Are those sratches or just some sort residue streaks? HELP WITH FINAL POLISH PLEASE!

I know this may be duff question but I gave up now! My silver is never "mirror" polished no matter what I do. I start polishing with emery papers, tripoli, rouge or blue and then white luxi polishing compounds. I clean all pieces between switching to finer compound in hot water and washing up liquid. After I am done I place silver in ultrasonic cleaner, but pieces have some kind of streaks (?) everywhere? I know that last step should be steam cleaning (I wish I had a steamer) but tried boiling my jewellery and still nothing. I think after I ended up with even more scratches than when I have started :(

My question is... Are this some king of streaks or just scratches? What am I doing wrong?

It's really hard to capture those streaks on photo as can bee seen only at some angle. How is the jewellery bougt on high street so perfect?
Alex


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From what I've read on here barrel tumbling but to be honest I'm learning as i go myself

Just had a thought do you use a dremel type set up with a split mandrel to emery paper it? I noticed that when I did it left a weird uneven looking surface, I have brass brushed it after and it looked more uniform but am yet to final polish so I don't know if I will have the same problem

I have barrel and I am no fan of it. At least not for a large flat pieces. Maybe I am doing it wrong too ;)

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Originally Posted by Alexa

I have barrel and I am no fan of it. At least not for a large flat pieces. Maybe I am doing it wrong too ;)

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Does it need a new home?? lol

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Originally Posted by Truffle & Podge

Does it need a new home?? lol

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Haha! Didn't think about that as yet but I might... ;) Will let you know first if it will look for new home.

Nice one! Cheers :D

I might not be able to help much with the problem, but I can answer the question about the high street stuff - pretty much all of it is silver plated over sterling. It lets the mass producers get away with far less finishing and gives a very perfect look (for a while anyway).

I use a magnetic polisher as one of my early stages in finishing, and find it gives me a much cleaner surface (slightly matte) to polish.

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Originally Posted by mizgeorge

I might not be able to help much with the problem, but I can answer the question about the high street stuff - pretty much all of it is silver plated over sterling. It lets the mass producers get away with far less finishing and gives a very perfect look (for a while anyway).

I use a magnetic polisher as one of my early stages in finishing, and find it gives me a much cleaner surface (slightly matte) to polish.

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ooh magnetic polisher, what's that?

Thanks George for solving mystery of High Street jewellery at least :) So there may be nothing wrong I'm doing cause I can't think of anything else could be done (beside plating now).
What shot/compound are you using in you magnetic polisher?