Chrysoprase Necklace

Published on 25th November 201728th November 2017 by coldfeetstudioblog

This past week I gave myself a Pulling Teeth Challenge because that’s just what making jewelry, or anything else really, felt like.

I think I’ve been a bit down for a good while just recently and then, all of a sudden, the sister of one of my good friends died. Just like that. She was one year older than me. I thought I was o.k., but going to the funeral did me in completely, you know the whole death and family stuff, and I still can’t comprehend how my friend or her family feels especially losing someone so young.

I mean they’re just there, and then they’re not.

It was a bit touch and go for a while there and, let me tell you, I was almost on the brink, but you’ll be pleased to know that I think I’ve finally pulled myself out of it.

Hearing about everyone else’s ‘dry’ spells on fb and Instagram, due to depression or anything else really, helped out a lot also.

Put things into perspective.

I knew I was in trouble when I was sitting at my bench and it was all I could do not to just lay my head down on my steel block. Giving myself the challenge of going into the studio every day and making myself start and finish something and then post it on Instagram even though I didn’t feel that I even had the energy to close a jump ring together let alone solder it, started to bring me out of it and on the day after Thanksgiving I thought I’d have another go at making a video.

Just for jollies.

Well for jollies and for the fact that the act of committing to something seems to have been the key to snapping myself out of it. Although it must seem as though I’m always vague and slightly confused I was definitely dragging at the beginning, but by the end I simply couldn’t take myself that seriously especially when I listened back to how awkward I am.

And my god the words! Why can’t I remember the words.

I think when my brain is on the go the words just aren’t always that relevant.

Sorry words. And sorry to those of you watching that might have liked some words that could have actually shed light on what I was trying to explain.

So that said, this new ‘How To’ video series is a bit rough and ready although you can thank your lucky stars there aren’t near as many to get through.

See. Bonus right there.

I do want to say that I will be the first to agree with any jewelry maker who’s been properly trained and who gets upset with someone, like me, who tries to ‘teach’ other people how to make jewelry.

I haven’t been trained. I just get through.

Think of this blog as just a thinking out loud platform for me to share with you how I do things. Not for me to tell you how you should do things. Some things I do quite well, some things not so well, but all of it is meant well and in good faith and for you just to have a go yourselves.

That said here’s my disclaimer.

Please remember that I am just a somebody muddling through. This is the way I do things. I am a wing it, try it, do it wrong, try again, sort of person. I do not maintain that I know what I am doing, only that I am trying to do it. Please feel free to enjoy my discoveries but follow your own research for professional advice and to perfect your skills. Above all, enjoy. Life is short.

Also.

The links to the tools used are only examples of the ones I use. There are many different types available of the same tools, some better than others. If you are beginning your jewelry adventure, please don’t just buy the ones in the links here. Research until you feel comfortable that you are purchasing the right tool for you.

And so without further ado…

For the Chrysoprase Necklace you will need.

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Materials:

A stone

🙂

(I used a 23 mm x 16 mm chrysoprase)

Silver sheet.

(I used 23 gauge fine silver)

A 3 to 4 “ piece of silver wire.

(I used 18 gauge fine silver wire)

black max or liver of sulfur etc.

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Tools:

pliers

saw

torch and solder

contact paper or rubber cement etc.

buffing tools

straight line chasing or stamping tool to make the leaves.

sanding tools or file

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Video 1

Where I think I’m just going to show you the necklace I’m going to make, but then decide to explain how I’m going to make it differently than I normally do even though that’s not what I intended to do in the first place and so it’s not really very clear what’s going on until you get further into the videos.

And even then it’s touch and go…

SPECIAL NOTE: It’s ChrysoPRase, not ChrysoPHRase as I’ve pronounced it here. The word was very long. Forgive me.

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Video 2

A quick recap on how I make my bezel collars.

Narrow bezel wire – Rio Grande #101003

Medium bezel wire – Rio Grande #101051

Wide bezel wire – Rio Grande #101076

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Video 3

How I cut my leaves to give them a more 3 dimensional look.

I haven’t shown how I make the basic leaves because I covered that – HERE – and thought it best not to keep going over things you’d already seen.

NOTE: Seriously, I did not lie to the nice snipper guy. I do not use my good snippers to cut off the ends of leaves I use them just for wire. I couldn’t find my old ones. Promise.

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Video 4

A quickie on making silver balls. Skip if you already make them.

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Video 5

In this one I’m figuring out the best way to make the necklace the new way and also deciding if I want to make it into a bracelet/cuff instead.

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Video 6

The contact paper bit.

NOTE: For sawing out fine detail on a piece of silver sticking an image onto it using rubber cement is probably a better choice. I’m not sure if you can print a design directly onto the contact paper because I haven’t tried. I know some people use sticky back labels to get the same effect.

Contact Paper – HERE

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Video 7

More babbling as I figure out the design.

NOTE: As each piece is individual and so not exactly the same shape as each other remember to keep the pieces in their specific order as you go along. I kept forgetting to do this.

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Video 8

Continued belabouring of the design

NOTE: When I make pieces that have a few different layers I pay attention to what I imagine the end weight will be. Sometimes the stone is heavy also. Had I used a slightly heavier stone here and just one layer of silver work I would perhaps have used the 20 gauge sheet, but because there were essentially three layers (including the leaves) and then the stone I used 23 gauge as it all adds up.

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Video 9

Soldering the first two pieces together.

Contenti soldering chips – HERE

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Video 10

Finding my grown up words and moving on to the next stage.

NOTE: I usually run a Sharpie around the edge of the top layer of silver if I want to contour it. This gives me a good guide line for sawing. Pencil rubs off too easily and the thicker Sharpie has a good width for a starting point and I can sand more away later if I want it to be narrower.

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Video 11

Soldering all the little pieces on.

At the beginning of this video you will hear what it sounds like when someone tries to get more than one word to come out of their mouth at the same time.

Doesn’t really work…

NOTE: When I’m attaching smaller pieces to the base I hold the attachments, leaves, balls, etc., close to the flame as I’m heating the base. This means that they’re not coming to the piece cold. Typically they don’t need as much heating as the base so you can control their temperature more by easing them in this way otherwise they may overheat and melt more easily.

MORE IMPORTANT NOTE: DO NOT BREATH FLUX IN. Quench your piece first before putting more flux on it. The heat from the silver sends flux fumes into the air. Heating the flux with your torch also sends fumes into the air, it’s just not as obvious as it looks here. Use an extractor fan if you have one or at least solder in an open, well ventilated area. I have a fume extractor which I didn’t put on here as it would have been too noisy, but even so putting flux on a hot surface as I did in this video is not a good thing.

Penny Brite – HERE

Long tweezers – Rio Grande #115222

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Video 12

Muddling through the next soldering part as I demonstrate to you why your piece of silver should be clean.

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Video 13

Fitting the stone in the bezel.

NOTE: Another reason why something doesn’t solder easily could be because your flux isn’t clean also. Just clean everything. Teeth, hair, clothes, etc.. then you should be covered.

Links – cut off wheel – Rio Grande #346085

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Video 14

Using the Black Max and the first buffing.

NOTE: Really you should wear gloves when you’re using the Black Max or any other chemicals. I have those latex free ones. I would take them off, however, when using the buffing wheel. It probably wouldn’t happen, but I just have visions of a piece of loose glove getting caught up in that wheel and taking your hand off. This is probably my tendency toward dramatic thinking here, but you never know.

You don’t need a buffing wheel, or whatever that machine is called, for finishing your piece. You can get smaller wheels for your hand piece which will do the job. Just maybe not as fast. Links below.

Small hand piece buffing wheel – Rio Grande #338130

Machine buffing wheel – Rio Grande #330541

Small yellow wheel – Rio Grande #332581

Machine 3″ yellow wheel – Rio Grande #332076

3m elongated face masks – HERE

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Video 15

Extra notes on setting the stone.

I was trying to explain here that although the bezel wire fits to the bottom circumference of the stone, because the stone I’m using has a very shallow dome there is a lot more wire to push over to hold it in place. In this instance if you push too much of the wire over the sides of the stone too quickly the silver will likely stretch unevenly thereby distorting the fit. The stone I used in the bracelet video had straight sides and so this wasn’t as critical, but you should always rotate the piece as you push the wire over the stone so that you’re not concentrating on one part for too long..

Also I don’t know if I explained it clearly, but by pushing the stone toward the bezel pusher as you push the wire over, you are always pushing the stone away from its opposite side. You will never get a good tight fit if you do it this way. You don’t have to actually pull the stone away from the bezel pusher very much, just make sure you’re not pushing it toward the pusher. See, not confusing at all…

In case you missed it, or need to go through the torture again, here’s the link showing how I set the stone in the previous bracelet video – HERE

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Video 16

Ceaning up and final buff.

I know it didn’t look as though I was sanding the sides of the bezel gently, but I was 😉

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And so that’s another one done.

🙂

I went ahead and made the bracelet using the method I said I would at the end of the last video and I think it’s definitely quicker and more precise than the way I demonstrated for the necklace. Next time I make something similar I’ll experiment some more and report back, but I think you get the drift.

And here is…

Day 1 of the Pulling Teeth Challenge

Day 2

And day 3

Thank you for letting me waffle my way out of my funk.

🙂

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Bracelet tutorial continued.

Published on 29th October 20171st November 2017 by coldfeetstudioblog

NOTE: If you’re here and you haven’t seen my previous post which shows how I make the first part of the bracelet from hell you might want to take a look at that one first.

Otherwise here are the second batch of videos which show how I made the sides of the bracelet.

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NOTE: That this is NOT stainless steel. It’s sterling silver.

This obvious lack of brain function marks where the bracelet starts to go off the rails. Had I remembered what material I was using perhaps I would also have remembered how to use the darn saw. If I had taken the silver to my bench pin in the first place things may well have been different.

But I didn’t and it wasn’t.

