Hi, Tralyn!
I did get your private message and thank you for reminding me about your thread! I'm sorry that I didn't return to this thread earlier - got sidetracked by a bunch of other ones.
Your blade is quite large, so buffing it out with a brass brush wheel probably isn't feasible for a number of reasons. Don't need to get into the reasons here.
Here's what I would recommend, and it's simple to do. First, use a palm sander of some kind on both surfaces of it using 180 grit abrasive (sand) paper. If the rust is really bad, then using lower grits like 80 and then working up to higher grits will work. If no palm sander is available, then you could try a sanding block of some kind to which you could affix the abrasive paper or hold it in place with your hand. If using a hand sanding block, you could cut the paper to overlap some the sides of the block. A piece of wood cut to fit the size of your hand should work just fine.
You would then sand the rust off. Even if you were to use some kind of gel, that's not going to guarantee that the surfaces are going to be smooth enough for you to paint on them. So, sanding of some kind is going to be necessary anyway.
No matter how you sand, please be sure to use a mask over your nose of some kind.
After the bulk of the rust is removed, then since this saw blade is prone to rusting, you are going to need to be coating it with something in order to prohibit the rust from forming again and also to provide a surface on which paint of any kind can be applied.
So, if you were to put any kind of water-based finish on it, even a water-based primer, there would still be the possibility for rust to form. I would recommend getting something like Deft lacquer in cans and then coating it a few times on both sides. You could set it up on a card table outside on cans to get it up from the surface of the table so that it's not directly on the table when you spray it. A semi-gloss of the lacquer spray should do the trick. I recommend Deft, because I have had so much success with it over a number of decades in the refinishing of brass. I know use a higher solids content of lacquer for the metals that I refinish. But, in order to use them, you have to have a compressor and a spray gun. They are way to thick to be available in spray cans. But, for your purposes, Deft should work just fine! Besides that, the nozzles on the spray cans of Deft are the Cadillac in the industry as far as nozzles on spray cans!
Please be sure to follow all directions and adhere to all the precautions on the cans of lacquer.
From there, the surfaces on it should be smooth, so that any kind of paint can be applied.
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