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Ted Mooney, P.E. RET
Pine Beach, NJ
The authoritative public forum
for Metal Finishing since 1989
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How to clean a silver plated trombone
Q. I bought a silver trombone for my son at Christmas. I am pretty sure it is silver plated. What would clean the tarnish on of it? The polishing cloth doesn't do the trick. I asked the company I bought it from but they didn't have an answer.
Susan Howard- Middletown, Ohio
1998
1998
A. Hello,
Your son's trombone probably has a lacquer finish on it that prevents the silver polish from doing its thing. You'll have to strip the lacquer off before you will be able to polish the silver. If it has the manufacturer's original finish, it is probably an epoxy coating that has been baked on. Stripping this type of coating involves nasty caustic strippers, so you might be better off handing this over to a professional musical instrument repair technician.
Jake KochG. J. Nikolas &Co.,Inc.
Bellwood, Illinois
Q. Badly tarnished trombone! I used Nevr-Dull ⇦ this on eBay or Amazon [affil links] and it worked well on the slide.
However took forever and the horn is worse and not as simple to clean. Any suggestions?
Rachel [last name deleted for privacy by Editor]buyer - Ruffsdale, Pennsylvania
2007
2007
A. Different polishes are optimized to do different things. Revere offers their Revere Copper Cleaner ⇦ this on eBay [affil links] , which has to be very powerful and fast acting to shine the bottom of copper pots. Maybe polish with that first, which will instantly remove the brass tarnish from your trombone, then use your Nevr-Dull ⇦ this on eBay or Amazon [affil links] again. Good luck!
Ted Mooney, P.E.
Striving to live Aloha
finishing.com - Pine Beach, New Jersey
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