As for the vise holding thing. I’ve written before about my cack-handed relationship with it. I would like to say that it’s a love hate relationship, but I’d be lying. It’s a hate relationship. I know it can do wonderful things, but I seem to have an aversion to it and so only use it rarely. Consequently, when I do use it, I find I have completely forgotten how I managed to work with it the first time and so it’s a learning curve all over again.

You may find this curve painful. I certainly did when I played the video back.

2 X 2″ lengths of sterling silver 5mm x 2mm rectangular wire – Rio Grande #100552

Miter-Cutting Vise and Jig – Rio Grande #112700

Sticky back measuring tape – HERE

Sorry that you can’t actually see the tape in this video. You might catch it in the others, but I have about a two foot length of it stuck on the edge of my table. I like it because it doesn’t get in the way and I don’t have to keep looking around for a ruler. It does wear out on my working table more than on the other tables I have because I’m scraping silver bits around and over it, etc., but it comes in a large roll and is easy to replace. There’s lots of different makes of this tape and some may be cheaper than the one I’ve linked. I like the one with both inches and centimeters on it.

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Making and soldering the bars.

Wolverine ultra flux – If you google it you can find a couple of places that sell it. I haven’t linked to any because it seems too expensive on amazon and I haven’t checked out the other places yet for a good price. I think mine is a 7oz jar.

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Finishing the caps on the bars.

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1.5″ piece of sterling silver extension chain – Rio Grande #632812B

Infinity Stamps sterling silver tags – HERE – I use H

Infinity Stamp custom stamp with tag mate – HERE

As I mention in the video the tag mate system with a custom stamp is quite expensive and actually the tags are also I think, but if you make a lot of jewelry and you’re interested in buying one with your own makers mark on it you’ll have to draw up your art work first. The way I did it was to draw my initials (which is all I wanted on my stamp) over and over again on a piece of paper until I came up with something I liked. Keep the paper white and the writing sharp. I think I used a thin sharpie.

I then scanned it to my computer and sent it to Infinity Stamps. (It was a lot sharper than the image here on my screen).

They charge you extra if you want them to do the art work, and they tried to charge me for alterations on another stamp I’d designed when I felt they hadn’t actually changed anything on it. This was probably an oversight on their part, but you have to be careful as it can add up. If you get the artwork right the first time and feel it’s nice and sharp etc. you should be o.k. Infinity stamps will reduce the image to fit the tag.

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Taking one of the end caps off.

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Not the most flattering working position, but I think I work it well…

Apologies as I tend to wear my old, worn out clothes in the studio. I’m not that good at keeping myself clean while I’m working. Perhaps black isn’t the best colour for buffing dust and cat cuddles 🙂

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Selection of Mandrel pliers – HERE

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This is the video where I go on, again, about the solder going up and over. I tell you every time that happens to me I kick myself. I think I’m more reminding myself here than anyone else. I also didn’t realize how many times a person could say, there you go, in one sitting.

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NOTE: In this next video when I say the ‘thin’ one, I mean the smaller torch head. I typically use a #0 torch head. The ‘thin’ one is a #00 and I sometimes use it for delicate chains. I mean really delicate, like under 20 gauge wire or if the chain has like micro links that you don’t stand a chance soldering anyway. Always up for a challenge. The larger torch head I use is a #1. I like the #1 because you can feather the flame around the piece and it heats everything up evenly all at once. This is good for a final once over if you want to make absolutely sure that all the pieces are solidly soldered or if you’re soldering pieces over a larger surface area. You have to be more careful with the #1 if you’ve got more delicate pieces that you want to attach as it can be a little fierce. However, you can adjust it to get a softer flame which is nice.

I use a #2 torch head to heat down my scrap pieces into maybe 1″ ish blobs which I can then take to my rolling mill to make small sheets. More silver than that is too much of a work out for me. I bought a #4 head to begin with thinking that it was a good one for the job, but it scared the bejesus out of me as it lit with a small explosion like sound and was like the flame thrower Signorey Weaver torches the eggs with on Aliens. That one’s on the top shelf now, out of harms way. For heating the balls at the end of the day, I turn off the tank and use my #0 torch head to use up the acetylene left in the hose. When the flame turns white I turn it off at the torch handle and then I turn down the pressure on the regulator.

I use an Smith acetylene/air torch, so I can’t recommend which tips you use with the other systems. I only used gas and oxygen once when I took some lessons at the community college. It always freaked me out as I could never remember which valve I had to open first. Just knew I was going to blow the school up. Too much anxiety right there.

AND finally, they are cross locking tweezers! Man! Almost drove me nuts trying to figure out what they were called.

This video stops abruptly because I’m recording it on my phone and the phone’s alarm went off. You’ll probably need a break anyway 😉

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Joining the bracelet ends to the setting.

There are lots of ways you can hold two pieces together for soldering. I have a lot of success this way, but sometimes you just have to move it around to see which way is going to be best. My third hand tweezers need to have their ends snipped and leveled which would have probably helped make this set up easier this time.

This is also the video with the shaky hand. I think the inside of my arm was leaning against the side of the table in a funny way and it was resting on a nerve. This may have been because I was holding my arms awkwardly as I tried to solder in view of the camera. Either that or I’m going to have to stop the afternoon drinking…

The alarm went off again in this video because I had it on snooze. Sorry.

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Second attempt…

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Cleaning it up.

Black Max – Rio Grande #331053

This is the bench lathe that I use – Rio Grande # 334016

And these are the buffing wheels that I use to get the result I’m looking for – Rio Grande #330541

I also use these – Rio Grande #332581 – to get into tight places before I give it a final buff with the wheel above.

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Setting the stone.

I think I called the gravers engravers. They’re not engravers. They’re gravers. I would be the engraver, if I were engraving, which I wasn’t, not really, and the graver is the tool, not the person. Just to clear that up. And yes, those things that you can buy at the supermarket that help you see better. Those are glasses.

This is the bit that I like to use (this one or one like it) to clean out the insides of my pieces – Rio Grande #343124

This is the nail bezel pusher – HERE

Foredom H-15 Hammer Hand piece – HERE

Foredom Hammer accessories – HERE

Foredom H.20 Quick release hand piece – HERE

Foredom H.18 Quick release hand piece – HERE

Optivisor – Rio Grande #113201 but you can pick whichever strength you prefer in the drop down box.

Burnishers – HERE

Gravers – HERE

The end.

And if you made it through all of that you’re a real soldier 🙂

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So there it is.

The bracelet from hell is finished.

No laughing allowed as it was my first ever talking picture show.

If you have any questions just ask and if I can answer I will, and if I can’t I’ll make it up 😉

I’d love to see a photo if you make one.

Au revoir.

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I thought I’d try something a little different this time.

Published on 29th October 20178th November 2017 by coldfeetstudioblog

Someone asked if I would write a tutorial on one of my latest bracelets, which I’m happy to do, but just for jollies I thought that this time I’d try to video my process.

I’ve never made a video of myself before and so I’ve never really heard my own voice other than on one or two voice mails so it was quite a shock really. I could definitely hear some american in my accent and it kind of surprised me. Perhaps not a lot of american, and some of you might not even notice it, but it was something I wasn’t expecting and it took a little while for me to realize that this is my voice now. Some of you may know that I come from England, but as I’ve been here for 28 years now I suppose it’s not surprising that the native tongue has mingled with my own. At times I think the cross contamination makes me sound a little Australian perhaps, but god knows I don’t want to offend any Australians out there. It’s bad enough to think I’ve messed up the whole American thing, let alone good old England’s thing.

Will they ever let me back…

Another thing I noticed and which I will warn you about now, is that I ramble. This shouldn’t really surprise anyone who’s ever read one of my blog posts, but it kind of surprised me listening back to it although I do seem to remember now that Peter and the kids have made it a long-suffering point to complete my thoughts.

And there I was just thinking they’d been brought up wrong.

I’m not proud of it. I tried several times whilst making this to get my head into straightforward explanation mode, but until I have some kind of remedial, how to talk in complete sentences, lessons I think I’m stuck with it for now.

Sorry.

It’s like I’m living in a dream land all on my own. All the possible words I could use and calls to action are just up there in my head bumping into each other. It’s like the sentences are completely unsure of whether they should even make the effort to get out of my mouth.

“Shall I go now? No, wait for it, wait for it… Now!

Nope too soon. Call it off. Abort. Abort…”

Really it’s not cool and so unless you think it’s not going to bother you, just save yourself now.

And lastly. What a nightmare!

Making this bracelet took me three times as long as it normally would, which I think is obviously because I was trying to explain my process along the way. (I use the term explain loosely). Also, and this is a huge, good grief!, moment, How clumsy can I possibly be? I think I dropped everything all of the time and the whole sawing using the vise fiasco really should have been my, walk away and do something completely different now! For heavens sake leave it!, clue.

But no. I slogged on and not only did I slog on, I decided to keep it all here, for you, so that those of you just beginning to make jewelry can see just how frustrating it can be even when you’ve been doing it for ages. Today I could probably make the same bracelet again and everything would go smoothly.

But yesterday was another story.

I don’t want to make excuses, but I do think I’ll have to practice if I ever decide to make another video because there has to be a way you can make and talk at the same time, and not only make and talk, but make sure that everything you do is actually in the line of the camera. Yes, I fell foul of that once or twice also. And why not? Everything else was hit and miss…

I also decided to leave everything in, minute by painful minute, because some of you might like to watch it that way. It’s broken up into snippets so that if, after reading this, you have decided to take your chances you can take frequent breaks.

…from which you may decide never to return.

You have been warned…

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And so, without further ado, this is the piece I’m going to be working on.

It is also the piece which, from now on, shall be referred to as

The bracelet from hell.

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Disclaimer.

Also.

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You will need:

Medium sized cabochon. I got mine from HELGASHOP on Etsy – HERE

2 X 2″ lengths of sterling silver 5mm x 2mm rectangular wire – Rio Grande #100552

1.5″ piece of sterling silver extension chain – Rio Grande #632812B

Lobster claw – Rio Grande #613042

Bezel wire

Fine silver sheet

Small length of 16 gauge sterling silver round wire

Small length of 18 gauge sterling silver round wire.

