Amateur Silversmith

Back at it ...

2009-10-12T10:44:00.007-04:00

Now that the weather is not as nice outdoors, it's a little bit easier to get down to the shop and work on silver again. I made a good start on the new ring that I was planning to make at the beginning of the summer.

As you can see, I have the band made, soldered on a flat piece of silver onto which I soldered a bar and a copper ball.

I even got as far as soldering on the bezel that will eventually hold the amethyst cabochon.

Pretty good progress for a first few hours in the shop !

B.T.W. The band is only soldered at one end, I want to make this ring somewhat adjustable.

Next Ring : The Design

2009-05-30T10:06:00.004-04:00

I had to take a little break from hands-on work, but I did some work on the next ring's design.

This is my attempt at drawing what I'm trying to achieve. The band will be made of silver, the band size will have limited adjustment since one end will be free to slide under the top.

The top will have an amethyst cabochon set in a silver bezel, beside 3 small brass balls, along with a textured brass step.

As usual I will post pictures as I fabricate the ring. I've made silver balls before, but not in brass, this should be interesting.

Ring from Scraps : Part IV !

2009-05-30T09:35:00.006-04:00

I was just not really satisfied with the ring that I ended up in part III.

As luck would have it, one of my friends visited northern Ontario a while back and visited an amethyst mine. She brought back some beautiful raw pieces and offered some to me.

So, that gave me an opportunity to incorporate a raw amethyst into the design of the band.

I reduced the size of the band, shaped a hole and incorporated the amethyst into the brass top. I had to grind the back of the stone to ensure a comfortable fit.

Here's the result, Dawn loves it.

Real Dumb !!! Don't do this at home !!!

2009-05-10T20:41:00.006-04:00

Well, last weekend I broke 2 very important shop rules that I have...

never work with sharp tools when tired
always use the right tool for the job !

I was working on removing batteries from a dead laptop battery pack. It was Saturday evening, I did not feel like going down to the shop to get my Dremel cutting tool, too tired to make the trip downstairs... and opted to use my trusty "very sharp" Swiss army knife...

Well it did not take long, the knife slipped off the plastic case and went right through the web of my right hand... drat !!!

Fortunately, I missed the median nerve, but did nick a vein... so off to the emergency room...

6 hours later... stitch in hand... now I can't do handwork for a while.

That will teach me !!

Hiatus in Jewellery Making Land...

2009-04-26T21:27:00.003-04:00

Between the 2009 Mission to Mars program at Pinecrest Public School and the arrival of Spring gardening, it has not left a whole lot of time to spend in the shop. I do intend to get back to it as soon as the must do in the garden is done.

New Ring :: Part 2

2009-04-05T09:54:00.006-04:00

As I mentioned in my previous post, I could not wait to try out my new torch.
I continued my work on the new ring; lots of welding of various metal types.

The design and shape of the ring is rather modern and asymmetrical. The band is made of brass with small sections and appliques of silver and has a copper insert.

I got my new torch !!!

2009-03-31T21:29:00.002-04:00

I found out a while back that Bernzomatic makes a nice mini torch. The ST900D is a mini torch with a 4 foot hose. It has a regulator on the gas bottle and a control knob on the handle. It should be perfect for welding small pieces, and I should be able to hold like a pencil. This should give me better maneuverability when soldering.

I could not find a Canadian distributor, so I had to order it from the US... fortunately my good friend Maggie, played middle men, and forwarded the torch from the American vendor.

Many Thanks Maggie !!!

I can't wait to try it out ! It just happens that I have some welding to do on the ring that I started a few weeks ago. ;-)

Stay tuned for comments on the torch !

Starting on a new ring...

2009-03-21T14:37:00.005-04:00

I made it back into the shop today, I started on a new ring.

The band is in four sections. 2 long lengths of brass and 2 very short pieces of silver.

The parts are welded together and form a band that will be 1/4" in width.

I started by flattening a bar of brass to the desired thickness, then cut two lengths from it.
I then flattened a short piece of silver to the same thickness and cut two pieces from it.
I annealed the brass lengths, then shaped them around the ring mandrel.
I straightened and cleaned-up the ends of the brass and silver pieces to get them ready for soldering.
I made up a temporary jig with tweezers and by carving a fire brick to hold the silver and brass pieces in position for soldering.
I fluxed the parts and welded the 2 silver pieces onto one of the brass length.
After cleaning the parts again, I fluxed the other brass length and welded it to the other half of the band.
It took a bit of reshaping on the ring mandrel after the welding. I took the opportunity to give a hammered texture to the ring.

