Brasso

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This article is about Brasso metal polish.

For Brassó, the Hungarian name of the city of Braşov in Romania, refer to Braşov.

For Brassó, a historical county of the Kingdom of Hungary with the above city as county seat, see Brassó (county).

Brasso is one of the most widely-used and well-known metal polishes in the world. It is a light brown, opaque liquid which smells of ammonia (the label of Australian Brasso claims "Liquid Hydrocarbons 630g/L; Ammonia 5g/L).

Brasso has been in use for over 100 years, and originated in Britain in 1905, after a representative from the company Reckitt and Sons brought a sample of liquid metal polish from Australia. The polish grew in popularity in England, eventually replacing the previous paste-style polishes. It has undergone very few changes in both composition and package design over the past century. Cans are often collected as a typical example of classic British advertising design.

[edit] Trivia

Brasso is also used to polish CDs prior to ripping them with a utility such as Exact Audio Copy. It is a mild solvent and a mild abrasive, so when applied to the reflective surface of the CD and rubbed radially, it can smooth scratches and reduce their effect. Although the effect is invisible to the naked eye (and often makes the surface look more opaque), it can tremendously improve the ability of many CD-ROM drives to read the disc.

Brasso has also been used to polish out scratches on the reverse side of iPods and similar MP3 players [1].

Because of its usefulness for CD and iPod restoration, there is now significant demand for Brasso in the USA, but it is often difficult to find in American supermarkets.

Brasso can be spotted in the blockbuster movie An Officer and a Gentleman, where the cadets use it to polish belt buckles.