Cleaning Contaminated Equipment

[luke1990]

I think I may have made a costly mistake. I have been trying to get better at finishing and have been taking some old cheap silver jewellery scratching them up then bringing them to a mirror shine. I must have done this hundreds of times last week and I was getting pleased with the results and the speed I was doing it.

Then I messed up. I thought I would have a go at oxidising with platinol. I did a set of pieces and cleaned the excess of with the radial wheels I use for polishing. They looked great and I left it for the night. The next day I received some resistance wax in the post. So I thought I would start again and scuff them up and bring them back to a mirror shine. I noticed this time when I polished them the shine wasn’t so bright. Almost like they had a cloudy effect. I tried the resistance wax to see if it would improve it and it just made it more noticeable.

In my effort to try and make them look as good as before I think I may have spread menzerna compounds on the radial wheels. When I polish pieces now they get dirty and don’t ever get a lustre. I then had a look online and I have come to realise I never neutralised the platinol! I think I am essentially tarnishing the pieces as I polish with a mixture of compounds & platinol on the radial wheels.

I have tried washing all my radial wheels in bi-carbonate soda but it doesn’t seem to make any difference. The wheels I use are the large habras ones by 3M. They end up being around £20 each and I could of potentially screwed up 5 of the types as well as a few polishing mops.

Learnt my lesson and realise that less haste more speed is what I should be aiming for. However Is there any way I can salvage any of the contaminated equipment?

Thanks

[Dennis]

Well Luke,
The first thing to learn from this is to use separate mops and brushes for compounds and to avoid transferring compounds to your radial wheels. They should be used dry and on clean metal.

If you think they are now contaminated, try cleaning them with a really hot and strong solution of soda crystals. Keep them in there for about five minutes, rinse and dry and then test them on some scrap silver.

Soda crystals are available in hardware shops and supermarkets an are stronger in effect than bicarbonate.

Renaissance wax is an expensive wax polish beloved of those who are seduced by fancy names. Its effect on darkened metal is to give it an attractive wet look, but this can be achieved with any household wax polish.

Removal of Platinol is difficult, because it tends to linger in crevices and recesses. So the best option is to reheat the piece without melting it and dropping it into pickle. The heating should also remove any polish. Dennis

[luke1990]

I didn't clean the metal before moving onto the next polishing compounds. That will never happen again.

Ah I didn't realise that. I had looked on youtube and on here and resistance wax has popped up a few times. I assumed it was best for keeping the jewellery shiny after oxidization.

I'll try out you advice. Thank you.