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spray siliver

Hand Lettering topics: Sign Making, Design, Fabrication, Letterheads, Sign Books.

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Jeff Umsted
Posts: 37
Joined: Fri Apr 09, 2004 9:55 pm
Location: Lapeer Mi.

spray siliver

Post by Jeff Umsted »

Hi all!

I have been reading up on the silvering thing a bit and noticed that a lot of the production mirrors are sprayed with a gun. Its not the same silver solution thats poured on is it? If so would the process be the same except spray instead of pour?

Just thinking again!
Jeff Umsted
Jeff Umsted
Lapeer, Michigan
Roderick Treece
Posts: 1086
Joined: Sat Apr 10, 2004 8:04 pm
Location: San deigo Calif
Contact:

spraying silver

Post by Roderick Treece »

The two I've seen spray their silver.I've been told that the big shops spray on a convayor belt system.
After quite a few unsuccessful trys i gave up on doing my own silvering.That lead me to find only two people in San Deigo that do "Resilvering"The first one happens to be 2 miles away which was great.
So when I got my last chipping project (31 sqft) ready to be silvered I called the local guy and found out he was sick and would'nt be coming back soon.
The next guy is about a hour away .I pack up my project and took it down there.What an experience it has been meeting Joe Sewel.He's 88 years young and mirrors out of this ramsackle of a set up.He mixes all his formulas from scratch and he sprays his silver on laying down flat.The other guy sprays his vertically but he buys his formulas mixed.I also asked Joe if he knew about angle guilding.He'd never heard of that but he used to do gold mirroring all the time.When I asked him if he could do it now it sounded like it would be much trouble to change over his silvering set-up.
I took another load of glass to him today.I showed him one of the completed pieces he'd mirrored the week before .
He gave me a little secret regarding removing the silver.He removes the silver with muriatic acid 20% solotion .Or you can use silver strip. He doesn't get near the backing paint with the acid.The striper will get under the the backing and tarnish it.When he's right next to the backing paint he uses powdered pumise and water,rubbing the silver off with his finger.Sounds like a gold leaf tecnique to me!
I'm still going to try to do my own silvering on small peices .But if you can see it being sprayed on you know why they do it the way.It would be like trying to pour a paint job on a car.
If enough people are interested in getting Joe to do a "gold Mirroring"demo I will ask him if he's up for it.Let me know

Thanks Roderick
Roderick Treece
Posts: 1086
Joined: Sat Apr 10, 2004 8:04 pm
Location: San deigo Calif
Contact:

Post by Roderick Treece »

I forgot to mension that the spray gun has two hose feeds to the gun and that the chemicals are mixed in the air out in front of the gun poir to hitting the glass.As far as I could tell the first local guy had all the pre mixed chemicals from peacock labs.Joe has all these unmarked dark brown bottles the he mixes he's "Brew"

Roderick
Jeff Umsted
Posts: 37
Joined: Fri Apr 09, 2004 9:55 pm
Location: Lapeer Mi.

spray

Post by Jeff Umsted »

Them (young) old guys sure have a way of making ya feel un-knowledgeable don't they?:P
How did you find these guys? Yellow pages? I would love to see a demo but its gonna have to be video tape or something along that line seeing that I am in Mi.
I can spray a mean paint job on a car or boat but you can wet sand and buff to a liquid shine with those. I would guess with a mirror you would just lay it on thick but that would only be a guess. Reckon I am gonna have to do some more research on the process. Thanks for the good info Roderick! Much obliged!! :wink:

Jeff
Jeff Umsted
Lapeer, Michigan
Mike Jackson
Site Admin
Posts: 1705
Joined: Tue Apr 06, 2004 11:02 pm
Location: Jackson Hole, WY
Contact:

Post by Mike Jackson »

Try visiting this link:
http://www.cometobuy.com/elitefin/elite ... ?number=38

There is an 8 photo slide show illustrating a home shop silvering system. You can at least see how he does it, even if you order the supplies from Sarah King.

I'd say you need a serious air filtration system if spraying silver. Without it, you'd have silvered lungs.

