Cleaning Silver with Aluminum Foil

Total Time: 15 minutes max

Source: Facebook

Supplies:

• glass or aluminum baking dish
• 1 piece of aluminum foil if using glass dish
• 1 cup oiling water
• 1 Tbsp baking soda
• 1 Tbsp sea salt
• 1/2 cup white vinegar
• rag for polishing
• tongs for removing silver from boiling water

Steps:

1. Line the glass dish with foil.
2. Put in the dry ingredients first.
3. Add the vinegar. There will be a reaction.

 
4. Add the boiling water.
5. Now add your silver.

 
6. All silver should be touching the foil and no piece should touch another piece.
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7. Leave between 30 seconds and a few minutes, depending on the level of tarnish.
8. Use tongs to remove the silver and use a rag to clean completely and to polish.

 

Judy
Gold Post Medal for All Time! 677 Posts

June 25, 20190 found this helpful

I used to clean with foil until someone on this site said that you could ruin silver this way. Since then, I use a silver polish.

Louise B.
Silver Feedback Medal for All Time! 337 Feedbacks

June 26, 20190 found this helpful

In reply to the poster who worried that this might ruin your silver, I believe there may be some truth to that, although for your purposes, it is not likely a concern. I googled this, and it says that in this chemical process the silver sulphide (the tarnish) is replaced with pure silver and the sulphide joins to the aluminum to make aluminum sulphide, so if your pieces are heavily tarnished, you might see a brownish tinge on your aluminum foil. The silver piece might have a slightly rougher surface (only visible with a magnifying glass) and will not be sterling silver, but will be pure silver.

Anyway, line a glass bowl with foil and place the pieces inside, touching the foil, but not each other. Boil enough water to cover the pieces, and add 1 tsp to 1/4 cup of borax. Pour the water over, and let sit till cool. Drain off water, and buff silver with a soft cloth. You can also do the same thing using baking soda and salt, 2 tsp of each. If the silver is heavily stained, you may have to do it twice.

I used this once on my silver souvenir spoons, and it worked well.