That's it for now...

Cam & Follower Ring ...

2009-02-28T17:08:00.005-05:00

I just needed to spend time in the shop this weekend, if anything, to get my mind off work. The week was rather rough... but on the good side, I survived the 16th round of layoffs since 2000.

Anyway, this ring's design reminds me of a cam and cam follower ;-)

The body is a flat band of silver. At the top, two rectangular semi-circular wedges of silver are soldered to the sides of the band.

A cylindrical piece of brass is soldered into a notch on the top of the ring.

All the silver parts came from the scrap box, hammered into shape.

Silver Ring with Sodalite Cabochon...

2009-02-16T13:59:00.012-05:00

Here's another attempt at recycling silver scraps. This time things went more as planned. ;-)

I scribed the flattened piece of silver with the objective to from two long pieces for a simple band.

I cut the pieces with my jeweler's saw and then refined the shape with a file.

I bevelled an end of each piece in order to provide a very strong weld joint.

I then cleaned the pieces in silver pickle for a few minutes to ensure a strong weld.

The picture with the beautiful fire scale, is the resulting joint before it got pickled again.

I now needed to anneal the piece in order to hammer the band into shape.

I brushed on flux, to use as a visual temperature indicator. Once the flux becomes liquid the temperature is just about right.

The flame was removed, and then the piece was quenched in water.

The band then spent some more time into the pickle to remove the fire scale.

I placed the band material around my hand-made ring mandrel and hammered into shape.

I overalapped the band at the top where the bezel for the cabochon will be welded. (black traces

on the band).

The excess material passed the bezel will be bent upwards to form a clutch for the bezel to be welded to.

In this picture you see the clutches have been formed by bending the excess material and filed down to a nice shape.

The bezel fits between these two clutches and rests on the double band.

At this stage the doubled band and bezel were welded together, but the cabochon was not set.

Here the rings has gone through a cycle of cleaning, the stone (sodalite) is not yet set.

When I get a chance, the ring will go through the next level of cleaning, I will set the stone and apply some wax and give it a final polish.

Just in Time ...

2009-02-09T20:55:00.008-05:00

This weekend my wife and I decided that the "fancy" chain was going to be a bracelet.

No... it's not that I ran out of patience... the thing got quite heavy. Making a necklace out of this type of chain would be some heavy !

We made a clasp and large jump ring of sterling silver, and soldered it to the ends of the bracelet.

It just needs a bit of cleaning and some jeweler's wax to complete it.

It was a lot of fun to make together, we're already thinking about a next joint project !

Casting Silver Scraps...

2009-02-07T13:30:00.012-05:00

Well we finished another project this week. So it's time to collect the scraps of silver from around the shop and cast some silver rods.

I use a ceramic crucible that I previously treated with flux to form a nice coat of glass on the surface. I use a MAPP gas torch as it produces more heat and enough BUTs to melt the silver.

Once the silver has melted and forms a nice silver sphere in the crucible, it is ready to pour into the mold. I need to keep the flame just in front of the silver as I tilt slowly the crucible to pour.

This ensures that the spout of the crucible is warm and does not cool-off the silver before it enter the mold. You want to pour the silver quickly but smoothly into the mold. This prevents trapping air into the pour and make an even density cast.

I let things cool down for a few minutes, then I opened the mold and there it is a nice rod of silver.

Ring from Scrap... Part III

2009-02-01T13:11:00.003-05:00

Well things don't always turn out the way you want them...

Remember a while back I said not to mix your metals... well this also means to not mix fine silver with sterling... because the overall melt point lowers and you end up with a melt-down. That's what happened when I tried to fill the gaps that I had in the bezel.

So... not wanting to give up, I changed the design of the ring and it became a band. I replaced the bezel with a piece of thick brass. Once all the welding and cleaning was over, I gave the band a treatment with the ball pein hammer. So the surface now has nice little dimples in it.

I'll see if I can get a better picture of the effect, it really adds to the band.

Regardless, this was a really great learning experience, and really fun to make...from scarp silver, to bi-metal band !

Ring from Scrap... Part II

2009-01-31T16:50:00.004-05:00

This morning I welded some parts together.

The silver band is assembled and sized. Since I don't have ring mandrel (yet), I turned my own in brass on my metal lathe. It's good enough for now. ;-)

I welded two silver sides to the side of the band and two brass sides to form the ends of the "stone" bezel.