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NOTE: If you watch the videos here and not click over to youtube you will be able to see all of my notes and links. I don’t have any descriptions etc., on youtube.

Making the bezel collar.

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Narrow bezel wire – Rio Grande #101003

Medium bezel wire – Rio Grande #101051

Wide bezel wire – Rio Grande #101076

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Working out the design.

Straight lining tool from 2moontools – HERE

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Coming together for soldering.

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Initial soldering.

Contenti soldering chips – HERE

Contenti siver solder wire – HERE

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Continuing working out the design.

This is a very short one because Peter phoned me half way through. That man. I tell you.

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Taking it back to solder.

This is the one where I like to use the word burn instead of melt. It’s just a thing I do…

Note: When I’m soldering the first leaf onto the stem I mention that the key to soldering is that all of the pieces of silver need to be at the same temperature for it to work. In this case I meant only the stem and the leaf because those were the only two pieces to be soldered together at that time. Had I wanted to solder down the tip of the leaf to the back plate, I would have made sure that the tip was in place and touching the back plate and I would have brought the back plate up to the same temperature also. This would have probably involved concentrating my flame more on the back plate in the beginning as that would have taken longer to reach the soldering temperature than the leaf and stem would. In this way, by paying attention to the temperature of all the pieces around the area you’re working on, you can also avoid undoing previously soldered pieces. If you keep an eye on it you can tell when a piece of solder is about to flow or when a piece of silver is about to melt. There are products that you can buy to coat previously soldered areas that can help prevent solder from reflowing, but it’s not needed in this piece if you’re careful.

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Cutting out the back plate.

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Cleaning up.

Contenti snap on sanding discs and mandrel – HERE – I tend to only use the coarse discs because I’m really impatient. Not necessarily a good thing.

Contenti abrasive discs – HERE

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Finishing up the setting.

Sticky wax – Rio Grande #700187 – Warning. This is a lot of sticky wax. You won’t need to buy any ever again.

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Finishing up the setting – continued.

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Cutting down the bezel collar.

NOTE: It’s not a dapping punch thing it’s from my hole punch making Pepe thing. Also it’s not a ball bur, it’s a cup bur.

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As this part of the bracelet is complete I’m going to stop here. I don’t want to push my luck as there are loads of videos in this post and I don’t know if WordPress has a limit. I’ll show you the next part of the bracelet in the next post.

I hope it hasn’t been too boring. I can assure you that it gets a lot more painful…

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MORE NOTES:

The two types of shears I use are both from Rio Grande – #111244 – #111289

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CLICK for part two HERE

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The How To’s of a ring.

Published on 14th May 201717th May 2017 by coldfeetstudioblog

For Patti.

This really is a fairly simple ring to make.

Honest.

I used 23 gauge fine silver sheet, 18 gauge sterling silver wire, and 10 gauge fine silver wire.

Remember that you’ll have to accommodate for the silver around the cabochon you choose to determine the final size of the ring.

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First up this is just the way that I make my jewelry. I’m self-taught and make loads of mistakes and don’t always do things the best way.

I’m a bit of a muddler really and so the way I do things and the tools I use are not meant to be set in stone.

The best way to view this How To is to take a looksee and see if it’s something you’d like to experiment with.

I won’t be answering the door to any subpoena’s for incorrect information.

Just saying…

😉

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I start all of my pieces with a quick drawing to get a feel for what I’d like to start with.

Sometimes these are brilliant pieces of art work.

Sometimes not.

Here you can see that I’ve already made the collar for the cabochon, but you don’t have to do that first.

I just happened to have this one hanging around for a while because I started off with an idea for it, then couldn’t make up my mind.

I’ve got a lot of indecision on my table.

Then I stamp and cut out little pieces of silver.

Lots of little pieces of silver.

Which I then play around with on the sketch I’ve made adding some silver balls that I have laying around.

Every time I turn off my torch for the day I take out a charcoal block and use up the excess gas in the line to make balls out of the scraps I have laying around.

This way I feel as though I’m not wasting anything and the bonus is I have loads of little balls just waiting for a home.

Of course, however many balls I have hanging around I never seem to have the exact size I’m looking for.

Life can be complicated like that sometimes.

Once I’ve come up with a plan I then take a piece of 18 gauge wire and wrap it around the stone.

I try to do this loosely to give it a little personality.

Here I’ve used sterling silver because that’s what I had hanging around and so I annealed it first to make it more pliable.

If I were using fine silver I wouldn’t have to anneal it first as it’s much softer.

Once I think it’s interesting enough and balances out the stone nicely, I place the little pieces of silver on it to get another feel for it.

And then cut out a piece of the 23 gauge fine silver sheet to solder it on to.

I usually cut out the shape of the pencil line I’ve made around the piece so that I don’t waste so much silver, but for today I’ve just measured out a rough piece to work with.

I did have lots left over to make new leaves though so it’s all good.

🙂

Now I clean it up with my handy sanding pad.

And place the collar and wire on it to solder.

NOTE: I cover all of the plate with flux.

Some old gentleman at one of the shows I did a couple of years ago told me that this helps prevent fire scale, so I decided to believe him and that’s what I’ve done ever since.

Seems to work.

(See more info on this at the bottom of the post)

Also you can see above that I haven’t cleaned the wire for soldering.

I know you’re supposed to, but I’ve found that it’s really the correct heat and the area you heat around the piece you want to solder that is the key. I do, however, always clean the back plate.

I’m not recommending it, just explaining what you see in the photo.

Next I sand around the area to clean it up.

Sometimes this is enough, but sometimes you will need to pickle it.

I then check that the stone still fits using either dental floss to ease it out again, the sticky wax on a stick thing, or, if it’s willing, by just tapping it out.

And now you add the bits.

🙂

I have attempted to make a little youtube video showing how I do this.

It’s quite boring so I’ve sped it up a bit, but if you want to take a look at it I’ll put it at the end of this post.

You’ll see that I place each piece of stamped silver individually around the collar. Sometimes heating a little blob of solder on the bottom of a leaf etc.,and then taking it over to the piece works well enough, but this time I found that I needed to place the solder on the wire around the collar first and then place the leaves, etc., on it for it to stay put.

I use tiny chips of solder from Contenti to do this.

I heat the wire a little then I gently heat a stamped leaf piece as I take it over to the solder. I melt a tiny piece of solder onto it’s underside and then I bring it back to it to the piece to fix it in place.

If you watch your flame and control where your heat is you won’t undo the pieces you’ve already soldered.

Continually watch the silver. You will see when a piece of solder is going to re-flow. Just take your flame away and come in gently again to the piece you want to solder.

This will work most every time once you get the hang of it..

NOTE: You can place all of the pieces on the piece at once and heat it up evenly until they’re all soldered, but I find that not all the pieces will stay put and I also like to make it up as I go along. You’ll see in the video that I sometime try different sizes of balls, for instance, or I might like to add or take away something.

Now I pickle it and cut it out.

You don’t have to use a sharpie to out-line it, but I find it helps me to keep the back plate just a little proud of the top which is the look I’m going for as, for me, it adds to the depth of the piece.

And now this stage is done.

Next up is the ring shank.

You can make this anyway you prefer, but for the purpose of this How To I’ll show you how I made mine.

I took two pieces of 10 gauge wire which I rolled slightly through the rolling mill.

You can leave them round if you wish, or gently hammer them if you prefer.

Once I flattened them slightly I then bent them so that their middles met to be soldered.

That’s when I found out that I’d used one piece of fine silver, and the other piece, which I’d found lying on my table, was sterling.

Told you I mess up a lot.

My life, I tell you.

But we’re not going to talk about that anymore.

Needless to say, when you have joined two pieces of the correct wire together you will bend them around your ring mandrel.

Depending on whether you measured out you wire before hand, which I didn’t, you may have some excess which you can then mark off at the size you want the shank to be.

And cut down accordingly.

You will then need to take your rubber/rawhide hammer to shape the ends around the mandrel.

Next you will need to angle off the cuts so that they will sit flush to the base of the ring top.

You can do this a couple of ways.

By holding it in you fingers to file down.

Or your thumb.

Or you can sand it.

I stick a piece of that sticky backed sanding paper on my table next to my bench block.

Once the ends sit flush you are ready to solder it onto the ring top.

Here I’ve already stamped the bottom with my mark and silver content. You can do this as I’ve done or you can stamp them on the ring shank itself.

I usually stamp my pieces after I’ve made them and before I’ve set the stone.

I balance the piece on one of my disc cutting punches and stamp it that way.

Don’t question me. It’s just a thing I do…

And now you’re ready to finish up.

I cleaned up the bottom with my new favourite abrasive wheel.

You can choose the best way for you.

Then I cut down the collar.

I ran a pencil around the inside of the collar keeping it flush to the top of the stone.

You might want to cut off the collar differently depending on the cut of the cabochon. This one had a distinctive curve that stopped without transitioning smoothly to the flat top of the stone and as I didn’t want the collar to sit short of the top I decided to roll it over the sides of the cabochon to meet the flat top.

I don’t know if that makes sense, but a long story short I felt that the collar would look wrong curved just half way up the edge of the stone.

I next brushed it with Black Max and buffed it down as much as I could at that point.

After which I set the stone and covered it with masking tape to protect it and finished off buffing it until I got the finish I was looking for.

I prefer this brushed look, but you can finish yours using the method you prefer.

And there you have it.

Your new ring.

Hope that all made sense.

I’d love to see what you make.

Happy Mother’s Day.

🙂

As I didn’t want you to watch sugar dissolving I sped this video up a bit, but I think you’ll get the gist. Here I’m soldering the bezel collar and the 18 gauge wire to the back plate using a larger #1 Smith nozzle on my torch which helps to heat the whole area evenly. The solder pieces are already placed inside the bezel collar and the whole piece is raised up from the honeycomb block on one of those titanium strips which I’ve bent into a triangle shape to support it. Once the solder pieces (pallions) begin to shine slightly you might just be able to see that I lift the corner of the silver plate up from the titanium prop with my pick. This allows the heat to get underneath the piece and helps the solder flow.

