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Forum » Sax Repair » Polishing silver… by chiamac (586 posts) 20 years ago Polishing silver… Does anyone put a coat of was once they get done polishing something? It would stop any oxidation and prevent tarnish. It’s also what we (jewelers) use to protect pieces from wear and to keep them in a high polish. Is this something that could be done to horns, or is it just too much work for what it’s worth? Reply To Post [Report Abuse] Report Abuse Web Address * Your Name Your Email Address Comment
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by selmersaxman (13 posts) 20 years ago Re: Polishing silver… Just get this polishing cloth called "The Blitz Cloth"....there is nothing better, unless you have an extreme job, then get some silver polish of some sort. Reply To Post by FISHERMAN (31 posts) 20 years ago Re: Polishing silver… I am not sure Chiamac but I have a Yani 9930 solid silver soprano and upon investigation it was advised against anything other than a standard polishing clothe due to some sort of protective finish that was applied at factory. I had purchased one of the double sided silver jewelry cloth's with the polish side and cannot use it. I tried it on a real old Flute and it did real good. It was really dull from years of oxidation and it was really great after the fact. Was a lot of work. Reply To Post by chiamac (586 posts) 20 years ago Re: Polishing silver… those cloths have a polishing compound in them. Ruby ruge on one side and white diamond on the other. Diamond is for the first pass and the ruby side will leave a mirror finish... and no you wouldn't want to use that on something which has a finish, cause it's just like sand paper, really really fine sand paper. After a while it would take that finish off and expose the metal. Or at least skuff up the finish a little. Reply To Post Yahoo! AIM by FISHERMAN (31 posts) 20 years ago Re: Polishing silver… Chiamac from a your view what would you recommend brand wise for older instruments that are oxidized without the clear protective. I used that cloth on a flute but it was small. I have a old Conn Tenor that I have been fixing up and learning on and I tried the cloth but that would take forever. The wife has some silver polish from wally world for jewelry but I am not sure of it and do not want to buff thru the silver plate just want to make it look good. Reply To Post by SaxMan (559 posts) 20 years ago Re: Polishing silver… I have never put any kind of finish on mine. I used to polish the damn thing each day with a rouge cloth but that got old. Now I wipe it down with the red rouge side of the cloth and polish it with hagerties spray stuff on a schedul of once every 6 months or so and before concerts. I keep 2 tarnish strips in my case and thats about all I do for it. If you have an old sax, you want to be careful on the patina - if it has one sometimes you just get a filthy damn sax with no patina, but if you ahve a patina, you want to shine it up but not remove it as long as you dont use anything too aggressive or something regular for too long you should be fine. If you just have crud all over the place, lightly use some brasso, it will take quite a while to go down to brass, just get the crud off then polish it with the rouge cloth or something like that. Don't use dips cause they take silver off. The only thing liek that oyu should use is an aluminum basic with baking soda, though that is a complete bitch to do something as big as a sax cause the water has to boil and you need to fill something about the size of a bath tub. Reply To Post by chiamac (586 posts) 20 years ago Re: Polishing silver… SaxMan, why would they put a patina on a sax? I havent seen one (well other than maybe BlackMax on the blackones) but I thought all the color was done in the lacqure (sp) as for polish... I forget what kind we have in our studio, it's a cream in a black little container. I tried it on some really really tarnished teapots, it works, but I got bored after 30 min... besides I needed to buff them anyway, which took even longer. You DON'T want to buff a silver plated (or gold) sax... it WILL take the plating off if you're not very very VERY careful... (wink wink) also, johnsons wax will work to protect the siver, I don't think it will (or could) harm the metal that much. also, it's cheap. there is some wax called Renaissance, but it's really expensive ($20 for a small container) however it's clear, and lasts a long time. Oh, a trivia question... why does siver tarnish?=) Reply To Post Yahoo! AIM by sax_maniac (984 posts) 20 years ago Re: Polishing silver… Chiamac - Is silver tarnish an ionic reaction, or a chemical one? Reply To Post by chiamac (586 posts) 20 years ago Re: Polishing silver… oh I forgot, FISHERMAN... to get into hard to reach places put a little polish or buffing compound on a string or string like cloth, then floss your sax!