Ultrasonic Damanging Jewellery

[Dennis]

Echoes of my comment earlier - I'm more interested in whether the stuff works than what it's made of!

Many of us echo that, but of course it is what motivates us in our small way, and industry in a larger way to pollute the planet. What of the future?

Let our grandchildren and their children deal with insufferable climate change, or emigrate to another planet. Or die in a hostile environment. Dennis

[ps_bond]

Not really; the risks are generally well known and can be managed appropriately. Like not tipping stuff down the sink, for example; using fume & dust extraction where needed and so on.

Mercury's perfectly safe to use with the right kit - I don't have the right kit so I don't use it. Citric acid is often touted as a "safe" pickle; once it is loaded with copper it is toxic and needs to be treated as any other pickle.

[Aurarius]

I'm all for environmentally friendly products, but one problem with them is that often they're only environmentally friendly in a very limited sense; all the tag generally means is that a product has satisfied some minimum environmental manufacturing standard, which manufacturers are generally happy to comply with on the basis that it encourages conscience-driven consumers to choose their product over supposedly environmentally unfriendly alternatives.
These days one of the most prevalent environmentally unfriendly manufacturing practices is using large quantities of precious resources to make products (ultrasonics included) that need to be binned after a year or two because they were never fit for purpose to begin with. Products that last for years and give good service avoid this fault at least.

[Tabby66]

You might think that milk is a fairly harmless product and one that is environmentally safe,......that is unless there is a spillage of a transport lorry for instance and it leaks into a canal/river, the reduced oxygen levels caused because it is readily biodegradable cause deoxygenation.....major fish kill results.......it is about handling and disposing of products used in the proper and a responsible way, surely??

[Dennis]

If you do have toxic waste here in Central London, you have to drive miles to dispose of it. What do you all do?

By the way Jill, Clare Smyth who has just been singled out as being the perfect chef, says that her customers prefer something simple like plaice braised in milk. Dennis

[caroleallen]

I can't imagine cleaning fluid would be that toxic. Mine all goes into a soak away but I guess it could eventually get into the water system.

[caroleallen]

Back to this old chestnut I'm afraid.

My Elna ultrasonic is not as great as I first thought. I have it on the highest temperature and it's set for 10 minutes at a time yet it doesn't really get my pieces clean and everything still has to be finished off with a toothbrush. Things come out with a film on them which comes off after a lot of rubbing with a silver cloth. I'm using Seaclean.

It's all rather defeating the object as it's supposed to be a quicker way to clean up after polishing. I'm beginning to wonder whether I should have gone down the steam cleaner route after all.

[ps_bond]

Are you in a hard water area?

[caroleallen]

No Peter, our water is classed as moderately soft.

[ps_bond]

OK, that rules that one out then! I do see occasional white deposits if I don't rinse and dry pieces thoroughly; I'm in an area where the water feels like it is 50% chalk some days... The other thought is if the u/s solution is leaving deposits?