10oz bars, removing heavy toning ??

[IdahoCopper]

I get that you should not clean or de-tone silver coins.

Is there any reason why you shouldn't remove toning from 10oz bars? I bought some recently that are heavily toned. They will look a lot better cleaned up.

Usually, I clean up my silver plate utensils with a water bath of baking soda with Aluminium foil and stainless steel as the anodes. The toning is quickly removed.

Comments or advice?

[Thogey]

TARNEX

[wolvesdad]

If very dark, they were probably stored/hidden in a large PVC pipe. My dad stored some silver dollars and a PVC pipe when I was young, and it horribly darkened/ toned them.

I would use ypur aluminum method. See if it works for that type of toning. You aren't going to hurt the content or value of silver bullion by cleaning it with the aluminum foil bath, or with Tarnex either(though any rubbing is likely to give it a funny appearance).

[pennypicker]

TARNEX

Tarnex works great on silver...that's what it is formulated to do. When I lived in Oregon back in 2013 my LCS was selling mint ASE's for $4 over spot and tarnished ones for just $2 over spot. I'd first buy his tarnished ones and carefully remove the tarnish with a Q-tip dipped in an even mixture of Tarnex and water. They cleaned up perfectly and they stayed that way for several months until the day I sold them....can't say what happened to their appearance after that.

[IdahoCopper]

I put them in the salt and baking soda bath with foil for about 20 min. Here are the before and after photos:

[pennypicker]

They turned out real nice plus you saved the $5 on a bottle of Tarnex

[AGgressive Metal]

Don't do this with bars that are actually premium vintage stuff like Englehard pours or older things like that. The patina is preferred intact on those. With modern stuff sure why not.