But Ammonia is a diamond's worst enemy! There are probably a hundred recipes floating around the internet for homemade jewelry cleaners containing ammonia. There are thousands of people using these horrible instructions and they are ruining their rings, bracelets, pendants and chains.

Here are a couple of quick rules concerning ammonia and jewelry:

1. Do not use straight ammonia to clean jewelry
2. Do not use diluted ammonia to clean jewelry
3. Do not use any ammonia to clean jewelry
4. To clean jewelry DO NOT USE AMMONIA

Gold and silver are fairly soft metals and ammonia is a strong, toxin that will actually eat these metals. It takes time for the damage to reach critical mass and you probably won't know there are problems until it's too late.

The ammonia does its worst work on the tiny and delicate prongs that hold your ringstones in place. This is how people lose thousands of dollars worth of gemstones every year.

Using ammonia based cleaners is like playing Russian Roulette. You may win for a few clicks but sooner or later......BANG!

Gems such as Onyx, Opals and pearls will quickly fall to the tortures of ammonia because they have soft finishes that will erode rapidly.

Be especially careful of sonic cleaners if you have been using the Ammonia cleaners. The sonic cleaner can deal a death blow to weakened ring prongs and bracelet and chain links.

So how do you safely clean your jewelry?

That will be the subject of a further hub.