Cleaning Silver
by Danielle B
My New Year's clean sweep as usual turned into a week long project where I get in the weeds trying to organize the house for a fresh start. Cleaning up after the holiday parties turned into a complete reorg of every serving piece in the house. I decided to give a try to an idea I'd seen on Pinterest for cleaning silver. I collect yard sale silver plated serving pieces so I was looking for a quick way to shine them up. I lined the sink with foil, added some generous scoops of salt and baking soda and filled the sink with scalding hot water. The chemical reaction resulting from the aluminum, salt and soda removed the tarnish! It actually worked! Lesson learned. Dip the entire piece at once or you'll get a line of demarcation on your piece. I also kept adding hot water and more ingredients because the hotter the water, the quicker it works. Remove the pieces from the solution and buff the remaining spots off with a cotton cloth.
Prepping the sink
The ingredients
Before
Test run
Before
After
You can see the lip where it wasn't submerged fully. 5 min for the piece, but another 15 to get this to come off.
I went a little overboard
After
The tarnish transferred to the foil
Want more details about this and other DIY projects? Check out my blog post!
Comments
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2 of 87 comments
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I question this... Because salt will cause silver to "pit". If you use this method, I would thoroughly wash the piece after, rinse in clear hot water & then polish/buff dry.
I will just use a good quality silver cleaner polish... 😉
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Try the product TARNX....perfect for all silver...silver looks like new after you use this.
Perect for all jewelry.
Frequently asked questions
Have a question about this project?
You need hot, almost boiling water, to put the silver in, otherwise the salt and baking soda won't react with the foil to clean the silver. Also, has anyone else had issues with buildup on their silver after using this method??? It looks great for a few hours, then starts to show signs of residue...
You boil the silver jewelry?
Isn’t it dangerous to be mixing these chemicals?