In the alcohol based procedure a container with a lid is chosen. Unbreakable ceramic or heavy plastic is recommended as the danger of fire by accidental breakage of a glass container is very high. A halfway mark is made on one side of the container and the other side of the container is marked in thirds. Then borax powder is added until the top third mark is reached. These proportions would be good for the water based approach as well.
Solvent alcohol is added until the container is almost full.
The mixture is shaken to thoroughly mix it and then the work is dipped in it, quickly placed on the soldering block, and set alight. The alcohol burns with a greenish flame and the heat of its burning deposits an even, thin protective layer over the surface of the metal. Again, where regular flux has to be applied for soldering parts together, firescale will have a tendency to appear. If one is just annealing a single time, as when a highly polished object is repaired, the polish will be almost completely retained on the metal. One might expect that one could prepolish pieces before assembly and perform multiple solderings without affecting the polish but this is not really possible as the firescale preventative is not a hundred percent effective, and after several heatings there tends to be an accumulation of firescale such that the polishing time required is the same as when no preventative was used.