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This isn't 100% miniature related, but I figured Dakka would probably be as knowledgeable on this as anywhere.
Full story:
Spoiler:
My father had an engraving of an RAF Britannia, which I had always assumed was copper that had been inked black, to pick out the details of the engraving. Unfortunately, he wrapped it in plastic to keep it safe, and the plastic reacted with the surface, leaving black stripes all over it. He always maintained that he had asked around, and it couldn't be fixed.
So eventually it passed to me, and I decided that maybe it can be fixed. I noticed that the black could be scratched of with a fingernail (and impossible amount of effort) leaving the shiny copper surface underneath. So my plan had been to strip the whole thing down to the bare metal using isopropyl, and then reapply the ink once the tarnish was gone.
However, before I got into all that, I thought I might try a bit of silver polish and see if that did anything. To my surprise, it did do something... It removes the copper surface, revealing a shiny mirror like surface underneath. It also removes the tarnish, but oddly, it doesn't affect the ink. Perplexed, I removed it from its heavy frame, to discover that it is not copper at all, but a flimsy piece of plastic with a mirror coating, and then a copper coloured coating over the top.
Since I've started removing the copper coating, I guess I'll have to continue, and just have a silver engraving (at least the tarnish is gone). But I've been wondering if perhaps I could put it back, or something that looks similar?
TLDR: I think I might have accidentally removed the copper plating from an engraving (leaving a silver mirror looking surface).
Questions: 1 - Was this ever actually copper? Has anyone heard of copper plating over plastic? 2- Can the plating be put back? I've seen home plating kits, I was wondering if anyone had experience with these? 3- I have an airbrush, copper paint, and glaze medium. I'm wondering if I could just glaze a copper coloured layer over the top of the mirror, and if it might look just as good. Does that sound like something that could work?
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2016/11/29 10:47:37
I have no idea about most of this... but option 3) you absolutely could use an airbrush to give it a very nice copper finish.
If it's really currently a shiny / mirror finish and you do intend to paint it - I'd just prime it black/brown first then do the copper. As long as you do thin coats with the airbrush it'll be nice.
It was probably just a coppery paint originally. My suggestion is just to strip the whole thing and repaint it copper. Weather to taste/age. Or skip the stripping and just repaint the whole thing and weather/age again.
The thing itself is supposed to be highly polished. That's why I was thinking about an orange or copper glaze, so I could capitalise on the already polished surface, and just tint it a little.
I had a look at electro plateing on YouTube... the process looks much easier than I had anticipated. All you need is tub of distilled water, some copper sulphate (or other metal), and a medium sized battery. Apparently, you can plate anything, so long as you hit it up with conductive graphite paint first. Naturally, my first thought was "damn! I could totally chrome plate miniatures". I'm not 100% on if you can literally do chrome, but it would be neat to get the highly polished metal look on plastic miniatures.
As for the engraving, it might already be conductive, as it's certainly got some kind of shiney metallic layer, and it appears it was electroplated once before...
I found other similar engravings for sale online, all from the 1970s. Unfortunately, I can't find any information about the company that made them, or what they are.
They are called Etchmaster Originals, and all described as copper etchings (though evidently they are bit of a scam, given that the copper part is only a few microns thick). There are loads of pictures of them though.
This message was edited 3 times. Last update was at 2016/11/30 07:54:58
