Getting the copper off?

[exeric]

Exeric: Ferric Chloride will remove nickel plating. I buy it a Fry's electronics, as folks use it for etching circuit boards. I have never tried it on copper, but I'll go throw a chunk in just to see.

silentgreyfello; Thanks, that's a good tip. I'll try it as well.

[silentgreyfello]

Exeric: Ferric Chloride will remove nickel plating. I buy it a Fry's electronics, as folks use it for etching circuit boards. I have never tried it on copper, but I'll go throw a chunk in just to see.

[rwm]

for five months i had a chrome headlight switch sitting in lye.nothing changed all the chrome is still on the switch. my hands would have rusted that cheap switch quicker i'll try a few more things on it this spring

[Robert Luland]

Well after two months. In the end Ammonia does get off the copper if you have all the time in the world. Like I said earlier, it gets the flat big areas fast (Couple of weeks). I’m taking this to the next scientific level. I’m going to surf the web for a young scientific forum and find me some geeks to collaborate with. In the air of things in the world right now. Don’t be surprised if I come back and tell ya copper plating is the reason for global warming. Bob L

[rwm]

no chrome has come off yet from the lye

[rwm]

ammonia will remove brass also. it wont work on chrome i have tried that. i tried chrome in lye and nothing came off .my plater claims i did it wrong. so i will try again in a bigger vat of lye. first time i used a mason jar. this time i will use a 1gallon bucket

[rousseau]

hey Bob
I can't tell from your pics but, are you sure your not seeing brass in the seams. lot of brackets were Brazed on back in the day.

[Chris Haynes]

Somewhere, someplace I have an article from a very old Australian motorcycle magazine that has a formula for removing copper and chrome. It is a mixture of fertilizer and diesel. I know, it sounds like Tim McViegh at work. You mixed the two and used a trickle charger to strip metal bare.

[Robert Luland]

Eric as I said earlier. The ammonia seem to get under the copper plating as I was peeling pieces off. No matter what I do I can’t seem to get it out of the weld seams. I beaded this to no end and it’s still there. If the ammonia doesn’t work this time I’m just going to lightly weld over the seams. The ammonia seams to work really well on big fat areas as you can see in the photo. Bob L

[exeric]

Bob, do you think the amonia would get under chrome and nickel to remove the copper? I was wondering if that would work on a beat-up chromed part that has copper and bare steel showing.

[Robert Luland]

Hold the presses. Soon as I beaded them the copper showed up in the creases. Back into the stew pot with'em. I'll let ya know in three weeks. Bob L

[Robert Luland]

Well boys it’s been 52 days and three ammonia changes into the experiment. I deleted the last picture off Photobucket not realizing that it goes back there to retrieve every time you open the thread. Today I pull’em out and no copper. I Going to do one more time around in the beader for good measure and tomorrow into the soup. Sure would be nice to have a happy ending. I will do the final report tomorrow. Bob L

[rwm]

after 5 days the chrome is starting to fizz

[rwm]

i got some chrome sitting in a brew of lye. it was hard to find a piece of chrome to sacrifiece but we will see how it goes

[exeric]

Wow! Fantastic news Bob. I'm going to get some ammonia and get that process started. Thanks for commiting to the experiment.