Homemade Ultrasonic Jewelry Cleaner
- Unlike passive cleaning methods, like soaking jewelry in a tray with solution in it, ultrasonic jewelry cleaners use ultrasonic waves and sometimes heat to knock grime off of jewelry. This sparkles and shines the jewelry. After the cleaner has done its job, you'll need to remove the jewelry and give it another gentle scrub with a soft brush to remove any leftover residue, then rub it with a soft cloth to shine it up.
- You can buy an ultrasonic jewelry cleanser, but it's also quick and cheap to make your own with a few household ingredients found in any drug or grocery store. These are the same ingredients used in commercial solutions. You'll need two cups of water, a teaspoon of plain household ammonia, and two tablespoons of a mild detergent, such as dishwashing detergent. Make sure that the detergent does not contain sodium lauryl sulfate, which will make the mix sudsy. Mix the solution in a bowl with a plastic or wooden spoon, a metal spoon will react to the ammonia, being careful not to churn up the soap, and then pour it into the ultrasonic cleaner. Or pour all the ingredients into the ultrasonic cleaner, then turn it on for a few minutes to mix the ingredients.
- Hard gemstones, such as diamonds, sapphires, and rubies, do fine in an ultrasonic cleaner with an ammonia solution. Platinum, gold, and silver do as well. Always inspect your stones to make sure they're not loose in their settings; an ultrasonic cleaner will loosen them even more. Also, if the stones have any small imperfections, also called inclusions, the ultrasonic cleaner could cause those to become larger. You should never put soft stones, like opals, pearls, amber, marcasite, and the like in an ultrasonic cleaner, nor should you use any ammonia-based solution with these soft stones, as they will lose their luster and become damaged.