We all love to decorate our house, bring in your souvenirs that can accentuate the look of the house; of all these antique brass metal objects are one of the most loved showpieces that people have in their houses, not only they look fancy, but at the same time they are expensive. If you too are having one of them, then you know that a lot of effort goes in cleaning and maintain the same.
Brass is nothing but an alloy of copper, zinc and some other metals. It had been widely used in ancient times for the purpose of making show pieces more elegant. However, you will find that over the years the brass pieces have some black spots over them. This does not indicate that you should throw them out of your house; instead, you should take these several tips for maintaining and cleaning brass which will bring back the initial shine and finish of the products.
Maintenance Tips:
Brass requires maintenance and if you want the showpieces made out of brass to shin and glim forever, here are some of the ways we can clean and maintain such antique brass pieces.
1. Assessing The Antique Brass Showpiece:
One of the first thing that you need to check is that whether the antique brass is lacquered or not, in case it has a shiny finish or its lacquered, then you need to take antique brass to the metal refinisher.
2. Cleaning Of Solid Brass Pieces:
There are two ways to achieve the same, you can either go for brass polishers which are available in the market:
Commercial Cleaning Agents – There are various cleaning agents manufactured by some companies for the purpose of brass cleaning. We can easily use these agents to clean our antique brass objects well. However, we should make sure that we do not use too strong agents for cleaning purposes.
Or Else You Can Switch To The Natural Ways Which Are Readily Available In Your House – When you are trying to clean solid antique brass pieces you should first and foremost wipe off any dust from the object. After that has been using a cotton rag you should slightly dab on the object then dip this rag into a mixture of mild detergent or soap and slightly warm water. This process will soften the dirt and make the next steps easier for you. One thing that you should keep in mind while treating all of this is to make sure that you remove the lacquer of the antique brass piece using hot water and varnish remover. It is important that you remove the lacquer off properly to ensure that you can easily clean away all the dust from the object. Then after this, you can consider various options for cleaning the brass.
- Ketchup – This is a very common cleaning agent for the brass which has been used by many people around the world for years. This item contains mild acidic sauce with some quantity of vinegar. We should take some ketchup on a piece of tissue and rub it thoroughly on the antique brass object. Leave the ketchup on the object for about 10 minutes and then remove the ketchup with a soft rag and warm water.
- Lemon and Baking Soda – This is the easiest and the most popular way to clean the brass product. All you need to do is rub the antique brass metal with lemon and baking soda. This will make the metal shine.
- Yogurt – Another very common and natural agent for cleaning antique brass is yogurt. All we have to do is apply some to the object and leave it on for 10 minutes then wipe it away with a woolen cloth and warm water.
These tips are handy and a great way to help your antique brass metal age gracefully.