Morbier Clock, 'Marciac'. Face and repoussé.

A little time has now been spent on the face and repoussé.
I have been swaying between disassembling the three pieces that form the front of the clock, the face / repoussé / case front. As they all require differing attention.
In the end i decided to just take my time and keep all attached. They are riveted together with small brass pins and i like the idea of keeping this fixing original. The only downside i can see is that i will not be able to clean and repaint the reverse side of the case front. As there is only surface rust evident though and the clock will live in a relatively dry atmosphere i see no real need to split the bits.

The repoussé needed gentle hand bending to return to shape and then face down on a leather sandbag such as engravers use. I gently pushed the dented areas back into place with a few differing wooden sticks. No damage caused and suprisingly easy.

I washed the whole item in warm soapy water and then spent a bit of time on the dial face with window cleaner as a fair bit of the dirt on it was 'set' in place. Patience and gentle perseverance cleaned this up a treat though.
Second stage was to address the century plus accumulation of grease grime soot and staining on the repoussé. I only have household products available and did not fancy playing with ammonia here so out came the tomato ketchup and a total covering was applied to the brass and the whole thing was left overnight.
This was then agitated and scrubbed with a toothbrush and washed off. The front was then left by the log burner for a couple of days to ensure there was no moisture trapped beneath the steel plate.
Out then came the household brass cleaner, in the UK i would have used 'Brasso', here in France it is 'Miror'. This was applied with a vigourous toothbrush and left to dry. I then spent my time brushing it off with toothbrush and flannels and then polished with clean cloths. Where the green dry bits were in the low valleys i routed it out with toothpicks.
All in all i am bery happy. I did not want an as new look as that seems pointless on a clock this age. I did however want it to look good.
I painted the backplate as i did the other case parts.