How do you keep copper from tarnishing?

[Gahagan]

I have a knife I am working on that has copper gaurds and I would like them to stay the bright copper color. How do you keep it from tarnishing short spraying with clear coat?
(Not finished yet need to do somemore sanding)

 

[EdCaffreyMS]

That's about all you can do for copper.....aside from a routine schedule of polishing. Waxing will help a little, but copper is so susceptible to oxidation, nothing short of an air tight coating will prevent the tarnish.

 

[Gahagan]

I am just concerned that by spraying it it will look cheap

 

[SBuzek]

Just let it patina,thats whats cool about copper.
Stan

 

[C Craft]

Polishing with Brasso or Flitz is about the same thing I think. Anyway the polishing with Brasso leaves a slight paste on it too. That will protect it for a while and it will patina later pretty much evenly. The problem with spraying is it scratches off and thats where the patina starts, giving it some weird effects!

 

[wdtorque]

Just let it patina,thats whats cool about copper.
Stan

I'm with Stan! Dozier

 

[murphda2]

You can also do a controlled patina and get some really cool colors with copper.

 

[Steven Janik]

Murph,
tell me about the controlled patina.

Thanks,
Steve

 

[Gahagan]

You can also do a controlled patina and get some really cool colors with copper.

Yes I would like more info on this as well.

 

[murphda2]

Don't make me lie to either of you as to how to do it. I know there is a japanese patina recipe that was used to patina copper, shakudo, mokume, and such using ginger root and a few other things. There are a wide range of colors you can get with the different patina mixtures (purple, red, black, etc).

 

[Seth Howard]

I hope a link here is OK. If not please remove it:

http://www.sciencecompany.com/patinas/patinaformulas.htm


Seth

 

[James Terrio]

Are you kidding? We love links like that! Thanks

 

[Gahagan]

Man that is pretty nice! Very informative

 

[murphda2]

Thanks for posting the link. I knew you could do it, I had just forgotten the source for the recipes. I don't believe this is the site I was referring to, but it sure works has alot of the same info.

 

[murphda2]

Here is another link to a tid bit of info which may interest you enough to buy the book. These are the recipes I was referring to where you use more natural ingredients as opposed to the caustic chemicals.

http://www.ganoksin.com/borisat/nenam/patina-studio.htm