Video Transcript

If you’ve got silver or silver-plated items in your house, sooner or later you’ll have to deal with tarnished surfaces. Here’s how to remove tarnish from silver.

The reason silver tarnishes is because of a chemical reaction with sulfur that’s in the air — but you can reverse that chemical reaction with a little science experiment right in your kitchen.

Start by taking a shallow dish and line it with aluminum foil. Make sure you set the foil down in the very bottom of the dish and line the entire surface. This is important because the silver needs to come in contact with the aluminum.

Now, go ahead and pour some boiling water into the dish that you lined with aluminum foil. Then add some salt. Salt will dissolve pretty quickly in that boiling water.

Finally, slip in the silver piece and make sure it’s completely covered with boiling water when the silver comes in contact with the aluminum. It creates an electrical current that will help eat through that tarnish.

Look at this: after just a few minutes, how much cleaner it is.

There you go — that’s how to remove tarnish from silver. This Simple Solution took that tarnish right off, and no polishing at all is required.


Editorial Contributors
avatar for Joe Truini

Joe Truini

Radio Show Co-Host

Joe Truini is a contractor, author, and the host of “Simple Solutions” on Today’s Homeowner TV and the weekly Today’s Homeowner radio show. He has worked on both large commercial projects and residential remodeling, and has written for national publications such as This Old House and Popular Mechanics. He has also written eight books, including three best-selling shed-building books. Joe lives in Connecticut with his family and enjoys hiking, traveling, and baseball in his spare time.

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