This lifting of the corner is a great tip and my solder flows every time I do it. I use less solder because of it and it really flows evenly around the whole area leaving no pits on the inside or outside.

Depending on how much you use some of the outside wire will be caught up in the solder flow, but generally only those areas that are closest to the collar. You’ll see that after the bezel collar is soldered I use my pick to pick up small chips of solder to attach the outer edges of the wire to the back plate. In this instance I didn’t need the wire to be completed soldered down as I wanted it to lay in a more natural flow around the piece. I just needed it to be secure, but you can use this technique to fix it all down if you need to.

If you use this technique, at times, if the pieces to solder aren’t evenly heated, you might find that as you bring the solder on your pick to the piece it will flow up over the wire and not underneath it to join it to the back plate. If this happens take another small chip of solder and hold it down with your pick as you heat it so that it doesn’t have the chance to go where you don’t want it to.

This second video, which isn’t 7 minutes long by the way, but is thankfully only as long as the first video, shows how I attach the small leaves and balls.

I flux everything and then heat it up. As I mentioned above at first you can see me taking each stamped piece to the small chips on my board, heating them slightly so that the solder sticks to their undersides and then taking them back to the place I want to attach them to. Usually this works fine, but for some reason today, (probably because I was being watched) they wouldn’t stick. To remedy this I then took the small chips and placed them on the wire where the attachment was to go and soldered them that way.

Let me know if I’ve missed anything out, or something doesn’t make sense.

😉

–

UPDATED INFORMATION – QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS FROM FRIENDS ON FACEBOOK.

If you have anything to add that may be of relevance just let me know and I’ll update it here.

First commenter: Only one issue: that particular flux is not a prevention flux for firescale. It’s a flow flux, to facilitate solder flow. No need to put it all over the piece; just use a little where you want your solder to flow.

From another commenter: I thought all flux covered firescale & flow. No?

Original commenter: No. There are flow fluxes and barrier fluxes. Neither does both jobs.

Another commenter: Sooooo cupronil says it’s both a flux and a fire coat preventative … is that not the case?

Cupronil contains some boric acid and some do use it like Prips as both, but I have not found it to be as good as using 2 separate fluxing preps- all in what you get used to and how you were trained. My training was to fire coat thoroughly, then use flow flux only where you would solder.

–

So.

Published on 14th April 201714th April 2017 by coldfeetstudioblog

I had the old end of the world earthquake dream this morning.

It wasn’t all bad.

As we waited for the pre-quake green black apocalyptic storm clouds to totally cover the sky a small van pulled up down our road handing out supplies to the residents.

Did we need any survival supplies?

I chose a couple of dust masks.

You know, those simple ones with the little vents in the front.

Seemed as though they’d come in handy.

A large high rise was due to fall onto us once the quake started. Instead of moving away from the object of our imminent death, we instead contemplated the chances that the gaping hole torn into the side of the building would fall exactly over where we waited thereby saving us from being crushed to death.

I tried to calculate the exact trajectory of the high rise’s collapse, but ultimately knew that the life saving cavity would miss us by a few inches.

Bummer.

Still didn’t get out of the way though.

–

In other, less violent, news I just managed to send off another $7,000 to charity.

To celebrate.

A chain.

🙂

–

This is a very simple chain which you may have already seen on my Instagram page, and I promise this post is not as long as my last one.

😉

I used 16 gauge sterling silver wire.

I haven’t calculated how much though, so sorry about that.

First up you will need a torch to ball up the end of the wire.

After which I like to use a large cup bur on it to round it out.

You won’t need the bur if you use fine silver as it will make a perfect ball when you heat it, but I tend to use sterling for most of my chains.

You can find a selection of cup burs – HERE.

If you have never balled the end of a piece of wire before simply hold the wire vertically in a pair of tweezers and move the flame up and down the bottom of it until a ball forms. If you keep the flame on the ball for too long after it has formed it may fall off, so be sure to remove the flame when you have the size you need.

Now make a loop as shown.

Solder the ball end at the spot it crosses over the other end of the loop and then make another smaller loop and cut off the extra length of wire.

This loop is turned and soldered just under the first soldered join.

Take the remainder of the wire and ball up the end again.

Make another loop.

This time you will thread the larger loop into the smaller loop of the first link before soldering the loop together.

After soldering it make and solder the smaller link as before.

And continue until you have the length of chain you desire.

I made sure that the balls were all sitting the same way and that all the links matched.

No rules though.

You can mix it up if you want to.

😉

Here are some more photographs of the process.

Now put a catch on it.

And you have a new bracelet.

🙂

Now I’m going to get my survivors guide to the end of the world out and see if there’s anything else I might need to start collecting other than dust masks.

😉

–

The anatomy of a stone cuff.

Published on 7th April 20177th April 2017 by coldfeetstudioblog

This is going to be a long one.

You have been warned…

–

I thought I’d show you how I made one of my cuffs. So if you want to make one yourself, and if you’ve the patience to get through this post, here are step by step instructions.

Before we start you should know that a lot of times I tend to make things up as I go along and only afterward realize that, had I a plan in the first place, things could have been done more efficiently. So if some of the steps here seem just plain wrong it’s just the way my brain works.

Not my fault…

Also there’s going to be a lot in here that seasoned jewelry makers already know and so many of you, who I know can recreate a piece just by looking at it, might want to skip this post entirely unless you’ve been having trouble sleeping.

–

Here’s what I’m working with, you can pick any cabochon that you think is worth the amount of silver in this cuff.

It’s a lot.

As always links are in the photographs and dotted around the text for the suppliers and tools I’ve used.

These are just what I use and are not necessarily what you need to create this bracelet.

Dendritic Landscape Opals from HELGASHOP

First off choose your stone and make the bezel collar.

Here I’m making a collar for the earrings, not the cuff, but the process is the same.

Find the right height bezel wire. You’ll want it to be at least a couple of millimeters, if not more, proud of the stone.

I find I mostly use this one – HERE

For thicker stones this one – HERE

And very thin ones – HERE

Overlap the bezel wire as you fit it snug around the stone and then mark off with a pen or pencil where the join is going to be.

Be careful when you wrap the wire around the stone, especially if the stone has a domed edge, that you don’t push the top of the wire over the stone as this will distort your line.

Cut the bezel wire a millimeter or so away from the line so that the collar will be slightly larger than needed.

It’s better to keep snipping away thin slithers until the size is right than cutting off too much to begin with.

Once you have snipped away enough for the collar to fit perfectly around the cabochon, (ideally so that the stone will slip easily in and out of it without it being too loose), push the two ends into and beyond each other so they overlap slightly then you can pull them gently apart until they meet under a slight tension.

The two ends should be flush together as should the top and bottom of the collar.

Once they are in place I like to squeeze the edges together with a pair of pliers. This takes care of any distortions on the flat sides of the collar.

You can just about see the join here at about 2:10 o’clock.

Or is that 2:11?

😉

This is how I solder my collars.

I like to hold them in a Third Hand – HERE – and solder them with hard solder on the inside of the collar.

You can’t see them clearly here, but the joins are on the bottom waiting to be soldered.

I prefer to use Contenti solder – HERE.

It seems nicer to me.

Just sayin’.

I also like to use their chips for soldering links and small parts – HERE.

And I use Wolverine Flux which you can find on Amazon.

Because someone recommended it to me and I believed him.

Don’t judge me.

As with everything here, you can use whichever products you prefer.

–

Now they’ve all got their collars on.

🙂

Hopefully, if they behave they will become a pair of earrings, two rings and a cuff.

–

Next I cut a piece of silver sheet leaving about a centimeter around the stone.

Here I’m using 23 gauge because I didn’t have any 22 left.

You can then saw or cut it out.

If you use snippers, as I do, it can distort the sheet. In this case take a raw hide hammer, I prefer one of those rubber hammers – HERE – and tap the sheet gently as you pull the hammer out away from the center rotating the sheet as you go.

This will flatten the sheet.

Alternatively you can place it in-between two bench blocks and hammer the top.

Whichever way is good for you.

I then take the sheet and hold it in-between a pair of long tweezers – HERE – and begin to run the heat slowly along the edges of the sheet until it begins to melt.

This can be a little frustrating.

I use an acetylene/air torch so I’m not sure how this will work with the smaller hand-held torches, but the key here is to use a torch head that will heat the edges sufficiently to keep the molten silver moving.

I’ve found that on smaller pieces a #0 torch head is sufficient, but on longer or larger pieces you may need to use a #1 torch head.

Ideally I needed a torch head in-between these two numbers for this piece as the #0 wouldn’t touch it and the #1 took itself way too seriously and wanted to control the whole show.

But, if you’re careful you should be able to melt the edges into a nice crinkly blob effect.

Note, however, that if you haven’t done this before and decide to practice with the torch you have that different metals will melt at different temperatures. So using copper, for instance, which would be great to practice on, may give you a different feel for what you’ll experience with silver.

One thing I’ve found is that it seems to work best if you keep the flame moving at a slight angle along the edge of the silver and then once it starts to melt you can ‘push’ the melting silver along.

(That’s not strictly true as you’re not actually ‘pushing’ the melting silver, but rather new bits are melting as you move along the edge.

Just wanted a visual is all.)

Anyway, watch it carefully as one lapse in concentration can result in the whole thing going to pot and you’ll have to swear mightily and roll around in a tantrum across the room.

Which actually might not be a bad thing as could be you’ll find all sorts of goodies that you thought were lost forever on the floor.

Not that I’ve done that.

So, all blabbing aside, this is what you should end up with.

Which I then clean up with one of these special things – HERE – that I bought a while back and didn’t know what to do with.

The melted edges can be very sharp and this bristle brush takes care of it almost immediately.

Love it when I finally figure out what to do with things.

Now solder the bezel collar to the melted sheet.

