ebay.com/19-tall-cast-ir...=Antiques_Decorative_Arts&hash=item335f30f927

I got my "Everedy Vintage Capper" off of eBay for $16.50 after shipping. I sandblasted the red paint off of it and painted it a glossy yellow, siliconed an Indigo Imp coaster where the pad used to be.

wyzazz said:

I got my "Everedy Vintage Capper" off of eBay for $16.50 after shipping. I sandblasted the red paint off of it and painted it a glossy yellow, siliconed an Indigo Imp coaster where the pad used to be.

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Sounds nice. You should snap these up off eBay and restore them for a few bucks. What do you think you could sell a restored one for; $75ish?

Looks a lot like the one that my wife picked up for me at a garage sale. I just went over it with some Scotchbrite and WD-40, then wiped it down. Been using it since 2007. Don't know about any dollar value it might have, but it works great.

Thanks for the help everyone! I don't think he's really interested in selling it, just making sure I don't inadvertently destroy any value it may have. From the sounds of it, there really isn't much resale value in it anyways.

I think I am going to clean it up a bit. Even if I don't get a lot of use out of it, I think it could make for a neat display piece! If I ever repaint it, I think I'd bring it back to a nice green.

Any recommendations on how to clean it? I know that sandblasting was mentioned, but I don't have a sand blaster unfortunately. Looks like Scotchbrite was also used to good effect.

Thanks again for the feedback!

JetSmooth said:

Sounds nice. You should snap these up off eBay and restore them for a few bucks. What do you think you could sell a restored one for; $75ish?

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If you're willing to buy my capper for $75ish it's all yours!

I don't even use it all that often, but for what I could buy a Wing Capper for, I decided to go with the Bench Capper.

I bought one off ebay that was very rusty, a little naval jelly & steel wool, it looks real nice. Be careful with the naval jelly, it will burn bare skin.

I would not worry about ruining the value. I don't know of any capper that has any sort of historical or collector value. I found one at a flea market last year and blasted and painted it and gave it to a guy at work who wants to get into brewing. The bell was a bit pitted and wanted to grab onto the cap after capping, but he's a machinist so I figure he would be better to fix it than I, and I think it will capped ok anyway. Well worth the $5 I spent on it. (Plus paint..)

Just FYI - I picked up one of these old cappers from Ebay, and was having a hell of a time with bottles getting stuck in it after capping. Figured out through some help here that there should have been some kind of rubber gasket in the bell....stacked two garden hose washers, tacked them in place with a dab of glue, and it works like a charm. Much more stable and comfortable to use than a wing capper.

Grein and Pahls Capper. I would like to purchase this item. Is there a price that you might take? Thanks...

RIBeer said:

Just FYI - I picked up one of these old cappers from Ebay, and was having a hell of a time with bottles getting stuck in it after capping. Figured out through some help here that there should have been some kind of rubber gasket in the bell....stacked two garden hose washers, tacked them in place with a dab of glue, and it works like a charm. Much more stable and comfortable to use than a wing capper.

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Hmm I'll have to try that....I have a pair that were given to me.

RIBeer said:

Just FYI - I picked up one of these old cappers from Ebay, and was having a hell of a time with bottles getting stuck in it after capping. Figured out through some help here that there should have been some kind of rubber gasket in the bell....stacked two garden hose washers, tacked them in place with a dab of glue, and it works like a charm. Much more stable and comfortable to use than a wing capper.

Click to expand...

Hmm I'll have to try that....I have a pair that were given to me.