I Rubbed My Knobs Down with Brasso
Written: Nov 02 '05 (Updated Nov 20 '05)
|
Product Rating:
|
|
|
Pros: Works eventually
Cons: Time consuming, I did not have any patience with this product.
The Bottom Line: I was not impressed, it took to long.
|
|
|
| LILvoyce's Full Review: Reckitt Benckiser Brasso |
I am in the middle of remodeling an older home and am in the process of working on the kitchen. Currently I am working on the kitchen cabinets and have repainted them. I had removed all of the knobs on the cabinets and decided to replace them. I had removed near 40 knobs total and went to price them in the store. To my surprise at $6 a piece for each knob, I was outraged at that price and was not willing to pay over $240 just on knobs. Call me cheap if you will. So I had this bright idea that I was going to try and find some sort of chemical to clean them. I chose to try a bottle of Brasso to see if it would work. I figured at around $4.00 a can, what did I have to lose?
What is Brasso?
It is a product that comes in a can, and it is a runny, tan in color, liquid that will clean and polish your pewter, copper, brass, chrome, and stainless steel. An 8 oz can runs about $4. I purchased mine at Lowe's, but have seen it in other stores as well.
My Experiences
Well, as I mentioned, I had near 40 knobs that needed cleaning and polishing. I was not sure whether they were brass or copper. To me it looked like they were brass over copper knobs. Anyway...
I was not so bad cleaning and polishing the first three knobs or so. I carefully rubbed them down with a bit of brasso on a soft cloth just like the directions had stated. I waited about 2 or three minutes for the product to dry over the knobs, then I took another cloth and wiped the product off, then I continued rubbing to polish. I was not impressed with the first time I tried this product. I found that if I repeated this process at least 3 times, then I was able to restore them to ALMOST perfect condition. There just seemed to be some stubborn spots that would not come as clean and shiny as I would have liked.
I was hoping that this whole process of my cleaning and polishing would not take me over an hour to finish. Was I wrong! I am ashamed to tell you how long it took me to complete this project. I became impatient after the first few hours of cleaning and polishing.
I decided to go against the grain and not follow the directions. This was a huge error on my part!!! Directions are usually there for a reason, but I am stubborn, and felt a need to find a "better and faster," way of doing things.
I decided since the chemical were so strong smelling that I would take my project outside and I placed newspapers on my padded card table. I proceeded to take a foam disposable dinner plate and place it on the table with about 6 or 7 knobs at a time on it. I poured the Brasso straight from the bottle over the plate of knobs. I got an old throw away toothbrush and began scrubbing the knobs with generous amounts of Brasso. I then placed them into a separate foam plate to dry. I began polishing the product off. It was not any better going against the products directions. In fact I ended up scrubbing more, because the longer the product dries on the knobs, the harder they became to polish.
Frustrated, I decided to pick up the foam plate. When I did this, the foam plate fell apart. It totally ate through it, along with the finishing off my card table. As stubborn as I was, it took me over two days to complete my project of polishing these *&^%*&#^%$ knobs!! I went back to following the package directions. I get down to the last three knobs and someone had noticed what I was doing and gave me some helpful hints on how to polish these old knobs the next time. I will just say that a little toothpaste and a fine type steel wool worked much better, faster, and was much less caustic to be around.
One final dislike:
I did not like the pull off tab to open the can. If you are going to open this product for the first time, I would recommend placing it on a flat surface while pulling up on the tab as to not accidentally spill any like I did.
Warnings and Cautions and Ingredients
Be sure to read all of the packaging directions because this product is harmful around children and pets and can even be Fatal. It is flammable, and caustic, and can cause irritation to skin or eyes.
It contains, harmful ingredients such as: Sodium Hydroxide and Petroleum Disstillate.
Overall?
I did not like this product. The fumes were strong. I had found another way that was safer for me to clean these types of metals, and went much faster than the Brasso.
*Note: In defense of this product, I wanted to mention that the knobs I was trying to restore were probably 25 years old, and who knows how the previous owner took care of them? Maybe you would have better luck with this product on your newer items. I will not give it another try, or recommend though.
Would You Care to read a few of my other Product Reviews?
A Product that Won't Kill My Vacuum
Meco Samsonite 2-Step Stool Still going Strong
Bissell PowerForce Upright Vac. works great for about a month
Wow, I love this product- Clorox Splashless
Fantastik wasn't so Fantastic to me
Snuggle: How about some SPRING Blush?
Hot Shot Fogger: I was Impressed
~Dawn~ The Next Best Thing to My Maytag
Scrubbing Bubbles Gel Toilet Cleaner
Recommended:
No
|
|
|
|
Epinions.com ID:
LILvoyce
|
 - Top 200 |
|
Member: Barbara
Location: FLORIDA
Reviews written: 664
Trusted by: 505 members
About Me:
Its time to find the Healthy Me...... This is my year to do that:-D
|
|
|
- Add to My Yahoo!: 
- Add to Google Homepage: 
© 1999-2010 Shopping.com, Inc.