If you have trouble soldering the collar because of the rippled edges of the back plate and you find you are left with some gaps that you can’t fill, solder what you can and then quench the piece. Put the piece on your bench block and gently tap the collar with your rubber hammer to close any gaps. If you do this gently enough you won’t distort the collar too much as the silver will already be softened due to annealing during the first solder and it won’t take much to close it.

If it does distort you can place the stone back into the setting and re-form those parts affected. I use wax – HERE – which I have blobbed onto the end of a stick to lift my stone in and out of a setting if I haven’t drilled a hole in the bottom from which to poke the stone out.

Doing this isn’t ideal as you should try to get your bezel collar and back plate to sit as flush as possible, but in a pinch this works for me.

Now you can put a little more flux on the piece and heat it up again so that the solder flows nicely around the edges.

Next I put the stone back in the setting and textured the area in-between the wavy line of the melted silver and the bezel collar. I also textured slightly up the collar.

I then used a pair of pliers to turn up the edges.

You can’t use normal metal pliers as I have here if there is no texture on the back plate as they will mar the silver, but you can carefully use the pliers with the nylon tips, or I have also used my burnisher to push the sides up from underneath.

Again this step can distort the bezel collar so you have to take care not to trap the stone.

Once this is done I cut the inside silver away.

As a note, I have turned the sides of the setting up both with the back still in and with it cut out. Although it seems more logical to turn up the edges with the back already cut out so that the stone doesn’t get trapped I found that, for me, it distorted the setting more and it was harder to get the shape back so that the bottom lay flat.

You could try either.

You don’t have to cut out the inside of the setting, but I like my stone to sit further down into the design as it gives it a little more dimension. It also takes away some of the weight from the larger settings.

Use your pliers to reshape any distortions.

Try to saw away the inside as close to the edge as you can otherwise you’re going to have to do a lot of filing.

😉

I rest the collar on the edge of my bench block and either use my file,

or an old, worn down grinding wheel – HERE – that is able to fit inside the setting.

This can be a bit vicious however so use with caution.

You want to end up with your stone being able to slip right through the setting.

Now cut out another piece of silver sheet just a fraction larger than the piece you’ve just finished.

Sand the silver sheet with a piece of rough sandpaper.

I like these foam backed pads from the local hardware store – HERE.

And use that special buffing thing on the bottom of the setting.

Or whatever you normally do to clean things up for soldering.

I like to lift the larger pieces I need to solder up off the block a little as it really helps to move the heat around.

I use one of those titanium strips – HERE – that I don’t know what else to do with.

I never can seem to bend them into the shape I want, but for this it’s perfect.

When I solder larger pieces I not only raise it up off the block a little, but once the flux has begun to gloss over I lift the whole of one side of the piece I’m soldering up with my pick. This really gets the heat moving around and the solder flowing.

For those new to soldering sometimes you will notice that the solder flows up onto the bezel collar. This is because the bezel wire is thinner and therefore heats up faster than the rest of the setting. The heat draws up the solder. Be patient. Keep an eye out not to melt the collar, but the solder will eventually begin to flow and you will have won the game.

It’s all about where you place the tip of the flame and getting it to heat all of the silver to the same temperature at the same time.

You don’t want to concentrate your flame on one spot, but rather move the flame continuously over the whole area you want to solder.

The very tip of the blue part of the flame is the coolest, so that can be a little closer to the top edge of the collar. The hotter part is about a centimeter out from the blue tip. This is the part that will melt things, so if you bring the blue tip down closer to the top edge of the collar the hotter part of the flame will go down beyond that to the area where you want the solder to flow and not melt the collar itself.

You still have to be careful, but it works.

😉

I then saw away the base to mirror the top layer of the setting and sand it smooth.

And voila.

A little grubby but I’m not complaining.

Now I put it in the pickle and work on the cuff.

–

Here I have a 6″ x 1″, 20 gauge piece of fine silver.

I tend to use fine silver for all my pieces and only use sterling for some wire.

Anneal the silver.

Charles Lewton-Brain says that you know when the silver is annealed when the flame turns orange.

I always looked at the colour of the silver, but now I look at the flame.

It’s good to mix it up once in a while.

😉

Once annealed I start to hammer it over the edge of my bench block to fold it in half.

Bit fiddly.

Eventually I decided it was easier to wedge the silver in-between the block and my bench, push down on the block and whack the thing upward.

Once it folded over as much as it wanted to, I annealed it again.

I then hammered along the very edge on the fold.

Which opened the ends up slightly.

Enabling me to get one of my jump ring mandrels inside and pry it apart by tapping gently on the mandrel with my rubber hammer.

I put the hammered part of the fold, about 5mm or so, into my bench vise and then hammered one side down to make it a 90 degree angle.

After which I was able to fold it back over itself.

And flatten it down.

It doesn’t look tremendously great at this point.

Going to have to work on my folding skills.

Remember to keep on annealing during this process. As soon as the silver seems harder to work with put it back under the flame.

Now you’re ready to stamp.

I hate stamping, and I hate wire wrapping.

Fortunately I only had to deal with one evil here.

You are going to have to level up the underside of the cuff with a piece of metal so that the stamp will mark evenly on the top.

Here I’m using another piece of silver because I was too impatient to find something else.

Not really one of my better ideas although it didn’t spoil the smaller piece as much as I thought it might.

You can use card or something else to pad it with.

Here is the front of the piece ready to continue stamping.

You can gently hammer on the edges of the strip if you find it has distorted during stamping, but the reason it’s distorted here is because I have stamped more on one side than the other which has, in essence, stretched the silver out unevenly.

You can correct this by stamping more on the other side to compensate for this.

Here I have leveled it up and snipped away part of the ends to help with shaping.

And now it’s ready for the edge melting process.

At this point I shape it on a bracelet mandrel.

And take the setting out of the pickle to cut down the collar to the correct height for the stone.

I run a pencil around the inside, snip as much as I can away with some snippers, and then file the rest down.

For this setting I wasn’t as precise as I usually am as I wanted a more uneven look to go with the setting.

I propped up the cuff and used far too much solder on it to join the two together.

But that setting ain’t going nowhere…

I forgot to mention that at some point I also added some balls and whatnots to the setting.

Sorry.

I pickled it once again then painted it with Black Max – HERE – which is not the least toxic of products out there, but is my favourite patina.

Just be very careful with it and always wear a dust mask when buffing it.

Always wear a dust mask anyway.

I give it an initial buff which I forgot to show you, with both a radial wheel – HERE – I like to use these 1″ yellow ones for the tight places and then with my dinky buffing machine – HERE – with this very fine buffing wheel – HERE.

After I’ve got it almost finished with the first buff I set the stone and place masking tape over the top.

Which I then cut away leaving enough to protect the stone.

And then I buff it again.

Until I’m satisfied with the end result…

So I hope you made it through without my boring you to death.

🙂

If you make one, I’d love to see it.

–

So we haven’t had a project in a while…

Published on 1st July 20161st July 2016 by coldfeetstudioblog

And I thought you might like to play along with me.

By the way, Dracula is great. I much prefer it to Frankenstein except that it’s spoiled somewhat by the fact that the Gary Oldman/Keanu Reeves movie is so true to the book that I can see it all playing out in front of me again. I really wanted to imagine it differently this time.

Oh well. Rebecca next…

Or Anna Karenina.

Don’t know.

So onto the project.

I bought a lovely piece of Sage Amethyst and thought I’d make another of my boxy pieces.

So if you fancy making one here’s how I did it.

I drew a rough design around the stone.

Then I took a length of bezel wire that is the same width as the depth of the stone and shaped it into the top three sides of the box.

You can just about see it below.

See.

I sniped it to sit perfectly on top of the stone.

Then I bent another piece of the bezel wire across the top of the stone.

And soldered it to the bottom part of the box.

(Prepare for fuzzy photo)

I turned it over and soldered what will be the top of the box onto a piece of silver leaving enough overhang on the bottom edge to create a lip that will cover the top of the stone slightly

Then I cut around the sides of the box.

(Another fuzzy photo)

and checked out how it fit to the stone.

I actually thought of leaving it right here as the plain silver looked so good on its own. But you know me and my fiddly ways…

Here’s the lip.

You can see above that the area where the sides of the box and the stone meet doesn’t lie flat on the block. Annoyingly I had forgotten my own instructions and chosen the wrong bezel depth so I had to adjust the lip slightly so that it didn’t lay quite as far over the stone as I would have liked. This allowed the two pieces to sit flush.

Had the sides of the box been deep enough I wouldn’t have had to kick myself and swear (just a little – I’ve had bigger problems) but as I’m all about problem solving I manned up and moved on.

So much for paying attention.

Then I forgot all about it when noticed a half set little Tiger’s Eye just laying around on the table doing nothing much in particular and thought it might look good with the amethyst.

The colour actually looks a lot better with it than this photo gives it justice and, as Snow White would sing anytime she had chores to do – Someday my Prince will come – It was as if it knew its soul mate would eventually come.

Somehow thinking of P when I’m doing the washing up doesn’t quite have the same effect on me..

As the sides of the tiger eye bezel wasn’t as deep as I wanted it I decided to make it another.

Now I don’t know if you remember, but I had an awful time fiddling around trying to get this vice thing to work for me.

But now I can tell you it’s my new best friend.

I just wasn’t being stern enough with the screws on the top.

Now I’ve figured out that I just have to be firm with it the thing holds the tubes, and whatever else you want it to hold, like a champ.

So I cut another length of tubing to fit the tiger eye.

And placed the cut off bit back in the vise and made sure to sand the ends completely flat.

You can file right down the vise and not damage the file, or so the Internet says, and you know the Internet is always right…

Once you’ve done that you can use your nifty bur to drill down into the tube to cut a seat for the cabochon to rest on.

As you probably know you can purchase cabochons, tubing and bur sizes in various millimeters so that they all correspond to make setting a stone a breeze. Once you get the hang of the annoying vise…

See here how it sits so pretty.

Took me over a year to figure out the easy way to do this.

Man I’m slow…

Next I cut out a matching hole on the top of the box.

