Help - What do I do with it now?

Photos of my pump. The round thing is a ball that should be loose but gets stuck.


I can't seem to find the other photos.

So I took off the extra rubber piece (1), took it apart at (2) which left an empty tube and a handle,
tried to rotate and unscrew the tube at (3) and after removing (4)(with no gasket) I could see into the outer tube and see that the inner tube had a small brass stop and a hole near the bottom.  Couldn't see anything else.

I decided to shine it up, since I didn't know what else to do with it.
In the meantime my husband wandered down to see what I was up too.  He offered up the simple solution of sticking it
in a bucket of water to see if it worked.   Wow, hadn't thought of that.  So I did.

Hand pump cleaned up by Corvett crzy, on Flickr


And it worked perfectly.

While shining it up I remembered that I had read the best way to clean chrome is with aluminum foil so I tried it.
It looks like bits of the foil might fill in some of the pitting (the brass coloring goes away some) but as soon as you wipe it off with something it comes out.  I'm wondering if anyone has done this before and if there's a way to keep the "filling" in the pits.  Possibly to carefully spray a clear coat on it or something like that?  Has anyone else tried this or do you have other methods to "pretty up" pitted chrome.  Other than re-chroming, obviously.

0405171601a by Corvett crzy, on Flickr

Pitted Chrome by Corvett crzy, on Flickr

I didn't take a very good picture after I used the foil, before I wiped it off again.

Thanks for any suggestions.

I'm wondering if I should give it a coat of clear "paint" to keep it from pitting worse?
Maybe the right answer is to just leave it alone and use it as is. It really doesn't look that bad
to me, I just don't want it to deteriorate further.

I was so proud of my plumbing, yeh I know it's pretty crude but it worked, the hand pump worked properly and after a few pumps walaaa, water at the sink........    Fast forward, hubby disconnected the water line to the city hook up (winter) before a camping trip and forgot about it = flooded the trailer.  So he decided to "upgrade" my system.

Sat by Corvett crzy, on Flickr

His system - yeh it looks prettier - BUT - now my hand pump doesn't work?
He removed the pex fitting I had and put in a brass "compression" fitting?  I don't know what that is but I'm wondering
if it's causing an air leak or something.  There doesn't appear to be any water leaking out.
He says he tested the hand pump in a bucket and it pumped water fine, says if he takes the spout off and primes it, it will pump water until you stop and it loses prime.  Said he didn't like the pex fitting and that it "fell apart".


Improved by Jim by Corvett crzy, on Flickr


Does anyone have any ideas, suggestions?  Hoping it's something simple we're overlooking.

Big Thanks to @alaska Shasta for the pump tutorial, our next step would be to rebuild it and your tutorial takes
all my fear away!!  I think it's even the same pump!!