Cleaning/polishing nickel silver question

I re-worked some of my reel seats with new wood but salvaged the old nickel silver components.

I removed the old seat piece by piece by heating the nickel silver with a candle and whacking the old wood inserts off with a pocket knife. It worked, everything came off as it should.

The nickel silver polished out nicely to like new when I got the new seat installed, but there is some candle soot, I guess, down in the bottom of the threads of the the nickel silver that the locking ring spins on.

I have tried everything I have to get down in those threads to make them look good, but they stay black in the base. I was using a toothbrush, nothing more abrasive.

Any ideas?

Bill

2dog, Dont know if this will work but: I use Simichrome to polish with. Mayby take a piece of tying thread, put polish on center and see if that wont get down in threads. Just a thought

I've never done any rod building or refurbishing, but the thought occurred to me that one of those ultrasonic jewelry cleaners might work if the part is not installed on the rod. They have a couple of small compartments with a basket to transfer the item from a compartment with cleaning solution to the compartment with a rinse.

Good Luck

I don't know how well it will reach to the bottom of the threads, but I use Hollywood Metal Polish for just about everything I want shiney. Here is their website http://hollywoods1.com/.

Tooth paste will do a nice job of polishing metal, it is a very mild abrasive.

I use a Miracle Cloth to clean all my nickle silver parts. To get down into the threads, take a toothpick and run the cloth into the threads with the end of the toothpick. If you can't find Miracle Cloths locally, you can try here: http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... :IT&ih=006

2dogkayak, if what appears to be soot is not very dark, this may just be a dullness from normal thread engagement and you may not be able to remove what you're thinking is soot. I would think soot would respond to cleaning at the root of the thread just the same as it would on the unthreaded surface and with the same polish you used on the rest of the nickel. A magnifying glass may reveal the actual kind of discoloration you're looking at. Hope this helps.

Cheers,

MontanaMoose

Success!

With a combination of Mag Eyes, Never Dull, a small steel brush, an Exacto knife, a nickel silver polishing cloth, and a lot of patience, I did a deep cleaning and then polished.

Good as new!

There was some kind of gunk holding the discoloration in, maybe epoxy or wax of some sort.

Thanks for all of the help.

It was all on target.

Bill

Thanks for the feedback 8)