You can just about see below that the tube has been soldered to just stand proud of the top of the box. You want the tube to fit snug into the hole you’ve made so that the solder joins the two completely and you want just enough of the bezel showing above the box to be able to push the sides over to hold the bezel.

Next I filed the bottom flush.

And cut out a backing sheet of 22 gauge fine silver to fit both the top box and the stone.

Before soldering the top to the backing plate, however, you have to pierce the back so that air can escape as you don’t really want another explosion in the studio.

Just sayin’

My tube sits all the way down and will be soldered to the back plate so creating a sealed chamber around it inside.

My preferred way to do this is to trace around the pieces to be soldered with a Sharpie pen.

This way I can play around with some ideas and then saw out my design.

After I have done this I can then go ahead and solder the box to the back plate knowing exactly where the design will lay by matching the top to the Sharpie lines.

I then drew in the bottom part of the stone again and drilled some holes for the prong setting.

I like to solder the prongs using a charcoal block. This way I can place each prong into the hole I’ve drilled and gently tap it with a hammer so that it sinks down into the charcoal a little. I place each prong as you would close a bezel up, tapping the next prong on the opposite side, etc., etc., until they are all in. This way seems to keep them more secure.

Then I place a little blob of solder at the base of each prong and place the leaves around the bezel and after soldering

See if I haven’t completely messed up and that the stone fits correctly.

Here is the pierced back.

And my grubby finger. Oh how we suffer for our art…

Here I have cut the excess silver from around the box and stone and have cut the prongs down to their correct height and finished them by shaving some of their thickness off and smoothing out the tips.

Here’s it’s sexy shot.

I fashioned it a simple, yet charming bale and soldered that to the top after I finished up the back design.

At this point we know that it would be an extraordinary thing for me to have managed to photograph every stage of the pendant’s making.

Extraordinary I am not.

I forgot to show you the back.

You’ll have to improvise.

Sorry.

Here is the piece sanded, patina’d and buffed.

Turns out that I’m not completely happy with it because the top left hand of the stone doesn’t sit as snug as I would have liked it to and the prongs are set too far out on the left hand side. I think it happened when I had to fiddle with the lip to fit over the stone.

🙁

But I will bravely continue on with my struggle to produce technically perfect little pieces of lovelies.

I’ll never surrender…

And here’s its back.

Finished while you weren’t looking.

And here’s another piece I had on the back burner.

So let me know if you make one.

🙂

–

A chain for you and a question…

Published on 15th February 201616th February 2016 by coldfeetstudioblog

I thought I’d share with you one of my chains.

It’s very simple, and like most things creative, not unique to me, but if you’ve not tried making your own chains yet and fancy having a go, read on…

You will need about 4 ft of 19 gauge wire for this 18″ chain and simple soldering skills.

I used sterling silver because that’s all I had available in 19 gauge.

Of course you can use any gauge and ring diameter, but you will have to adjust for the amount of links, etc., accordingly. You can use copper if you prefer, but note that the solder tends to show more.

TIP

When making calculations for a different chain design or gauge I like to make a 4 or 5 link sample chain. This way I can measure how long that small piece of chain is and then multiply it for the actual amount of links I would need for the chain length I want.

I can also see at this time if I like the chain design and the gauge.

For this reason I’ve started making different sample chains out of copper for quick reference.

To calculate the length of wire needed for each chain I’ve found this handy interactive chart.

how to work out the circumference of a circle

and for calculating millimeters into inches,

how to convert mm to inches

NOTE

Jump ring sizes are measured using the inside diameter. To be sure that I actually have enough silver to complete the chain I measured the jump ring I want to use by the outside diameter.

–

Now for the chain…

Make 24 x 9.5mm jump rings.

Wrap them with tape.

And saw them apart trying not to slice your finger open – because it hurts.

TIP

After much experimenting I find it easiest to use long blade passes through the rings holding the rings just proud of the edge of a wooden block. Start sawing at an angle and once you’ve got a good purchase straighten up the blade so that it runs more or less perpendicular to the outside of the rings.

With practice it becomes easier and that’s actually the first time I’ve cut myself.

Must not have been paying attention.

Always pay attention…

Now make 26 x 3mm jump rings and do the same.

Beware as this is more fiddly and swear worthy.

Now solder the small jump rings together.

Note: I like the whole chain soldered, but you can skip soldering the small jump rings if you wish and just join the completed larger links together at the end.

For a completely soldered chain, however, I find it easiest to solder the small jump rings first.

For joining the jump rings I like to use chips of solder which I buy from Contenti.

I sprinkle a small batch directly onto my soldering board and use my pick to take them one at a time to the links.

NOTE

You do not need flux or solder to join fine silver together.

You really only need one of these tiny chips to solder the 19 gauge jump ring together. The key, as always, is to make sure that the ends of your jump ring fit tight together.

There shouldn’t be much of a gap at all otherwise the solder will not flow across the two ends to join them.

Now they are all soldered you can slip two of them onto a larger jump ring and prepare to solder that closed also.

TIP

Always point the joins you want to solder in the same direction. This way takes the guess-work out of finding the join, especially if you’ve done a good job preparing them and they’re so tight you can’t find the join at all.

Now take two of the soldered links and join them together with a third, large link.

Solder these also.

Now you’ll have groups of three.

Which you’ll join together with another large link.

Although at this point it becomes easier to solder the whole chain together at once.

Continue in this way until you have used up all of your jump rings.

Now you could stop right here and you’d have a nice, large loop chain to clean up and buff.

You could leave the rings round or hammer them slightly to give them more character.

But I took a pair of round-nosed pliers and opened up the links.

If you do every other link in this way you’d once again have a nice, large loop chain to wear.

If you then took the oval links and squeezed them together so that their middles touched, you’d have yet another design of chain.

But I was going for the figure 8, which is achieved by holding a pair of flat nosed pliers at each end of the oval link and twisting it 180 degrees, making sure that you twist each link in the same direction.

So here’s another chain design.

You could also change it up by using a different size joining ring.

Your options are limitless…

If you continue to stretch the rest of the 9.5mm links you can go through the same process, making a different style of chain at each stage.

But, like I said, I was going for the figure 8 all the way…

Here it is after the pickle.

And once it has been dunked into the Black Max, or Liver of Sulphur. and buffed.

All ready and waiting to go.

You can see here that I also hammered the ends of the figure 8’s.

–

Now for the question.

How much would you charge for this chain?

Bear in mind that you have to accommodate for your experience. For example it’s not fair to set a price when it’s taken you all day to make something which, in fact, it should only take you 2 hours.

I’ve made quite a lot of them now and each time this particular chain takes me 1 hour 50 mins from start to finish.

No breaks. No daydreaming. Just exact timing carefully watching the clock.

Right now silver is $15.79 and so this piece has $4 worth of silver in it.

If you have a scale you can easily weigh the finished piece in troy ounces and then calculate the silver content.

You can find the current silver prices at the top of Rio Grande’s site.

I have a scale similar to this one.

So, what is your formula for pricing?

I used to just guesstimate, but as time has gone by I’ve begun to see how important my time is and how, in the past, I was almost giving my jewelry away.

This had always been o.k. with me insofar I was learning my craft as I went along, but if you are serious about making and selling your jewelry there comes a time when you should start to look into the real value of your work, if not you are not only underestimating your worth, but also undercutting the worth of other artists.

This is a simple formula that I like to use.

–

labor + materials + overhead + profit = wholesale price

wholesale price x 2 (minimum) = retail price

–

At the end of the calculation I then look at the figure and see if I think it’s fair and if I think the piece will actually sell for that.

I would be interest in your opinions about this and how you work out your prices

🙂

–

The rise and fall, and rise again, of the Willow Creek Jasper…

Published on 9th November 201510th November 2015 by coldfeetstudioblog

I’d like to tell you that everything I make starts good, ends good, and everything in the middle is perfect.

But…

–

So I cut this nice little Willow Creek Jasper cabochon from a big chunk I bought from The Gem Shop.

And thought I’d show you something I made with it.

I decided to go for something like this, but wasn’t sure about the garnets.

I thought they might be a little too pretty, but decided to go ahead anyway.

If you’re new to bezel making here’s how I prepare mine.

I run a length of bezel wire around the stone and cut it off a little larger than it needs to be.

If the stone has corners I define those with a pair of flat nose pliers first.

Then holding it as tightly as I can I tuck one end underneath the other and mark where it overlaps with a pencil.

O.K. so that was a lot more overlap than I needed.

I was obviously feeling generous.

Now I snip the extra off leaving it a slither longer than I measured it.

And I work the two ends by pushing them beyond each other to close up the gap and create some tension when they touch together.

I use my flat nose pliers to slightly flatten the join. This helps to finish up the alignment.

The join has to be perfectly aligned before soldering.

With no gaps.

Now I solder it.

I like to use a third hand and place the solder piece on the outside of the bezel, but there are many ways to do it. Just make sure to heat the silver evenly so that the solder flows over the join. If you heat one side more than the other the solder will pull away from the join toward the hotter end and the solder won’t fill the join.

If this happens take your flame away, start heating the whole thing again so that the silver heats evenly and then help the solder flow across the join with your pick.

The bezel should fit nice and snug.

See.

Look at the shine I got on that cabochon.

I did that.

😉

In fact I was so impressed with myself that I celebrated with a cup of tea.

Here’s the other side.

They’re not so impressed. Especially the last man.

Next up I soldered the bezel wire to the back plate and pickled it.

And because all of a sudden I thought perhaps I should I’ve stared rinsing the piece in a solution of water and baking soda when I first get it out of the pickle.

Then I rinse it in water.

I also hold my breath when I open the pickle crock pot.

The hypochondria’s been creeping back in.

It’s O.K.

I’ll be O.K.

Now I trim away the excess silver from around the bezel wire leaving a couple of millimeters as a border.

And then I cut away all of the silver plate inside of the bezel wire.

You don’t have to do this when making a bezel setting. I just like to sink the stone down into its surround a little more to try to give it more depth.

