Recently I picked up two (300lbs) used, Russ Bassett Co., multi-media filing storage cabinets, as well as one small two drawer filing cabinet.  So far, the process I've come up with is:

1. heavy duty paint and rust stripper.  It's basically painted on & in under 10min, it changes color as it bubbles up - then you scrape with a sharp edged putty knife & it lifts right off.  (oddly - the stuff has a consistency like whipped toothpaste).  Bets to remove all external hardware (knobs, handles, etc) before you start.

2. power dril and sanding gear. I purchased a 2" wire brush cup, a couple 5", padded sadning disk attachemnts for the drill, adhesive back sanding disks (40grit, 100grit, and 200 grit.  Use the wire cup brush on the hard to get spots that tear the sanding pads& any spots the paint stipper didn't get. (note: it's a good idea to follow a repeated pattern in your sanding technique).

3. Three to four cans of high gloss, spray polyurethane clear coat. If you have to break the work up over multiple days, Since rust can start appearing quickly in a humid climate, I found it's a good idea to put a single coat over the area you've worked on and sand it off later when you continue working.  Generally have to sand these pieces several times, with finer grit each time, but rust seems to require deeping sanding each time.  I put multiple thin coats, sprayed in rows & columns to overlap, but very careful not to get anywhere near enought to run. buff down with drill & polishing disk once it's completely dry and repeat till you get a good depth of gloss.

So - I'm sure there's other ways of doing this, but this was what worked for me & produced some great results. Will upload some photos to thinglink.com account today. Hope that's helpful~

Cool! Have you seen the stuff at Twenty Gauge or Sonrisa? Gorgeous stuff. I have a tanker desk sitting in my garage waiting to be refinished -- a double pedestal, with really unique handles. I, too would like to get it down to bare metal. I tried painter stripper, but it didn't work too well on the original enamel finish. You could try an orbital sander, the swirl marks could be an interesting texture. But from what I've found in my research, the best method is sand blasting, then several stages of sanding, followed by a powder coating to protect the metal from rust and corrosion. Good luck with your desk, please post pictures!

I think you mean this link: http://www.retrooffice.com/home.htm