=) haha Reply To Post Yahoo! AIM by sax_maniac (984 posts) 20 years ago Re: Polishing silver… Another thing you can do is put your cloth on the end of a wooden chopstick to get in tight places. I try not to be too obsessive about keeping the tarnish off my horn, but shiny silver is very unforgiving to dust, spit, etc. Everything stands out a lot. I like to use a very clean damp rag to lightly wipe it first because dust can be rather abrasive. Reply To Post by FISHERMAN (31 posts) 20 years ago Re: Polishing silver… Thanks For information. Right now I have it tore down completely doing a full pad and spring restoration. It was a freebie so I am trying to learn and restore at the same time. Reply To Post by chiamac (586 posts) 20 years ago Re: Polishing silver… Chiamac - Is silver tarnish an ionic reaction, or a chemical one? it's oxidation (spelling?) BUT silver dosnt' oxidise... it's the copper in it that makes it tarnish. However fine silver is way to expensive and soft for use in everyday things. and also highly polished silver shows fingerprints... or just about anything and everything that comes in contact with it. Which is why we put wax over things... free stuff is good to learn on, and don't be scared of screwing up. I mean how much do you "really" learn by doing everything right all the time? Reply To Post Yahoo! AIM by SaxMan (559 posts) 20 years ago Re: Polishing silver… What?!? I thought it was suplhur that made silver tarnish - I have heated up silver before to make it oxidize and it looks quite different than the black stuff from the air. actually I am sure that it is the sulphur that makes the silver tarnish cause a display of the reaction is right here: scifun.chem.wisc.edu/HOMEEXPTS/TARNISH.html and here is a display of the reaction for silver oxide to form: www.chem.umn.edu/services/lecturedemo/info/Silver_oxide.html And if silver were to be alloyed with copper for silver plating, I am pretty sure that the copper would end up on top of the silver as it doesnt conduct electricity as good as silver does and would not as readily adhere to the brass. The patina I was speaking of was on older horns, not new ones - boy would it be nice though if they did that for you though. Reply To Post by SaxMan (559 posts) 20 years ago Re: Polishing silver… Or sorry, that first article proves that sulphur is what causes the tarnish. Though technically I guess tarnish refers to oxidation but what normal people use tarnish for is dulling the finish. Reply To Post by chiamac (586 posts) 20 years ago Re: Polishing silver… And if silver were to be alloyed with copper for silver plating, I am pretty sure that the copper would end up on top of the silver as it doesnt conduct electricity as good as silver does and would not as readily adhere to the brass. what's this talk about electricity? they melt the two together to form a alloy... and yes you can make them come apart. Reply To Post Yahoo! AIM by SaxMan (559 posts) 20 years ago Re: Polishing silver… yeah, but as far as I know, they dont roll the plating into the horn. except for maybe those new series III's and the sterling yanagisawas - I don't think there is any way in hell sheets of silver could be tooled into a sax withtout and uncomprehendable amount of work. Reply To Post by chiamac (586 posts) 20 years ago Re: Polishing silver… so how come they can plate something in 24k gold? Reply To Post Yahoo! AIM by chiamac (586 posts) 20 years ago Re: Polishing silver… actually I'm not going to respond to you from now on. It's fun to respond to you're posts, but itgets old. Don't worry, you're still amusing to read, and I get a good laugh from most of your posts. I don't want to take the time anymore or bring myself down to your level. Thats all. anyway keep it up!=) Reply To Post Yahoo! AIM by sax_maniac (984 posts) 20 years ago Re: Polishing silver… Yeah, uh... I thought that silver or gold plating was done by electrical deposition in a solution. I'm not familiar with any silver/gold on brass laminate materials. They wouldn't survive the forming process. Maybe that's how the Chinese horns are made? Hee hee hee... Reply To Post by SaxMan (559 posts) 20 years ago Re: Polishing silver… Chia, a friken buisness major knows more aobut this than you do. when you plate a sax, you electroplate it - means that the sax is the cathode and an anode is stuck in a solution of silver nitrate and ammonia or cyanide. A charge is sent through and the silver ions are attracted to the sax and bond to it. And wasnt it me that told you that you cant plate a sax with gold directly? it has to be silver plated first, that is how they do it. the put a thin layer of silver on then some gold. maniac, they usually are elctroplated, but for those "sterling" saxes I am pretty sure that the silver is rolled into the brass so that they have a little bit of workability other wise they would constantly be dealing with something several hundred degrees to form it. The silver would be rolled in while the sax is still at the sheets of brass stage of course. Reply To Post by sax_maniac (984 posts) 20 years ago Re: Polishing silver… Another communication breakdown. I think chiamac's comments had to do with a process where someone would attempt to electroplate something with silver and copper - not silver ON