On Sat, 17 Jul 2004 13:50:54 -0700, in |ô "ted.ffrater"
wrote:

Most rewarding but more time consuming.
Its a little known technique used in the darkest stygian workshops
in the Old Birminham jewellery quarter wherby you use a piece of string
to polish around work and inside holes..

Not all that "little known", Ted. Most experienced jewelers I know, use string
like that. for those holes, crevices, and other hard to reach openings, it's
not only sometimes the only way to reach and polish them, but often, people are
surprised at how fast it can work.

However, my understanding of Jack's situation is wires protruding from an
otherwise flat surface, with solder to be cleaned up not just on the base of
those wires, but likely, more problematically on the flat surface near those
protruding wires. For that, string is less effective. The little rotary
brushes I had in mind are not the bushes on a (usually) wood hub to be mounted
on a tapered spindle on a fixed polishing machine. while these are often what
we pros might use, I am assuming that Jack's setup does not yet include that
degree of polishing equipment. The brushes I had in mind are those small
mounted wheel brushes (also available as cup shapes and end brushes) mounted on
a 3/32 or 1/8 inch shaft for use in dremel or other small portable rotary tools
(or for us, your flex shaft machines) . The ones i use most often are 7/8 inch
diameter wheel brushes in several grades of bristle (the white very soft ones
are wonderful for very delicate work and with rouge)

Also, a note regarding brushes for polishing, for those not so used to them.
use the shortest length bristle you can, for a given use. Longer bristles
don't work as quickly and effectively, especially for initial cut down work
where you're actually needing to remove scratches, rather than just bring up a
high polish. If you need longer bristles to get into an area, then fine, but
shorter ones remain more aggressive when you can use them.

peter