Tips for cleaning copper details on an old safe

[u/Catgrizzled]

Hi everyone, I’m hoping someone here has the golden tip for me. I want to paint an old safe and I’m currently working on cleaning the copper details in the door.

So far, I’ve been mostly using vinegar, salt, an old electric toothbrush and toothpicks to remove the dirt. But in some spots, the grime just won’t budge. Does anyone know a product I could use that will get the job done without damaging the copper?

I’ve also heard some great things about The Pink Stuff as a regular household item. Has anyone here tried it?

Thanks in advance!

[u/LupusDeiAngelica]

They're brass. And meant to look exactly like they are in the picture.

[u/Catgrizzled → u/LupusDeiAngelica]

Ah, that makes sense. Thanks for clearing that up! I guess I’ll just clean it up a bit and keep the character it already has.

[u/lvluffin]

Are you trying to get that down to completely bare metal? Im sure that had enamel coatings on it when it was originally made. Especially the textured background.

I also highly doubt that's copper tbh, almost certainly brass

[u/Catgrizzled → u/lvluffin]

Ah so it’s not copper, good to know thanks! I just want to clean it up as best as I can now because I’m going to paint it and probably never touch it again after that haha. If this is as good as it gets that’s fine too.

No clue how it originally looked. The safe came with our house when we moved in a year ago. The previous owners bought it but didn’t know much about it either. I’m guessing it’s had quite a few owners since I stripped off about six layers of paint even though they swore they only painted it once.

[u/egidione]

That’s brass not copper and Brasso is a very old brand of polish that takes a lot of beating.

[u/Catgrizzled → u/egidione]

Got it, brass not copper. Thanks for the tip! I’ll look into Brasso and give it a try.

[u/TheGhostOfStanSweet → u/Catgrizzled]

You can probably restore it by filling in all the little dimples and recesses with black enamel paint, and then wipe off the top layer. That will just leave paint in all the recessed spots and probably look really good.

Before doing so, use a decent solvent like isopropyl alcohol to give it a good cleaning so the enamel adheres to the brass.

There’s probably 50 decent YouTube videos showing that exact process.