copper. As silver is more conductive, I can see how it would deposit more heavily than the copper. But I think we're all beyond believing that's how it's done. Page 2... I've never heard of such a rolling process. I'm wondering how the silver is "rolled" into the brass. Considering the deformations that occur when manufacturing the horn and the differing thermal expansion coefficients of silver and brass, I can't figure how the two would stay together long term. It seems the sandwich would eventually come apart. There's lots of elaborate sterling silver art to observe. I suppose it's not too hard to imagine that someone could fashion up a saxophone from it as well. Maybe someone who knows two shits about saxophone manufacturing can chime in here... Reply To Post by sax_maniac (984 posts) 20 years ago Re: Polishing silver… BTW - I'm not a business major, if that's what been implied above. I'm an engineer who happens to be finishing a business Master's Degree (so I guess there's SOME truth there). Sax is my passionate hobby. I started playing in 1980. Music has always been an important part of my life, but I'd rather not make a living at it - lest it lose it's lustre. Reply To Post by chiamac (586 posts) 20 years ago Re: Polishing silver… and I'm talking about MAKING the alloy, which dosn't involve rolling, electroplating, or anything else but MELTING the two together... This makes a new metal which can be treated as ONE, not as silver and copper... I tried to look up a chart which shows the differnt silver and gold alloys, but I couldn't find one. Reply To Post Yahoo! AIM by SaxMan (559 posts) 20 years ago Re: Polishing silver… yeah, well you dont plate with melted metal - thats called hot dipping and it looks really shitty unless the stuff is EXTREMELY hot. And as for rolling - rolling is a process of putting a really thick layer of something on another something. you take what you want a plating on and heat it up real hot, then take the other piece then heat up the side that is to go down a little bit - you usually have one metal considerably softer than the other. Once the paltign is heated up, you pound it into the other object and the atoms mix together and let it cool and where the atoms mixed you have a thin layer of alloy that holds the rest of the plating on. this rolling is only thick sidings when it would take a lot longer to elctroplate it - I electroplated a key once with copper after i found a container of copper sulfate in the science room - used the diesal for power and it took aobut 5 or 6 minutes ot get a 4 or 5 micron thick plating. Reply To Post by chiamac (586 posts) 20 years ago Re: Polishing silver… I"M NOT FUCKING TALKING ABOUT PLATING!!!!!!! if I were talking about playing I would say "I'm talking about plating" but I didn't and therefor I'm not talking about it. Reply To Post Yahoo! AIM by sax_maniac (984 posts) 20 years ago Re: Polishing silver… chiamac - I'm astonished that SaxMan thinks you're so incredibly stupid. They must not be teaching reading comprehension in school anymore. Take a deep breath and let it flow through your 10M. Ahhhhhh...... Now don't you feel better? It's amazing how legitimate topics like this end up as arguments. I hope they lock this thread down soon. Reply To Post by SaxMan (559 posts) 20 years ago Re: Polishing silver… So why the hell are you talking about it then you dumb asshole? How does alloying copper with silver have any relevance to the original question? How does it have any relevance to instruments? You dont god damned use a copper/silver alloy in instruments except maybe for certain necks. I think you stepped in your own shit and are trying to hide that now - you dont know shit about metallurgy do you? or jewlery either. And I thought you werent responding to me any longer? It would do us all a favor as we wouldnt have to listen to your fatuity so much. Saxmaniac, how the hell is it so hard ot beleive - this guys a jeweler and he says that copper is what makes silver turn. Well anyways, im gone for a week and a half to hawaii Ill be back to raise some more hell then. Reply To Post by sax_maniac (984 posts) 20 years ago Re: Polishing silver… Good luck at the spelling bee, SaxMan! Don't forget to hold Mommy's hand in the airport! I hear if you're good on the plane, the pilot will give you your OWN WINGS! Going to Hawaii for a week and he's not got the money to equip his computer for simple microphone recording? FEE! FI! FO! FUM! I smell the blood of a POSER! Reply To Post by SaxMan (559 posts) 20 years ago Re: Polishing silver… Yeah, except this trip is free for me. Reply To Post by chiamac (586 posts) 20 years ago Re: Polishing silver… AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAA tears Thanks man! Going to Hawaii for a week and he's not got the money to equip his computer for simple microphone recording? it's called a cheap pair of earphones!=) I hear if you're good on the plane, the pilot will give you your OWN WINGS! I remeber when you could escort someone right up to the gate and shit. But yeah not anymore. I'm gettin old. fun fun!=) Reply To Post Yahoo! AIM