Local antique shop has a 20's theater popcorn machine. He wanted me to look it over and see what can be done with it. I'm re-doing the electrical as necessary.
It has a lot of what I assume used to be bright metalwork. Based on appearance and my extremely limited knowledge of such things, I suspect it was polished nickel originally. Now it's a uniform dull pewter gray color. Another note: as I was disassembling things to get the wiring out today, we found piece under a brass corner guard that looks as tho it may have been chrome, so there's that.
I brought a piece home after the initial survey last week to straighten and see if buffing would bring out any shine. I used coarse black media and a rag wheel and got basically nothing. Didn't want to overdo it and wear through the plating if indeed it is plated.
So, my questions are:
1) How would one go about identifying the finish?
2) If it's nickel, what should/can I do to remove the oxidation and get it to buff up?
3) Is there a liquid treatment that will help? Something along the lines of muriatic acid? (No idea if that's appropriate, just an example of the sort of thing I'm asking about)
Given the amount of brightwork and the hassle involved in getting it off, cleaned up and back on, I've already declined to take on that part of it, just trying to come up with some information for the owner to give him an idea of his options.
It has a lot of what I assume used to be bright metalwork. Based on appearance and my extremely limited knowledge of such things, I suspect it was polished nickel originally. Now it's a uniform dull pewter gray color. Another note: as I was disassembling things to get the wiring out today, we found piece under a brass corner guard that looks as tho it may have been chrome, so there's that.
I brought a piece home after the initial survey last week to straighten and see if buffing would bring out any shine. I used coarse black media and a rag wheel and got basically nothing. Didn't want to overdo it and wear through the plating if indeed it is plated.
So, my questions are:
1) How would one go about identifying the finish?
2) If it's nickel, what should/can I do to remove the oxidation and get it to buff up?
3) Is there a liquid treatment that will help? Something along the lines of muriatic acid? (No idea if that's appropriate, just an example of the sort of thing I'm asking about)
Given the amount of brightwork and the hassle involved in getting it off, cleaned up and back on, I've already declined to take on that part of it, just trying to come up with some information for the owner to give him an idea of his options.