Mike Jackson
Mike Jackson / co-administrator
Golden Era Studios
Vintage Ornamental Clip art
Jackson Hole, WY

Photography site:
Teton Images
Jackson Hole photography blog:
Best of the Tetons
Jeff Umsted
Posts: 37
Joined: Fri Apr 09, 2004 9:55 pm
Location: Lapeer Mi.

Post by Jeff Umsted »

Thanks Mike!! That gives me an idea of the process. $1600 bucks!!! :shock:
I'll pour! Thank you!

Jeff
Jeff Umsted
Lapeer, Michigan
Mike Jackson
Site Admin
Posts: 1705
Joined: Tue Apr 06, 2004 11:02 pm
Location: Jackson Hole, WY
Contact:

Post by Mike Jackson »

It has been a long time since I bought mine, but my spray gun was around $300. I only used it once or twice. I think Frank Mason had one for sale a few months ago.

Mike
Mike Jackson / co-administrator
Golden Era Studios
Vintage Ornamental Clip art
Jackson Hole, WY

Photography site:
Teton Images
Jackson Hole photography blog:
Best of the Tetons
Darryl Gomes
Posts: 14
Joined: Thu Apr 08, 2004 7:04 pm
Location: Underwood, Ontario Canada

Post by Darryl Gomes »

When I was working in Toronto, we used to spray silver out of high voluve spray bottles. We would mix the activator and reducer in one bottle and the silver in the other. After tinning and rinsing, we would grab a bottle in each hand and spray them together so the solutions would mix as they hit the glass. It worked really well and if you saw some thin spots you can easily add more silver there without having to pick up the glass and roll the silver around.

Darryl
Jeff Umsted
Posts: 37
Joined: Fri Apr 09, 2004 9:55 pm
Location: Lapeer Mi.

spray

Post by Jeff Umsted »

Hi Darryl,

Do you mean like a spray bottle like a windex bottle? The ones with the trigger hanging down? This sounds like my sorta thing. Thank you for the great tip! :D

Jeff
Jeff Umsted
Lapeer, Michigan
Mike Jackson
Site Admin
Posts: 1705
Joined: Tue Apr 06, 2004 11:02 pm
Location: Jackson Hole, WY
Contact:

Post by Mike Jackson »

Jeff and Darryl,
When Rick first started showing us the Angel Gild process, he was working mostly upright on doors and windows, using a "Prevail" spray bottle. He'd mix the two parts in one bottle, mix and swirl it until he thought the two were "going off" and then sprayed it on the glass. He either used a small collection tray or a bunch of rolled up paper towels taped to the glass to catch the solution that was dripping down the glass. It worked, but you had to know what you were doing and be able to adjust your formulas on the fly to fit the needs that day on that piece of glass. Silver was not so bad, but gold was much more tricky.

We are talking about two different animals here. One would be a small interior glass sign and the other big spray units would be for large, fully covered pieces of glass.

Mike
Mike Jackson / co-administrator
Golden Era Studios
Vintage Ornamental Clip art
Jackson Hole, WY

Photography site:
Teton Images
Jackson Hole photography blog:
Best of the Tetons
Darryl Gomes
Posts: 14
Joined: Thu Apr 08, 2004 7:04 pm
Location: Underwood, Ontario Canada

Post by Darryl Gomes »

Hi Jeff.. Those are the bottles.. Make sure you get the ones that have a large volume of spray. We got ours from Home Depot. I think that they hold a quart of liquid. I'm sure mixing it all together would work, but I think that what you mix would have to be used within a few minutes, where mixing in 2 bottles allows you to keeps your solutions longer.

I believe the largest pieces we did were just over 2'x3' with this method. I would think you could go larger quite easily.

Darryl
Darryl Gomes
Underwood Ontario
Gavin Chachere
Posts: 1
Joined: Sun May 30, 2004 8:37 pm

Post by Gavin Chachere »

Carbit Paint Co sells a sprayable mirror backing paint in their industrial line,dunno if thats of any help to you or not.
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