How to clean a silver chain from blackness at home

Almost every­one has a sil­ver chain. It is strong, shiny and goes with every­thing.

How­ev­er, when oxy­gen or sul­fur comes into con­tact with sil­ver, a chem­i­cal reac­tion occurs on its sur­face. This caus­es a change in the col­or of the prod­uct — dark­en­ing, con­t­a­m­i­na­tion and stains.

Do not wor­ry — this prob­lem is solved! In order to enjoy a flaw­less shine for a long time, you need to know how to prop­er­ly store and clean a sil­ver chain, and fol­low these rec­om­men­da­tions.

How to clean a silver chain: 7 proven methods

Warm water, mild soap, ammo­nia- and phos­phate-free deter­gent are used BEFORE clean­ing the sil­ver chain from black­ness in the fol­low­ing ways:

1. make a mushy paste of bak­ing soda and water. To apply it on top of the sil­ver and pol­ish the prod­uct, use a clean cloth to get into the crevices and depres­sions, take a tooth­brush;
2. mix 1/2 cup lemon juice with 1 tea­spoon olive oil in a bowl large enough to hold the clean­ing solu­tion and a small microfiber cloth. Dip the cloth in the solu­tion and wring it out so that it does not drip, then pol­ish the sil­ver, rinse and dry it;
3. white vine­gar (NOT apple!) and bak­ing soda make a gen­tle deter­gent. It removes even a heavy coat­ing that pre­vents pol­ish­ing of sil­ver. Pre­pare a solu­tion by mix­ing 2 table­spoons of bak­ing soda and half a glass of vine­gar. Soak the chain in it for 2–3 hours, then rinse and dry;
4. a sim­ple chem­i­cal reac­tion of bak­ing soda, alu­minum foil, salt and boiled water is an effec­tive and inex­pen­sive way to bet­ter clean a sil­ver chain. Place the foil mat­te side down in a saucepan or kitchen sink. Place a sil­ver chain on it. Then pour boil­ing water over the pieces to cov­er and add 2 table­spoons of bak­ing soda and salt. It is impor­tant that the soda and salt are com­plete­ly dis­solved. After 5–10 min­utes, using tongs or nitrile gloves (sul­phur-free rub­ber gloves), remove the prod­uct;
5. tooth­paste — this com­mon prod­uct for the care of teeth and oral cav­i­ty per­fect­ly cleans and restores the shine of many met­als. Smear the chain with tooth­paste and leave it for a while. Then — rinse the chain under run­ning water and let it dry. It is impor­tant that the tooth­paste does not con­tain col­ored and whiten­ing com­po­nents, as it can per­ma­nent­ly dis­col­or sil­ver;
6. a solu­tion of bak­ing soda and water is only suit­able for chains with­out pen­dants. Pen­dants can be wiped with a cloth soaked in it;
7. ash is the old­est method of clean­ing sil­ver acces­sories. To clean the chain, you need to pour ash on a soft cloth and wrap the prod­uct in it for the night.

After clean­ing the sil­ver chain at home in any way, thor­ough­ly rinse it with run­ning water or wipe it with a clean, damp cloth. Then dry the jew­el­ry and pol­ish to pre­vent stain­ing.

Impor­tant­ly! Tow­els, hand­ker­chiefs, woolen cloths can­not be used for pol­ish­ing. They con­tain coarse fibers that can scratch jew­el­ry.

For clean­ing and pol­ish­ing sil­ver at home and a chain from black­ness, you should buy spe­cial flan­nel or microfiber nap­kins. When pol­ish­ing, move the cloth back and forth. Avoid cir­cu­lar motions — they mag­ni­fy small scratch­es.

If this is not enough to remove dull­ness and black­ness, it is worth using such a method as clean­ing a sil­ver chain with ammo­nia.

How­ev­er, it should be remem­bered that jew­el­ry with stones dete­ri­o­rates from this.

If your prod­uct con­sists of small shaped ele­ments and stones, do not try to whiten the sil­ver chain your­self with­out know­ing how to do it cor­rect­ly. After all, chem­i­cal com­pounds can seri­ous­ly dam­age it.

To be sure of the integri­ty and safe­ty of the prod­uct after clean­ing, it is bet­ter to give it to a pro­fes­sion­al jew­el­er.

How to clean a silver chain at home?

The best clean­ing is pre­ven­tion! It is impos­si­ble to allow the prod­uct to come into con­tact with house­hold chem­i­cals, chlo­rine, items con­tain­ing sul­fur, wool, latex, may­on­naise.

Make it a habit to remove all jew­el­ry while doing house­work.

You should not wear a sil­ver chain while being under the sun’s rays.

When sun­bathing or swim­ming in the sea, it is bet­ter to put sil­ver jew­el­ry in a bag.

Jew­el­ry should be put on last before leav­ing the house. Per­fumes and cos­met­ics accel­er­ate the tar­nish­ing of sil­ver.

Sil­ver should be stored in such a way that it comes into con­tact with oxy­gen as lit­tle as pos­si­ble. Indi­vid­ual bags are best for this pur­pose.

Use­ful life hack! To reduce humid­i­ty and min­i­mize tar­nish­ing, place a piece of chalk in a box or jew­el­ry box. Then all clean­ing will con­sist of wash­ing with a weak soapy solu­tion.

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