antiquedoorknobmetal
I restored antique brass door knobs and plates.
This is what the brass looked like before restoration.
This is what the brass looked like after restoration.
The door knobs have a color mix of yellow and copper. The plates have mostly copper color.
Which color is supposed to be the original brass? And what or where is the other colored layer from?
There's a pivot joint in the middle of the knob shaft which lets the two ends rotate relative to each other. You need to get things lined up so each end of the shaft engages just its side of the lockset. That may take some experimentation to get the amount screwed into each of the knobs just right to balance this out, though the cross-pin should help you find the right position.
A pin in the small hole starts it. Pull on the handle as you push the pin in the hole. An ice pick or small nail will be strong enough to do what you need. After the knob is off, you may be able to remove the rosettes as you suggest, but a lot of the rosettes are removed by prying of the rosette by setting a flat screwdriver tip in the slot that is visible at the edge of the rosette where it meets the door. This is usually located on the low side of the rosette. After that is off, the 2 screws that hold the rest of the knob is visible.
This is for the other hole, this is just for the idea, the pin on this one is too big to fit in the hole of the rosette.
It takes a little finess to remove, first be certain you are able to depress the release. On practically every schlage I worked on, only one side will release. Once you know you have something depressed, lightly push and pull on the knob, you should be able to observe the slight movement of the knob at the hole were the pin is inserted, the hole will move one way then another to touch the pin. Once that is confirmed, pull the knob and release the pin after a firm pull is made. If it does not work on that side, try the other side. It will work.
Best Answer
Copper is "red", adding zinc to it makes it brass and the more zinc the more yellow/gold. However , there is always an exception. Yellow brass is usually 70 Cu; 30 Zn, but a cheaper yellow brass is ( muntz metal ) 60 Cu ;40 Zn and is a little reddish compared to 70;30. For these two alloys the color trend reverses. So it looks like the knobs are 70;30 and the plates are 60;40 ; both are brass.
These consumer items are very unlikely to be bronze ( Cu + tin ) which is more red than brass.
Well over 100 years ago some consumer items were bronze instead of brass. Plumbing materials are a little different as the better properties of bronze make bronze a little more likely to be used for plumbing.
Very long ago I worked at a secondary copper smelter; they melted copper alloys into standard composition ingots. It was important to separate copper scrap into about 10 categories. Experienced people could sort tons of these alloys by color and form, not counting the pure copper wire and tubing/pipe.