There is some "filling" to do to refine the bezel, it also needs to be blended into the band.

I also need to further refine the shape of the band. For comfort, the back of the band should be a bit narrower from the front.

Making a Ring from Scratch... or is that Scrap ?

2009-01-29T19:24:00.005-05:00

One side benefit of making jump rings is that you always end up with some scraps of nice clean silver.

This picture shows the various stages to go through in order to create usable material from scraps.

1. Collect your scraps, don't mix metals ;-)

2. Melt them in a crucible, a MAPP gas torch works best for this and don't forget to heat up the spout of the crucible, otherwise your metal will cool off before it gets into the mold.

3. Pour the melted silver into the mold to make a shape of silver. My mold has several sizes of rods.

4. Hammer the rod into shape. Make sure to anneal the "blob" several times as you go, otherwise, you'll end up with unusable broken pieces.

5. From the flatten piece, trace some nice straight pieces and cut them with a shear, less material loss this way.

6. Hammer your pieces into the desired shape using a ring mandrel or some steel rod.

Ambitious Silver Chain...

2009-01-28T20:13:00.006-05:00

After Christmas, my wife and I decided to work on a common project. It combines jump ring making and shaping with lots of torch work.

All components are made of "fine" silver. It is very soft and easy to shape. But it is pretty close to "impossible" to solder.

The picture shows the various components of the chain. My wife makes the jump rings, then their joints fused with the torch, then she forms them. Meanwhile, I make the pieces that look like push pins. These are short lengths of silver wire with the ends melted into a ball.

Then, the fun part begins. Assembling the chain links together. This is accomplished by alternatively flipping the links and connecting them with the pins... I use the torch to melt the other end of the pin into a ball, that locks the chain link in place.

We have not decided if this is going to be a bracelet or a necklace. It will probably depend on my patience. ;-)

Silver PMC Leaf...

2009-01-28T19:58:00.003-05:00

Here's a really cool piece that my wife made with silver PMC slurry. A while back, we took a course on how to use silver PMC to make interesting shapes that would be practically impossible to make any other ways. This is an excellent example of this.

My wife picked a leaf out of our garden and very patiently applied something like 20 thin coats of PMC slurry.

During the Christmas break I finally got the time to install a proper fan above my welding/soldering area in the shop. We were finally able to fire the piece. After pickling and some deburring, this is what the leaf looks like. It turned out to be rather heavy (solid silver after all). It will make an interesting brooch or pendant.

Arts and Craft Copper Bracelet...

2009-01-28T19:47:00.003-05:00

This is a copper bracelet that I made during the Christmas break.

I recycled a piece of copper pipe that I cut lengthwise with a hacksaw. I used a cold chisel to spread the tube open and flattened it on my anvil with a ball pein hammer.

I cut the piece roughly to the size of the bracelet, deburred it and cleaned-up the copper surface.

I drew my interpretation of 3 McIntosh roses on the surface with a sharpie pen. I then drilled small holes in the corners of the shapes in order to thread my jeweller's saw to cut-out the shapes. I refined the shapes with small jeweller's files and cleaned-up the edges with ribbons of sandpaper cloth.

I then cut the bracelet to size and shaped it with my plastic mallet against a wood form. I have not decided on the finish for the piece, so it's sitting on my desk for now.

Silver Bracelet...

2009-01-27T21:16:00.009-05:00

This is a silver bracelet that I made while attending a class in the fall last year.

I cut the silver segments, then gave them a full turn twist, while holding them in pliers. I did not anneal the silver as I wanted the segments to hold their shapes.

I formed the connecting rings and filed a flat at the joint. I then got a lot of practice soldering the rings to the end of the segments.

I made the elongated jump rings, connecting the segments together, then soldered the joints of the rings.

I made the catch in a similar pattern of the segments and jump rings. I soldered a small connecting ring to the catch bar and attached it to the last segment. The catch ring is sized so the bar just slides in but will not accidentally come loose.

The bracelet then spent a bit of time in pickle to remove the soldering by-products. I then carefully filed and sanded all the solder joints. Finally it spent a few moments in the tumbler filled with stainless steel shot.

About this blog...

2009-01-27T19:35:00.000-05:00

Just a little space on this huge Interweb thing, where I write about my attempts at creating interesting pieces of jewelry in silver and copper.