Clean jewelry stains with toothpaste, DON'T DO IT

Jewelry cleaning had to mention toothpaste. Many tips tell us that toothpaste can clean the stains on gold and silver pearls. Although toothpaste is very effective in cleaning some stains, we do not recommend using toothpaste to clean your jewelry. Toothpaste can indeed clean the blackness of silver jewelry, but why don't we recommend using toothpaste to clean it: toothpaste can cause damage to metal surfaces such as gold and silver and the gemstones inlaid on them.

You must be wondering how soft toothpaste is. How could it possibly damage the surface of jewelry?

First, let's mention the Mohs scale of mineral hardness

What is the Mohs scale of mineral hardness

In 1822, the German mineralogist Friedrich Moss first proposed that it is a standard used in mineralogy and jewelry, a standard for expressing the hardness of minerals.

Mohs hardness

Diamond 10; 

Corundum 9; 

QUARTZ 7; 

TOPAZ 8; 

Pearl 3

Every substance in life has a Mohs hardness, such as our fingernails, its Mohs hardness is 2.5; the teeth look strong, but its Mohs hardness is only 6-7; toothpaste melts in water, so soft, but its Mohs hardness is

The cleaning function of toothpaste mainly depends on the cleaning particles contained in the toothpaste. Toothpaste is rich in many cleaning particles. The Mohs hardness of these cleaning particles is 3-4, which is harder than our fingernails.

What is the Mohs hardness of the metal surface of most of our jewelry?

24k Gold -- 2.5

925sterling silver –2.5

18k Gold – 2.8

14k Gold—3.5

It can see that most of these metals, gemstones with a hardness below 3.5, and pearls have lower surface hardness than toothpaste. Therefore, cleaning this jewelry with toothpaste will scratch the surface of the jewelry and damage your jewelry.

Of course, there are two types of damage.

1. Aged Vintage Gold Jewelry

Because of the old retro jewelry, he does some old treatment on the surface of the jewelry to make the jewelry look retro. Don't worry about this kind of jewelry; you can use toothpaste to clean it.

2. The surface of the jewelry is mirror polished.

Most of the jewelry on the market is highly polished with a mirror effect, and even some gold and silver jewelry can use as a mirror in your hand. This kind of jewelry is not suitable for cleaning with toothpaste.

So how to properly handle jewelry cleaning with Mohs hardness below 3.5?

It is usual for jewelry to oxidize and turn black in the air. Usually, we only need to wipe the surface of gold jewelry and silver jewelry with a silver polishing cloth and a gold polishing cloth. The silver fabric and the gold cloth are the polishing materials for polishing gold and silver. Some simple decontamination materials implant into the fiber cloth in nanometers. Therefore, wiping the surface of the gold ornaments and silver ornaments with the silver fabric and the gold cloth can make the silver ornaments as bright as new.

Generally, the used cloth will turn black, but it doesn't recommend to wash the silver fabric and gold fabric because they lose their function after washing with water, and the silver polishing fabric and gold polishing cloth can use repeatedly. Can be replaced with a new one after darkening

If it mades of silver and gold polishing material, then depending on the surface material of the jewelry, you can choose to use a gold polishing fabric or a silver polishing fabric. The decontamination and polishing ingredients in the gold polishing fabric and the silver polishing cloth are different, so they cannot be used together. Silver material use silver polishing fabric and gold material use gold polishing fabric.

So when you buy your favorite jewelry and know how to match it, you also need to understand how to store, clean it properly, and maintain it so that your jewelry will be worn for a long time and bright.