Physical Vapor Deposition (PVD) (Also Known As Thin Film Deposition).

It may be tougher than electroplating.

This post was edited by brickeyee on Wed, May 22, 13 at 14:31

I've dreamed of stripping those lacquer finishes off faucets too.

When you do something like this, you have to be prepared for plan B, starting over. $350 is not an inexpensive experiment, so if it fails you can end up spending as much as if you had gotten the more expensive item you wanted in the first place.

If you try it, you could order a replacement handle or something to experiment on first.

And continue the hunt. Sometimes it takes forever searching but often you can eventually stumble upon what you're looking for. Now, I would never (or be able to) spend $1000 or close for a faucet, so sometimes you do just have to float back down to earth and find another beautiful option that will work well enough. I have had to compromise on dreamy selections and find I love the outcome anyway.

The material typically use for the "deposit" with PVD on faucets is zircon, a good bit tougher than lacquer.

In another life a few times I had stripped chrome off of some solid brass parts using a buffing wheel. That was a bear and I was better than average at buffing with everything I could possibly need at hand. My guess is that PVD would be more difficult. I'd continue searching.

ooohhh - jakuvall, I think you just saved me from a big mistake! Thanks so much.
I think I will take snookums advice and keep looking for a bargain.

Look at Huntingdon Brass faucets. They aren't horribly high priced.

You can remove lacquer from brass by dipping it in acetone. Is that what you were planning to do?

cella,

I just ran across your post & am wondering if you ended up with an lacquered brass faucet in your kitchen. If so, what did you go with? I'm looking for one too. Did you "un-lacquer" a shiny brass, by any chance?

Curious if rosylady's process works w/out doing any destruction to the faucet?

If anyone else has feedback, I'd love to hear it.

Thanks!

I'd also like to hear if anyone has experience in un-lacquering faucets? Which faucet did you decide on? I really am looking to do this so any advice would be great!

I just removed lacquer from 1985-ish polished brass bathtub jets. I used zip-strip, because I couldn't remove the jets.

1985 would not have had the PVD lifetime finish. Would have been just lacquered brass.

yes, it was just lacquered brass

would love to know if you had any success! It is a few years later!

Update on removing lacquer - the de-lacquered jets looked great, but they tarnished; even though it's supposedly popular to have that "patina'd" look, I felt that I had to polish them every month or so.... In the end, I had them replated in polished nickel!

I have the same question-- specific to faucets. There are guides everywhere on removing lacquer but I'm concerned about damaging the faucet contents (the one I have is not yet installed)...