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Pickler

  • Thread starter Thread starter gonenorth
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gonenorth

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Hi Everyone,
Does anyone know what a 'pickler in the button trade' would actually be doing in the 1890s?
 
Hi Gonenorth I Have come across " pickling shops " while working in various factories and basically brass is left in a weak acid or maybe alkaline solution to clean it , the atmosphere in those places was choking the fumes were terrible Bernie
 
Hi Gonenorth one of my first jobs was in a sheet metal shop and it entailed dipping mild steel brackets for railway lanterns prior to dipping in the tinning vat it was a cleaning process all sorts of trades used the process cheers . 33bus tom
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Thank you for the information - that brings that trade to life - smells and all - poor fellow.
 
Heres what my Grand Father did and they called him a Pickler


3. A chemical solution, such as an acid, that is used as a bath to remove scale and oxides from the surface of metals before plating or finishing


All he ever wore was a leather apron and his arms were covered in burn marks caused by the splashes.
 
In the electro plating game they call it degreasing in a vat of trycoline
before any plating operative puts into any chemicals
ie; brass copper .zinc and most certainly nickle and chromeand in barrell plating you do not have to also anodizing you do
have a nice day astonian ;;
 
I used to work in the offices of an Electro plating company in Caroline Street.
I can still smell the smell of the Pickling shop.
They used to have wooden pallets to walk on because the floor was so wet and corrosive and wore huge rubber gloves and aprons.
 
hi alberta
I am an electro plater by trade from and i have worked at most of the plating firms around hockley and alot of them should not be allowed to operated under the health and safety the conditioned was always appauling i remember that company you worked in it was a posh place with good working conditions but they rarely advertised vacancies i always kept my eyes open for that place but never got my foot in the door have a nice day alberta best wishes astonian ;;
 
My last job was a machinist working for a company which had its roots in Birmingham. Many will recognise the name Wigin Nickel Alloys, I worked for them at the Hereford factory.
Sometimes ,if work was slow, I worked pinning coils in the large pickle shop. Two days later my throat was sore and my arms red raw. The works overalls just rotted.
Must say the Health and Safety Laws put a stop to it and pickling became a safer occupation. Is anyone going to start a fettling thread for that was as bad.
 
If you go to the Museum of the Jewellery Museum Quarter, (which still contains almost everything as it was when Smith and Pepper closed down there in the early 1970s I believe) you can see the many evil processes which employees were expected to do. The last one for many metal products was 'finishing' - or dipping in acid. It's unthinkable now, but people did this full time until they retired for health reasons (if they survived that long).
Peter
 
Thanks everyone - that has been really interesting. I'm wondering what 'fettling' is???
Best wishes,
Gonenorth
 
Gonenorth, A worker doing fettling is smoothing castings large or small of large bits of casting before they are polished. Len.
 
fettling is taking the sharp ends off products that have been manufactored
by a company such as alumimium casting [ metal products ] i worked for the birmingham alulmimium die casters on ickneild port rd as a fettler i was also a ali- die caster
fettling is standing in fromt of a grinding wheel and turning it around in your hands
and grinding off all sharp edges of the casting and smothing the edge of the product
i have also worked as a caster for j,v murcotts casting in aston by lovers walk
and worked in shady lane great barr ali casting
that my fiemd is fettling you could also used a hand tool to fettle
 
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