If you want to try this make sure to saw as close to the inside edge as possible otherwise you’re going to have to do a lot of filing.

And that gets boring real soon.

The end result should see the cabochon passing through this first step of the bezel without it getting caught on the sides.

Just in case you were wondering we’re still on the rise bit of the project so try not to worry too much.

Now I stamp and cut out some leaves.

I found these little beauties

HERE

I try not to buy much from overseas, but in this instance I couldn’t resist.

I was having one of my bored Sunday buying days.

Nice stamp though.

Once they’re trimmed I push them against the edge of my block to give them some dimension.

I’m all about dimension.

Except around my waistline of course.

That can be as flat as it wants with no complaints from me.

Next the garnet bezel.

I’m using a 5mm garnet cabochon which I found at Rio Grande.

And this is the tubing that I used to set it.

If you haven’t got one of these special little glob on a stick things you’ve got to get one.

Aside from coming in very handy they just make me smile.

I’m sure there are lots of other fun stuff you can do with them aside from picking up small things that don’t want to be picked up and, of course, you could easily make your own out of wax, but even when I’m not using mine I sometimes have to look over at it and give it a wink.

Just sayin’.

I used it in this instance to pick up the garnet and measure it with this gauge tool.

I’ve got to tell you that this is another one of my smiling tools.

It’s just so simple and neat.

And here the two of them are doing their stuff together.

Brings tears to the eyes…

O.K. so I measured the height of the garnet and then marked out the length of the tubing.

I cut the tube with my new favourite tube tool.

And sat back admiring my work.

Again.

Now I use the corresponding bur bits to drill out a seat for the garnet.

This takes a bit of practice and a steady hand as there’s not much room to play with if you chose this method to make the bezel.

The first couple of times I made one I gave up on ever being able to do it properly.

But.

This is still not the fall of the Willow Creek Jasper.

I know you’re getting anxious.

So there’s hope.

Always hope.

Again, there are different ways to do this, but this is the way that I’ve found works for me.

I take an old pair of flat nose pliers and hold the tube against a wooden block and gently drill out the middle, first using the round bur.

Up until now I’ve found that the tube easily slips out from the pliers if you’re not paying attention.

But then.

I had a brain burst and got out an old pair of plastic tipped pliers which I rarely use because they don’t have a spring handle and I don’t like them as much as my other pair.

These grip the tube so much better and I’m not worried about ruining the plastic stuff as I never use them anyway.

Win win.

(Update: The heat from the drill bit melts the plastic stuff so it doesn’t work after all. Man! I was so excited as well. I’m going to see if I can’t drill some tube sizes into an old pair of pliers, or something like that.)

After using the round bur to drill away to the depth you need you go in with the setting bur.

This one creates a little ledge for the stone to sit on.

Check out the fit as you go along using the fun goo stick thing.

Use your beeswax or Bur Life as you drill.

I prefer the beeswax as the Bur Life is too crumbly for me.

And voila!

The stone should sit level in the bezel cup and deep enough for the edges to be pushed over the slope of the stone.

With practice this is possible.

My theory is.

If somebody else can do it. So can I.

Be strong.

Now I place all of the components on a sheet of 22 gauge fine silver to outline where I need to saw the sheet to prepare for soldering.

And so begins the downfall of the Willow Creek Jasper…

It all started innocently enough.

A phone call with P.

Another cup of tea.

Some yelling at Willow who has taken to barking all of the time wherever she is and whether she wants to or not.

P thinks it’s because she’s deaf and old and becoming senile.

I think that’s a bit harsh.

Deaf maybe.

You can yell at her all day and she won’t hear you.

But look at her.

🙂

So basically I was distracted and didn’t know it.

And so happily continued on my way

Until everything was nicely soldered.

Except for the little balls which needed a slight adjustment.

Nothing much to worry about.

Except for the fact that I had soldered the bezel collar upside down which might not have been a problem except that the stone really really didn’t look as good this way up as it would the way I had intended it to be.

I could have continued with it, but it would have bugged me every time I looked at it and as I’ve decided to really try to make the best jewelry I can and also didn’t want to begin over, I reheated the piece and took the whole lot off and re soldered it the correct way up.

A little tricky as, if you remember, I had cut the inside of the bezel away and now had to try to solder it back on again with no wiggle room whatsoever.

Here’s a trick to removing already soldered components.

If you just want to remove one item then heating it and picking it off with your tweezers is good enough, but if like me, you want to remove everything, it can be difficult to keep the heat spread evenly enough to loosen everything at once as one side invariably cools just enough for the solder to harden again.

So basically, just as you get one side of whatever it is you’re trying to remove loose the other side becomes soldered again and you can end up going backward and forward in a never ending spiral of desperation until you either melt the stuff accidentally, or more likely on purpose, as you’re so very frustrated and annoyed with it all.

To ward against flinging your torch across the room at this point and setting the room on fire I find that if you turn the whole piece over and heat it from the back it gets everything glowing nicely and evenly and then you can quickly turn it back over and pluck the pieces off easily.

Of course then you have to chance that one of the components will fly off the tweezers and burn a hole in your leg so that you’ll never be able to walk again.

Fortunately this time I was saved by the towel.

Always pluck carefully.

Now, of course, because of the traumatic rescue, the whole bezel setting is a complete mess and solder has flown everywhere including into places that you never knew it could flow into.

And also the little border I cut out at the beginning was a little messy and uneven.

To even up the border I marked the outline with a sharpie which helped me see the areas I needed to file away.

I have to admit that I cheated here by using one of those handy little flat burs.

Even so, it took some time.

A few moments of, Man! Why can’t you get anything right.

And another cup of tea.

But eventually I cleaned it up, and soldered that pesky leaf back on which had decided that with all the fun going on it would take a little field trip.

Next up I cut away the excess silver.

Filed it and added a bale.

Then I cut away the back design.

Just so’s you know, the flower design is upside down here on purpose and has nothing to do with the fiasco above.

The top half of the back of the cabochon isn’t as nice as the bottom and I wanted a nice colour to show through.

Then I cleaned it up some more with the flat bur and trimmed away the collar to the best height for the stone.

And gave it a good scrub with the Penny Brite and a toothbrush.

At this point I wasn’t too sure about how to hang the bottom garnet as, although wire wrapped tear drop beads are nice, I felt it would be a little too unfinished for this piece.

So I made it special home.

Yes, I know.

It looks like a cow bell.

Then, relieved that the struggle was almost over, I blackened it with Black Max, buffed it as much as I could, and set the stone.

After setting the stone I covered it with blue tape and buffed some more.

Once I’d got it to the point I was happy with I got out the setting tools for the smaller garnet.

These are neat little punches that hug the round of the bezel cup and, as you hammer the top gently, push the bezel over the stone.

It’s a bit freaky when you first start using them as you just know you’re going to damage the stone.

But it works well if you take your time.

And so there you have it.

I’m still not sure about the bottom garnet, and might change it up, but on the whole I like it.

Especially as now the stone is the right way up…

Here are a few others that I just finished.

Now I’m off out to yell at Willow again because she’s driving me nuts!

It really only makes me feel better as she can’t hear me at all…

–

Finally!

Published on 26th September 201513th October 2015 by coldfeetstudio

I’ve got some things done.

It’s been like pulling teeth.

Every day I go into the studio just to find some excuse to take a break.

Even after just fifteen minutes.

When I can’t find a reason to leave the studio I just decide that I’m so thirsty I’ll die if I don’t get a drink stat!

What’s all that about?

Remember this.

That wouldn’t cooperate and decided that it just didn’t want to be made even though it deigned to pose to show you what you can do with all your broken pick sticks.

Well it took me three days by Jove, but eventually I was able to finish it in-between all the drink breaks and consequent rest room trips.

Not completely sure about the beads though.

And I ordered an I.D. stamp.

Ain’t it cool 🙂

From Infinity Stamps.

They’re very expensive, but I’ve had one before and I really like the quality.

You just design your logo and send them the pic.

It also took me five years to make these.

In the meantime, while I was procrastinating going into the studio by ordering more stuff, I bought a sand casting kit.

The wrong one as it turns out.

It all looked so easy on the videos, but man, that sand went everywhere. I even got some in my mouth.

It was like I was a child again.

O.K. still…

I couldn’t keep my space clean to save my life, yet the man on the video didn’t get a grain out of place.

It was very depressing.

My first casting came out so horribly that I just packed all the stuff back into the box in disgust and put the whole thing down as a waste of money.

But I really, really wanted to do it 🙁 and if that man could do it, so could I damn it!

I’d bought it on Amazon and decided to go back there to buy some different sand and try again.

The same sand that the annoyingly good at it man used.

And, while cursing myself that I always get things wrong, I decided to read the reviews on the kit I’d bought.

Now I always read the reviews before I buy anything.

Always… except for this time.

Should’ve read the darn reviews.

Everyone complained about the sand, and when I came to think about it, I couldn’t quite remember why I had bought the brand I’d gone for in the first place when it was more expensive than the brand I’d originally gone onto Amazon to compare pricing on.

The funk’s messing with my brain man!

Then I got a bit ticked off because it was 120 odd dollars and it didn’t work even though it said, new and improved sand, in big letters on the tub.

That should’ve been my first clue.

So in a fit of determination I sent the whole package back even though I’d used the sand and the casting flask had burn marks around the funnel area where I’d poured the silver in.

I told them on the little return box that I’d used it, but that it was horrible, but Amazon refunded me straight away, even before the company had received my parcel back.

I was quite impressed.

Don’t know if the sand casting people are going to be though.

Now I’ve ordered the one I wanted in the first place.

Stay tuned…

Emboldened I next contacted a nice lady on FB who reps for JoolTool.

I’d decided that I’d had enough of defective tools and products.

If you remember some of the discs that came with my JoolTool (seven of them!) kept spinning off the spindle when I was using them because their threads had worn or something.

These things are expensive and so are the adhesive pads and papers that you stick to them.

I mean this bunch right here cost over $400!

