Furniture, Wood and Cabinetry Finishing - Cleaning brass hinges of wood interior doors

I am in the process of cleaning some old brass hinges (70+ years old) of wooden interior doors. The hinges had a lot of paint (when trim was repainted many times over) and/or were heavily tarnished. I soaked them into paint stripped, cleaned them, and buffed them with Brasso. They look much better now, although they don't look "like new" (which is OK, since I want to leave a bit of an "antique look / antique brass" look rather than a "polished brass" look). Two questions:

1) Was my method fine? Or was there any other method? Given that some hinges had paint on top, using stripper sounded like the olny option. Another alternative to Brasso?

2) I want to put a clear protective coat, to prevent further tarnishing Would it be OK to use some spray cans of polyurethane? Or spray cans of polycrilic? Or spray lacquer? Or something else?

Thanks

Carlos

I think that your technique was good and your options for clear coats are good. I would use spray lacquer since it will dry extremely fast, enabling more coats in the same day.

I agree, I often soak hinges in deglosser of laquer thinner to remove paint but stripper would work better if their were multiple coats of paint.

Be glad you have old hinges. Most of the new ones have such a thin brass plating that most any method will remove the brass along with the paint.

Thanks you guys for your help!