Black spots on silver plated mouthpiece?

[Sousaswag]

Hi, everyone, I've noticed that on my Pt50 there have been black spots popping up on the rim and in the cup of the mouthpiece. My question is, what is it? And can I get rid of it? If you need pictures I'll be glad to take some. Thanks.

[PMeuph]

Tarnish.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tarnish" target="_blank

A polishing cloth may get them out.

Second on my list is to clean with Toothpaste.

if all else fails, I usually use a light dab of Haggety's silver polish followed by a quick polish with a rag. Clean with dish soap after.

[Sousaswag]

Great. Thank you very much. I'll try the polish cloth first.

[royjohn]

The best advice on cleaning silver plate is from Jeff Herman's website. He is America's premiere silver restorer.

For light tarnish, a slight yellowing, he recommends cleaning with dilute Dawn (citrus free), Better Life Dish Soap or Better Life Natural Glass Cleaner, using a cellulose sponge. When a polish is necessary (all polishes are at least slightly abrasive), the least abrasive are (in order) Blitz Silver Shine or Herman's Simply Clean Collector's Polish, 3M Tarni-shield Silver Polish, Twinkle Silver Polish. Mildly abrasive are Goddard's Silver Polish ((liquid or foam), Town Talk Silver Polish and Weiman's Silver Polish.
Hagerty's and Wright's are mentioned as very abrasive. Apply the polish with a cellulose sponge or a cotton ball or cloth.

Many of the silver polishes have some wax in them which protects the silver from further tarnish. IDK if this would bother folks lips, but it would probably wear off the rim quickly with playing contact.

There is a warning not to use baking soda, Nevr-Dull, Simichrome. Silvo's or Tarn-X. The stainless steel pot with salt and aluminum foil is also out. Some of these are as abrasive as 0000 steel wool, according to Herman.

There is more detail at Jeff's website (which is fascinating if you like silver), including info on polishing copper and brass: http://www.hermansilver.com/silver-poli ... atings.htm. There is a long list of polish no-no's.

Before I learned all this, I used Wright's on mpcs and they are still OK, but using the polishes that Jeff recommends will increase the life of your silver plated mpcs. Possibly more than you wanted to know, but useful info.

[Doug Elliott]

His objection to the baking soda and aluminum method clearly applies to Sterling and other alloys, not pure silver like is used for plating.

[royjohn]

Doug Elliott wrote:

His objection to the baking soda and aluminum method clearly applies to Sterling and other alloys, not pure silver like is used for plating.

I emailed Jeff Herman about this and he asked me to phone him. His comment was that he didn't specify fine silver vs sterling in the discussion of the dip method because many people don't know what they have...but that, yes, the dip method doesn't etch fine silver as it would an alloy, so it could be used with silver plated mouthpieces. He did note that the aluminum foil will scratch the silver plate, as silver plate is quite soft and a lot of things will scratch it.

So I guess you could whip up a dip for mouthpieces or silver plated small horns, slides, etc. Perhaps if you made sure to keep the foil flat and uncrinkled it wouldn't scratch the items. Or you could use a good, very mildly abrasive silver polish.

I suppose this is all too precious for some and surely one application of polish will not destroy your silver plate, but over time, it is possibly best to use some care.

Doug, I'd be interested in your comments about whether it's best to keep the silver shiny and slippery or not...but I suppose, since you yourself sell all kinds of rims, that it is all down to user preference...or not? Did Doc R ever address this? Nice to see you on here, Doug!

[Lee Stofer]

In my shop, I tend to clean mouthpieces first with Dawn detergent and warm water, then put them on a mandrel and spin on the bench motor, using soft cloth and TarniShield. If the mouthpiece is really tarnished, I may spray it with Tarn-X first, then wash it, as this chemically removes the tarnish without scrubbing/scratching. Once the mouthpiece is spin-polished, it goes back to the cleaning sink to get washed again. This removes any residue, which will form a dark grey ring on your embouchure if you don't wash it after polishing. The TarniShield polish is pretty low in abrasives, and does contain some sort of silicones that act as an anti-tarnish agent. These silicones are pretty durable, and are a big part of the reason that Anderson Silver Plating now balks at plating over existing plating. They tell me that they know of no guaranteed method of getting them off the surface short of buffing down to the base metal. With my personal mouthpiece, after polishing it as described above, I just wash it with water for many months, and although it normally doesn't gleam like a new one, it is untarnished silver, and clean.

[royjohn]

bloke wrote:

"Uploading to the internet", today, seems to be the equivalent of "one's words being in print" in the past, yet (though neither indicates that a person knows of what they speak) "uploading on to the internet" is far easier than was "getting one's words into widely-distributed print".

Since mine was the post with the internet citation in it, I'm supposing that bloke's post refers to me and the validity of the info I posted. While I agree that anyone can post anything on the internet, and many people post inaccurate and slapdash information, the validity of information posted can often be ascertained by looking at the evidence presented and the credentials of the presenter.

I have a degree in chemistry and thirty five years experience in the lapidary and jewelry field and am a certified gemologist (GIA). You can find Mr. Herman's credentials on his website, so I won't repeat all of them here. He's had a lifelong career as a silver restorer, has restored collector's silver for museums and collectors and founded the Society of American Silversmiths in 1989. His complete CV is posted at his website. He also presents photos of scratching and etching related to several polish methods on the page I referenced. I think his information is reliable and valid. It does not surprise me that many commercial polishes are made more abrasive than they should be, as they do indeed work faster --- by abrading away part of your 0.0005" of silver plate.

If you, bloke, had looked, all Mr. Herman's info would be obviously available. Instead it's "point and shoot." I looked up pencil erasers and found that many of them have abrasives in them, including pumice. So I'd have to agree with you that one should "consider the source" when evaluating info posted on the internet, which yours and my posts are.

[Doug Elliott]

Bounty paper towels will scratch silver, but that doesn't stop me from using them.
Nearly anything will "scratch" a fresh silver surface, even the rouge that is commonly used to buff it. What scratches you see just depends on how much you magnify it.

I used the baking soda and aluminum method on a bunch of old mouthpieces and a silverplated soprano trombone. It worked but they're all pretty dark again by now. The big advantage of that method is that it doesn't remove any silver, only the tarnish.

Items like mouthpieces that we all use on a daily basis have no real relationship to the museum pieces Jeff Herman is talking about. If it doesn't have enough plating to withstand normal use and cleaning, it's time to get it replated. Not a big deal.

[royjohn]

Hey guys,
All I said was, if you want to take optimal care of your mpcs, here are the resources. I stated that there might be little difference in practice in using the other methods described, so Doug and bloke are just repeating what I said with a different emphasis. I guess a lot depends on how much care you want to take with a mpc in the daily grind of playing and practicing.

I do note in the FS by owner section that many sellers specify the condition quite exactly and base their prices on condition. If you're possibly going to be selling your mpcs, perhaps knowing what to clean them with and that paper towels and aluminum foil and lots of other things will scratch them is useful info.

If I made any ad hominem comments which generated more heat than light, I apologize.

I guess one way around all this is to buy one of bloke's stainless mpcs, which won't be scratched by much.

[Three Valves]

I purchased a NOS mouthpiece that was seriously tarnished.

After rubbing and elbow grease didn’t work the baking soda and tinfoil in hot water did!!