Over the last year I got sidetracked and have tumbled down a rabbit hole! I have steered myself into tool restoration. Not to display, primarily to use. Once or twice i have restored a tool simply to display. Most notably I poured hours of research into a late 1940's 14 Craftsman Streamline pipe wrench. Very unique design and the only one of its design ever made and sold for only 3-4 years by Sears. Sears actually ensured no one else would ever produce exactly the same wrench by somehow making sure it cannot be found in a patent search! I would not call it rare because it shows up routinely on eBay. That said I have yet to find one cheap.
While eye catching in design, I believe it would be lousy in hard use. There are clearly weaknesses in its design which may account for it only being sold for a couple of years.
Several restorer/wall hanger collector guys have You Tube videos showing them restoring these wrenches. Primarily most restorations of these wrenches are left as bare steel with no paint which is very tempting to do once the rust and nasty has been removed.
I chose instead to research the colors these wrenches wore when new. Once I determined that I closely duplcated the color scheme of a dark navy blue and highlighted the cast letters in a close match to John Deere yellow using a paint pen. My only deviation was cold blueing the movable jaw.
It came out stunning. A coworker that is big into 3d printing made me a stand made in the reverse color scheme of the wrench. The stand is a yellow that matches the color of the words on the wrench. In the base a title block matches the blue color of the wrench.
Ya, odd, I know. But I like it and it sits on a windowsill at work. BTW, I bought it as a rusted hulk and paid $3 for it.
Other oddities I have found and restored include a babbit scraper. I didn't even know what it was when I bought it for a quarter. I have many restoration projects ahead of me now, among them a number of hammers, hatchets,axes, and a few sledge hammers as well.
Like I said before, I mainly restore tools for use, if not by me, then someone else. Virtually all of them start out rusty, cracked handles etc. All cheap and only quality tools. I dont waste time on import stuff.
Anyway, at least I am routinely back to tinkering in my shop which is a good thing.