Natural Copper Strips

Our copper strips are 99.9% pure copper, it has an excellent appearance and is good for cold working, fabrication, welding, and soldering.

For bending, grade C106 is a little easier than grade C101 which is a little springier.

Copper thicknesses up to, say, 0.9mm can be cut by hand with tin snips.

If you want to make beaten copper, the best option is to choose a thickness of 0.7mm or below.

We sell a lead-free tin/silver pre-fluxed solder that is excellent for use with copper.

Our C106 copper can also be used as anodes for copper plating.

One face of the copper sheet has a protective film to help reduce scuffs and scratches during handling and working. The reverse face can have some scuffing. This is caused during the cutting process, where large sheets are slid into a mechanical guillotine. The plastic film should peel away easily to show the actual metal. Occasionally, there can be scuffs under the plastic film, but we endeavour to ensure this is minimal by handling full-size sheets from pallet to film coater as carefully as possible.

Scuffs and scratches can be removed after work using an orbital sander with Scotchbrite-style conditioning pads. There are many grades of pads to choose from.

We stock two grades of copper sheet, C106 and C101. The thickness will determine the grade. C101 is 2.0mm and 3.0mm thick. C106 is 0.4mm, 0.5mm, 0.7mm, 0.9mm 1.2mm and 1.5mm thick

We have stock sheet sizes up to 3000mm x 1000mm and 8ft x 4ft (2438mm x 1219mm), and we also offer Custom sizes, CNC Shape Cutting, Fabrication, Welding, Bronzed, and Aged Patina applications on this product. Grade C106 copper is a general-purpose phosphorus-deoxidised copper.

The natural colour of copper sheets can vary a little between batches and between manufacturers. This is normal. Left uncoated indoors and open to the air, copper will naturally go darker in colour due to moisture and oxygen. This process speeds up if the copper is outdoors, changing through shades of brown towards black, and then finally, after maybe 10 years, it will turn green. This is the Verdigris you see on old buildings with copper features.

Copper is a living metal, it reacts with its surroundings, it has great character and appeal.

Copper, aside from silver is the only naturally occurring metal that is naturally antimicrobial in nature. Viruses and bacteria cannot live on a clean copper surface, this includes Covid, MRSA and many other problematic microbes.

If you need a batch of new copper with the same colour as a starting point, you will need to place a special order directly with our sales department.

Copper, which has some variation in colour, will naturally age to the same endpoint.

If you want a copper colour that does not change, then you need to seek out faux copper sheet products.

If required tarnish can be removed from copper with many proprietary brands of cleaners, we find that Bar Keepers Friend is a very good product, this is readily available on Amazon.

C106 finds many applications in architecture and general engineering, particularly in chemical environments, due to its good corrosion resistance. It is also tough, malleable, and ductile.

Grade C101 copper is an electrolytic tough pitch copper with the addition of controlled amounts of oxygen, it is principally an electrical grade copper and good for fabrication and welding

For those interested in the application of patinas to copper there is an interesting book, The Colouring, Bronzing and Patination of Metals: A Manual for Fine Metalworkers, Sculptors and Designers, it can be found on Amazon

Copper comes from mined ore; big producers of copper ore are Chile and Peru, and a new mine is developing in Mongolia. Russia is also a big producer and has large untapped deposits. It takes 1 Tonne of ore to produce around 10kg of copper. Copper is currently very expensive, and the price is likely going to increase due to the green revolution and the extra demand. Copper ore deposits in ocean ridges may become feasible to extract as prices increase, ocean deposits appear to be very large off the Fiji Islands so this would be a boom time for them and likely a disaster for sea life in those areas.

Much more information can be found about copper on Wikipedia