FRAUD ON HOUSEWIVES

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIX, Issue 21328, 1 November 1932, Page 12

FRAUD ON HOUSEWIVES

" NICKEL PLATE POLISH " HARMFUL EFFECT ON METALS Tho way in which Canterbury housewives have been imposed upon by an itinerant vendor selling what ho claims to he a "nickel plate polish" was revealed when a sample of the so-called plating liquid was submitted by the Christchurch Press to two qualified chemists for analysis. Both of them found after tests that it consisted of corrosive sublimate (mercuric chloride), which, besides being positively harmful to any metal surface it is placed upon, is also a dangerous poison. Tho investigation was carried out following the receipt of a complaint from a correspondent who forwarded the remainder of tho contents of a small bottle for which she paid 2s 6d. She found that instead of producing tho lasting, silvery effect claimed for it, objects treated lost their brightness after an hour. One of tho chemists stated that there was a more serious side to the question. Corrosive sublimate, they pointed out, was not a safe thing to have distributed to households all over tho countrysido for use as a polishing material. Buyers were told that it was good for nickel-plating cutlery, and that meant it would be likelv to come in contact with food. Mercury itself was not so harmful as tho chloride". Besides this, there was the fact that tho liquid would ruin any cutlery it was placed upon, and would injure any other metal or plated objects to which it was applied. Ino alloys of spoons would be damaged by mercury, while if any of the sublimate were placed upon aluminium objects it would eat a holo right through them.