Copper tray part 2

[telophase]

Almost an entire pot of copper polish, a sponge, a toothbrush, several soft cloths, two episodes of Top Gear, and probably a whole lot of dead brain cells later, the copper tray is clean! Or as clean as it's going to get for now!

You should go to my previous post and look at the tray as it was first, just to get the full impact of the change. Really. I'll wait here.

You back yet? Good. Now click here

Back:



Front:



Close-up on pattern:



Woo! That black stuff on the back almost all came off. And the rest of it might come off in the future, if I decide to attack it again. The front has a lot of tiny spots of dark that just wouldn't come off for me now, but when you stand back you don't actually notice them.

And here is the tray in its final home:



The square white thing on the table is a stack of Portal-themed coasters, and the two cardboard boxes are chess sets that used to belong to my dad that Mom handed off to me on the same visit that she handed off the tray.

I think the tray fits quite nicely. :D

Comments

[tessercat]

Nice!

[telophase]

Thanks!

[movingfinger]

Huge improvement! And so satisfying.

Since it's a tray, if you find some solution that will react with those spots, you could on your next go-round soften it up by pouring the stuff in, and really letting it sit. I'm not sure what the spots are but copper is very reactive. Maybe just deep tarnish.

[telophase]

Yeah, I'm thinking deep tarnish--I was able to get some of them off by putting the copper polish (they didn't have Barkeeper's Friend at that store) on them and letting it sit for a few minutes as I worked on other areas of the tray. So it may be possible to get the others off.

There's a few areas that aren't as bright, and have a little bit of tarnish still on the surface. I plan on trying to get it at least one more time before putting a light coat of beeswax or museum wax on it.

When I was working in museums in the 1990s, museum wax was mostly used for keeping objects lightly stuck to shelves, but also used for other things like coating metal to keep it form rusting or tarnishing--I remember getting a recommendation from a curator at another institution, when we asked her about preserving one of the guns we had in our collection--to clean it well and apply a light coating of museum wax. I'm not sure where to get beeswax around here, but I know the Container Store sells museum wax.

[riofriotex.livejournal.com]

I agree! The tray looks great in its new home! You did a great job on it. Did you apply the beeswax yet?

[telophase.livejournal.com]

Didn't see any at the grocery store, so will find some and apply later. Also, I wanted to have at least one more go at the spots that haven't come up yet.

[estara.livejournal.com]

Great work! I need to keep this in mind, my copper table is pretty dull by now, although we bought it new from the souk in Damascus. They did use some sort of black pre-made patina on it I think, it never glowed like that table. I find it interest to see the difference in design between your Turkish copper plate and my Damascene copper table.
My parents own a brass table which I used to love, but my mum put it into the cellar some years ago - I wonder who will want it later on. It certainly isn't suited to my sister-in-law's taste. It's larger than my own copper table and I have no space for another one of those - mine is my living room tv-table already.

[telophase.livejournal.com]

Thank you! Those tables sound beautiful. :)