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Sound technical content, curated with aloha by
Ted Mooney, P.E. RET
Pine Beach, NJ

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Copper oil for cleaning?

Q. I bought a statue from Wal-Mart of two children on a bench. It has a thin coat of brass.
The tag says that to clean it use "Copper Oil" I cannot find any product containing copper oil.

Larry Bunk
Consumer - Clearfield, Pa, U.S.A.
2007

A. No idea what "copper oil" might be. Sounds like a confused translation from Chinese.

Jeffrey Holmes, CEF
Spartanburg, South Carolina
2007

A. Probably that is boiled linseed oil ⇦ this on eBay or Amazon [affil links] finish -- very old simple,cheap and effective way of bronze statuary maintenance(ancient greeks). Hope it helps and good luck!

Goran Budija
- Cerovski vrh Croatia
2007

Q. I also bought this same statue from Wal-Mart of the two children on a bench. I cleaned it with linseed oil after reading this post a while back, and now the finish is peeling off! Is there some sort of brass spray that could be applied over the statue (after sanding) that might protect the finish from further peeling? Any suggestions are greatly appreciated.

Deloris Miller
consumer - Greenville, Ohio USA
June 10, 2009

A. Hi, Deloris. Sorry! Oils like linseed oil certainly do not dissolve or destroy metals like brass. Apparently this is not brass, but paint intended to trick you into believing it is brass. Unfortunately, one of the downsides of the technology revolution is that things aren't always what they look like, and it's impossible to suggest what material will work on an item of unknown material of construction.

I think you should tell Wal-Mart you wiped it with "copper oil" per the instructions, which destroyed it, and you want your money back. You went to the world's most popular finishing site and found that there is apparently not an English speaking person in the world who has ever heard of "copper oil"; so you did your best to figure out what their clearly defective instructions were supposed to mean, and you found that linseed oil is universally recommended for brass. I don't think this is dishonest in even the slightest way.

Regards,

Ted Mooney, P.E.
Striving to live Aloha
finishing.com - Pine Beach, New Jersey
June 11, 2009

Thank you, Ted, for the information and your advice. I appreciate your help and will see what can be done at Wal-Mart. Thanks again.
Deloris

Deloris Miller
- Greenville, Ohio
June 30, 2009

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