Al-Ko hitches

Heretic

For the first time in 35 years plus, I'm now towing a van with an Al-Ko hitch.  This requires the ball to be clean and not greased.  The ball is now showing signs of rust, what is the recomended procedure for dealing with this, or will the hitch deal with
it itself.  I will admit that as an mechanical engineering design engineer I am not sure I like the Al-Ko coupling idea for snake and pitch control, I preferred the old style spring device (although it did require a bit of a heave to couple up).  However,
time will tell.