JAX Pewter Black - Metal Finishing Solution - Antique Finish without Heat or Electricity - Gallon

Wow! Using this on white metal parts for a Model Expo Nieuport. Blackens parts in 30 seconds! Very impressive!

Great stuff. Works fast! I clear coat after drying for a lasting finish.

This patina makes silver solder lines a dark graphite color with a nice shine.

The first time I tried this product, I was horrified by the results! I had thoroughly cleaned some test pieces of brass by sanding and wire brushing, soaked some in white vinegar and others in diluted muriatic acid. Dunked the parts in the Jax and they turned a dark brown quite quickly. When I rinsed them with water, the brown coating flaked off and left a splotchy mess on the brass. Some parts looked like copper, other parts were brown. Nothing was black. Horrible and unusable. I got a suggestion to try painting it on with a brush rather than dunking it. For some reason, that made all the difference! I was able to move the Jax around with the brush and got a nice, even coating and it actually turned out to be black! I have been using Casey's Brass Black for several years, but it has a few drawbacks. It's inconsistent on solder and the blue color can stain wood & paint. Jax has a very light blue color in the bottle, but seems to go on clear and doesn't stain. It will also blacken pot metal (cast metal fittings) that are often used on ship models. Casey's will not do that. Parts must be thoroughly clean! On the brass I tested, I left one side uncleaned and Jax didn't do anything to it. I leave my parts soaking in white vinegar after cleaning them (by filing, sanding, and wire brushing) for a minimum of 10 minutes. I've tried less time and sometimes get spots that won't completely blacken. The one drawback is the price. On the Jax website, it is considerably cheaper, but their shipping charges actually wind up making it more expensive than Amazon's price. But it's still quite expensive compared to Casey's. As long as the chemicals stay viable, this bottle will last me for a long, long time.

Worked very well to "age" a brand new 2" pewter owl figurine that was too shiny and silver-looking for my taste. I put the figurine in the Jax liquid for about 20-30 seconds. The chemical reaction started within a second or two and looked like brownish rust. Since it was my first time ever doing this I didn't know what to expect, and was waiting for the brownish stuff to turn black but it just became a darker brown. At that point, using needle-nose pliers as tongs, I took the owl out of the liquid and began rinsing and rubbing it under cool running water (I wore disposable nitrile gloves). As the brown stuff rinsed away I could see the patina left behind was in fact a dark gray (whew!!). With the figurine still under running water, I used Q-Tips to further rub off the chemical that had settled into the nooks and crannies. In the future I would leave the pewter object in the liquid for less time since came out a tad darker than I would have liked, but I do prefer it to how it looked originally. Considering this was my first time doing anything like this I am quite happy with the results.

I have followed the instructions for more than one brand of products very similar to this... and the results have been iffy. I am not sure if its the chemical that's difficult to use correctly, or if its just one of those products that don't quite work as advertised? That said, this brand was a decent value for price. Unfortunately the hardware I was trying to age... appeared to age ok. After having it soak for much longer than recommended. Still running into issues where the hardware seems not to be holding the process. Maybe it's user error,...? However I think that more information could be made available with the product. Still have not achieved the desired effect, as I have to re-finish the hardware. It seems to be hit and miss with what metals will age more quickly. I have had 3 pieces of hardware, made of the same materials... and only 2 aged well. Now all three are losing the black patina. That said... giving this a 3 star review, because it works, but I haven't seen it work well yet.

We're new to stained glass, we used this on a zinc frame. Worked fine.

Does it’s job and is easy to use.