A little bit of history first

In Australia around the 1880’s – 1920’s a company called “Hetherton” manufactured and supplied some of the best Wrought Iron Palisade fences and gates as can be seen here stamped with their name and crown.

This photo was taken from a pair of gates we repaired and automated for Sydney University.

You will probably find this stamp on your palisade fence on the horizontal rails somewhere in between the vertical round bars.

Types of Palisade fences we supply and repair

Double Row of Spear Heads with every single vertical bar drilled and set into sandstone block. This is the Rolls Royce of fences

Single Row of Spear Heads with a bottom rail attached 4x places to hob wall. This is a more cost effective way of Palisade fencing

Types of Spear Heads

Below are some of the Spear Heads we have.

The spear Head number can be found if you  hover your mouse over the picture

If you have a balcony with cast iron panels and you are thinking of giving it a much needed makeover then you should be thinking of stripping off the old 10 or so layers of paint that have been applied to the panels over the years by the previous owners. We are talking of 90yrs and over here.

There are a few options that you can use, it all depends on how much time and effort you want to put into it.
Use Paint Stripper, (preferably a water washable one to neutralise the stripper before undercoating). A wire brush, wire wool coarse grade, rubber gloves, safty glasses, paint scraper, sand paper and a dust mask for the sanding because of the lead based paints on the panels. Once cleaned paint with a good quality zinc phosphate primer 2 coats ("Galmet") then 2 top coats of oil based paint. Please note that it is important to undercoat thoroughly because the cast iron will bleed rust stains through the top coat if not undercoated liberally.
But the best way would be to remove the panels and "Shot Blast" them.