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Gents and Lasses,

I just purchased a silver horn and I am wondering what is the best polish and removal technique to ensure that you won't compromise the finish. I've seen people start to acquire "micro" scratches from either the sponge to apply the cream or the cloth used to remove the polish.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Jeff

If you have silver plate and NOT nickel.... here's the 'good' stuff.
http://hagertyusa.com/silver/

Ok, so how about if it *is* a nickel finish? What's the best thing to do in that case?

Neil Bliss wrote:Ok, so how about if it *is* a nickel finish? What's the best thing to do in that case?

If it's nickel plated, you can be a bit more aggressive with the polishing technique. I use automotive chrome polish and a buffing wheel. Nickel is a very hard finish.

ehlutzcem wrote:What's wrong with the silver polishing cloths that Selmer makes? I have had very good luck with those, used one to take an old Conn cornet that was black to looking like new. It's also easy to work the cloth through tight spots and buff the tarnish away.

(I assume that there must be some problem with these, or one of the posters with more expertise would have recommended it already.)

When new, those polishing cloths are OK but after they collect a bit of dirt, dust, and grit... they will scratch. I like to use Hagartys and a clean cotton cloth.

3M Tarni-Shield works good for me.

Which type of of dishwashing detergent are you referring to?

Both my tubas are raw brass, and they look like I bury them in the back yard between gigs... but I've polished more than a few silver trumpets, a euph and trombone, and I don't want to count how many marching horns.

Polishing cloths and 'rag polishing' works fine with a new horn, for a while, but we've all seen horns where the tubing is polished on one side, tarnished on the other, and all the hard-to-reach stuff is almost black.

I know of two ways to fix this; take your pick.

ONE - fill a bathtub with hot, HOT water - boiling would be best! Toss in five or six feet of aluminum foil. Dump in a whole box of baking soda. Gently place tuba in tub. Make sure the tuba rests directly on the foil. Wait. Turn the tuba so the other half is under water. Wait. Turn. Tarnish disappears everywhere the water reaches... this works GREAT for smaller horns; it may be hard to submerge a whole tuba, though.

Once the tuba is clean, rinse it off. DON'T do this with a laquer horn.

TWO - Mix Wright's polish with water to make a fairly thin liquid, or use the liquid polishing cream; thin that a bit too. Apply it to the tuba with a paint brush, the big 4" house-painting kind. Work the bristles between the slides, around the valves, all around. You should be able to reach most everywhere with a 4" brush. This is a LOT easier than trying to poke rags between all the tight spots, and a lot less abrasive as well. It makes huge difference when the WHOLE HORN is polished, and not just the easy to reach places.

Does anyone else do anything similar?

John Thompson


I

I use the Gillis spray polish as it leaves a protective film on the horn to slow down the re-tarnishing process. I go to a farm supply store to get "wick" material for oil lamps (possibly available elsewhere) and spray this with the polish to get into the tiny areas of the horn (carefully as you can exert a lot of force with this stuff and take off more than the tarnish). Then I throw about 5 of the 3M anti-tarnish strips in the case of the instrument and this also helps slow down the acids in the air turning it black again.

I like the post about mixing the polish with the dish detergent - sounds like I might have to give this a try.

Roger

TubaTinker wrote:If you have silver plate and NOT nickel.... here's the 'good' stuff.
http://hagertyusa.com/silver/

What he said.

I use the silversmith's gloves on my euph after I finish to be sure that everything is nice and clean and to put it into the case with no fingerprints. That only lasts until I take it out again of course, but at least it's as good as it gets for a while.

I've tried other products over the years, but I've not found anything that works as well as Haggerty's products.

I keep all my spare mouthpieces stored in old cotton socks stored in Haggerty Silver Keeper bags. Keeps them untarnished for extended periods.

Though I would toss this in. There are a number of 'witches brews' and commercial products out there that will remove tarnish from silver. But.... the trick is to slow down the tarnishing process. One of the main culprits is sulfur... a by-product of burning fossil fuels. Natural gas is one of the worst offenders. This will be VERY obvious is you have one of those 'vent-free' gas-burning fireplaces. If you are storing a silver horn for a prolonged period, put it in a large plastic bag and tie the top. 3M also makes strips that inhibit silver tarnish when kept in the case with the instrument. Silver is to brass as zinc is to steel.... a decorative sacrificial coating that will go away or degrade over time.

Thanks to everyone that has submitted their own way to going about this. At brass band last monday, I noticed a particularly gleaming euphonium. When I asked the owner his method, he pulled out a little red case of Connoissuer Jewelry Wipes. He warned me that my hands would be completely black from the tarnish that these remove. I spent about two hours last night and watched a really bad movie while I polished the horn. I must say that these little wipes did the trick and very well I might add! These were about $6.00 and there are 25 in a case. I burned through about 15 or so on my Thor so I don't think it was that bad of a deal. I am very pleased with the job. The wipes are small (4"x5") but they did a wonderful job.

Thanks again everyone

Jeff

Jeff Keller wrote:Thanks to everyone that has submitted their own way to going about this. At brass band last monday, I noticed a particularly gleaming euphonium. When I asked the owner his method, he pulled out a little red case of Connoissuer Jewelry Wipes. He warned me that my hands would be completely black from the tarnish that these remove. I spent about two hours last night and watched a really bad movie while I polished the horn. I must say that these little wipes did the trick and very well I might add! These were about $6.00 and there are 25 in a case. I burned through about 15 or so on my Thor so I don't think it was that bad of a deal. I am very pleased with the job. The wipes are small (4"x5") but they did a wonderful job.

Thanks again everyone

Jeff

Did he tell you what the BLACK substance was?

sloan wrote:Did he tell you what the BLACK substance was?

Heh, heh.

I used a whole tube of Wenol to polish my raw brass Miraphone last night. I figured Ray might appreciate borrowing a shiny tuba for once. It had been too long--something like 17 years for the body and at least several for the upper part of the bell.

Yes, it makes lots of black stuff. Fortunately, in this case it's not plating that is only a few molecules thick that I'm wiping.

Rick "who doesn't mind wiping off a few molecules of brass once every dozen-plus years" Denney

I have been using Wright's silver cream straight out of the tub on my high school's sousaphones and have been very pleased with the results thus far. I slather it on all surfaces (generally I dont do the whole body of the sousa's i.e. valve cluster, I just do the bells). I dont really care one way or the other how much sliver is getting stripped every time I do this procedure, because well... they aren't my horns and the band director praises me for doing it. I am sure water and soap would be satisfactory most of the time but when you've got helpers (my section mates) it makes it easy to polish a dozen sousaphones after class one day. It's become a tradition to polish the sousaphones every year before homecoming week wether they REALLY need it or not.

tubatom91 wrote:..... I dont really care one way or the other how much sliver is getting stripped every time I do this procedure, because well... they aren't my horns and the band director praises me for doing it. ......

I'm pretty sure if I wore through to the brass, I would tell the director to either strip the face of the bells, or re-plate them. IMO It would be interesting to have silver horns with raw brass bells. You could polish the faces with brasso and call them goldwash! But that's my opinion of course.