(I shouldn’t have looked at the price…)

I’d already contacted the shop a couple of months ago and no one had answered me, so I was feeling pretty taken.

BUT this rep was great and Anie, the product designer and owner, phoned me and walked me through fixing them and now they are perfect and ready to go!

Great result.

Great customer service.

Very happy camper right here.

To celebrate I have a little pair of earrings you can make.

All for you 🙂

First take 18 gauge sterling silver wire and wrap it around a mandrel six times.

I’ve used the largest ring on this pair of pliers.

It always irritates me when I get this particular pair of pliers out because I can’t remember why there is a number 1 and an asterisk on them.

I don’t think I put it on them, but why would I buy a pair that were marked?

Just another of life’s mysteries to mess with my mind…

Now snip and solder them.

Shape them into rough ovals and haphazardly hammer them.

And group them into threes.

As always I’ve forgotten the next photo which would have been of making a loop out of a thicker piece of wire.

I used 8 gauge half round wire.

Now loop the three wires through it and solder the top of the loop together.

Because the half round wire is thick I left the top of it shaped as a teardrop instead of trying to get it perfectly round.

Now find two large silver balls that you have in your silver ball scrap box and solder one onto the rounded part of the thick tear drop ring.

The next photo’s are fuzzy, sorry. I tried hard to get good ones, but, as good as I am, I couldn’t hold everything at once.

Hold the tear drop point facing down in your third hand tweezers.

If you haven’t already got third hand tweeter, get some.

They’re invaluable.

Saves a lot of hospital visits.

Now make sure that all of the soldered areas of the thin large rings are facing down away from the tear drop and place one of those old pick sticks through the tear drop to separate the three rings from the soldered part of the tear drop.

This will help prevent the tear drop solder flowing onto the three rings while you’re soldering the ball onto the round part of the tear drop.

Capisce!

Put some flux on top of the round end of the tear drop and on the bottom of the ball.

Heat the bottom of the ball and pick up a melted ball of solder with it.

Now heat up the round end of the tear drop and solder the ball onto it.

Turn the tear drop over and clasp it in the third hand, again putting the broken pick stick between the bottom of the three rings and the inside of the round end of the tear drop as before.

Get a little jump ring and place it in your third hand with the join facing downward and put some flux on the bottom of the jump ring and on the tear drop end of the large ring.

Gently heat the jump ring and pick up a small piece of solder as you did with the ball.

Now heat the tear drop end keeping the jump ring away from the flame, but close enough to stay heated and when the solder is ready touch the jump ring to the tear drop end.

Pickle the earrings.

Make some ear wires.

And polish the way you desire.

And voilà!

Your earrings are ready.

Now you can knock yourself out and make as many variations as you want.

I tried a different way to connect the ear wire here, but don’t like it as much as the other way.

Always good to experiment though

😉

I leave you with the progress of the painting.

And,

you might want to look away…

a poor me sawing injury

because when you’re in a funk normal activities take on a life of their own and like to do things to make you swear.

I’ve made it small for grossing out purposes.

A lot.

–

For Nancy.

Published on 26th August 201513th October 2015 by coldfeetstudio

The end caps.

–

You can make these plain or textured, wonky or straight, rustic or perfect, but these are the way I made mine for the pieces you’ve seen.

I use fine silver.

I buy all of my sheets in fine silver and most all of my wire in sterling. I like to use fine silver for my bezel settings because it doesn’t tarnish like sterling.

Sterling tarnishes when exposed to air because it has a little more base metal in it than fine silver. Sterling is .925 silver and fine silver is .999 making it purer. PMC is also .999 as is Thai Silver.

Just love the Thai Silver 🙂

Back to the project…

Cut a strip of 24 gauge sterling silver, or fine silver, sheet and texture it with a favourite stamp.

I have a selection of stamps from the Indian Jewelry Supply store – HERE

It’s like christmas every time I look at them.

Cut a manageable length off the strip and wrap it around a mandrel.

You might need to anneal the silver to do this as stamping, hammering, or any work you do to a piece of silver hardens it. Annealing the metal by running a soft flame over it until it changes colour and then quenching it, softens it again making it easy to work with.

Some people don’t quench afterward as they say the silver hardens again, but, as you may know by now, I’m too impatient to wait for it to cool on its own and I’ve found that quenching doesn’t really affect the results I want for this project.

When you’re annealing be careful not to melt the metal. It just takes practice. If it does start to melt no worries as you can then practice your reticulation skills, but that’s for another day… 😉

You want the silver to just begin to turn a dull pinkish color then take your flame away.

Now you can bend it around the mandrel until the two ends meet for soldering.

The mandrel can be anything that is the shape and diameter you want. I often use anything on hand. The shanks of my stamps or dapping tools, wooden dowels, but better still are the mandrel sets that come with a jump ring maker.

Like this

As you then have a selection which will last you forever and you can more easily match the mandrel diameter to the size of bead you’re using.

I’ll be using 8mm beads for these tube ends.

Now solder the seam.

Once soldered you can cut the tube into the lengths you want either by hanging it over the edge of your bench pin.

Or by using some other way to keep the tube secure as you saw.

This is an old paintbrush.

For this method, slowly turn the tube and gradually saw around the circumference for an even cut.

Now you can put the smaller lengths of tube back onto the mandrel so that it just overhangs a couple of mm’s making it easier to file the ends straight.

At this point you can decide whether to keep your tubes straight or make them wonky.

I like wonky.

So I use one of my dapping things to hammer into the tube to flare out the ends slightly.

And then I might even hammer them down even more to wrinkle them.

I haven’t done that here, but just so you know all of my secrets…

The next step is to punch out the silver discs which will be the end caps of the tubes.

I like them to be just a fraction larger than the tube, (including the flared out diameter), as you’re going to dome them and this reduces the diameter of the disc.

Now you can use a hole punch or a drill to make a hole in the center of the discs.

I’ve found the easiest way to use a hole punch is to mark exactly where you want the hole to be with a sharpie and then place the bottom of the punch over the mark.

Then you can see exactly where to punch.

Now you will shape the discs into the caps using a dapping block.

If you don’t have these tools you can perhaps use makeshift ones.

Making shallow holes in blocks of wood, for instance, may make a good substitute for the dapping block. You can also round off a matching dowel piece to use as the punch.

For the discs you will have to either saw them or snip them. You can then file them down when they’re soldered to the tube.

At this point you are going to solder the caps onto the tubes.

You can solder the first cap from the inside.

But will solder the second cap onto the top.

Warning:

You can only do this if there is at least one hole in the silver for the hot air to escape.

If you do not leave a hole the heat will build up inside and the piece will explode!

It will fly away from the soldering board and, if you’re as lucky as me, will probably land on your body.

And it will hurt.

Now clean up the edges of the caps with a file and sanding board.

And they are pretty much done.

These are my ‘rustic’ ones, but you can make these so that the joins don’t show. It will just take more precise measuring and filing, etc.

Here’s what I did with mine.

🙂
–

–

I’m a jump right in person. You?

Published on 24th August 201513th October 2015 by coldfeetstudio

Of course this doesn’t always go according to plan.

I’m just a little too impatient to read all the books and watch all the YouTube how too’s.

I just like to look at the pictures and wing it.

So I’ve made a few of no go’s over the years, and that’s o.k. as sometimes new ideas come from them.

I tell you this as I just want to remind you that, for most of the time, I don’t really know what I’m doing. I would hate for you to think that I have the best advice out there, even reasonably o.k. advice.

But I just love making stuff and think that if you want to have a go at something you should just do it without thinking you have to be some kind of expert at it who never makes mistakes.

Here’s a mistake.

19 gauge sterling silver wire using an 8mm mandrel.

Oh yes, it looks all fine and dandy I know, but it’s stiff and lifeless.

The gauge of wire is too thick for the diameter of the ring and the chain can’t move freely.

Now, I know that when you’re using rings to make a chain you need to know the ratio between the wire gauge and the diameter of the ring.

Yep. I know that.

But when I want to make something and I get excited I ain’t got no time to go looking for a chart or read the books, so I eyeball it, make a wish, and have a go.

Don’t try this at home folks.

Actually I wasn’t far off. I think half a millimeter may have done it.

Or maybe one.

(See, I’m doing it again.)

Don’t do it people!

Get a chart.

(I haven’t found a chart yet but I’m looking.)

If you have a chart I want one in millimeters, not fractions. I can’t be doing with all of that 5/16 stuff unless you’ve also got a chart for turning 16th’s into millimeters.

Math is NOT fun for me.

Web surfing is, however, so I’m off to find my chart as soon as I finish up here.

So the chain wasn’t a waste of time really, because I also decided that sterling silver hurt my fingers too much. But using sterling silver wasn’t a waste of time either as I soldered each link perfectly, not always a regular occurrence, so that was pure satisfaction right there.

See.

So next up I made another chain, this time using 20 gauge fine silver with the 8mm mandrel.

Much better, but I’m going to make another today using the 8.5 mandrel.

You should have a go if you haven’t yet.

It’s fun.

And the sense of accomplishment having made your own chain is a wonderful thing.

Warning: I may have mentioned that I still haven’t got ‘the chart’ so you might want to wait until you, or I, find one or I actually make a chain that’s perfect.

Don’t hold your breath on that last part.

–

So.

Single Loop Chain.

(This is going to be boring for people who already do this, so stop reading now unless you need a nap)

20 gauge fine silver 8mm mandrel

Make your jump rings and fuse them together.

I use a hard charcoal block for this.

The most important thing to remember when fusing silver is to make sure that you have no gaps in-between the two parts you are fusing together. The join has to be completely touching. If you have any gap at all, however tiny, the ring may fuse, but you can end up with a thin area of the ring which will be weaker than the rest of it.

So preparation is key.

Place the rings on the block with the joins all facing the same way. If you’ve done your job right and the ends are flush against each other it can be really hard to see where the join is so this eliminates that problem.

You want your flame to be a little softer than perhaps you usually use so you can turn down the pressure on your regulator a little to get it to a nice balance that will heat the silver, but isn’t so fierce that it melts it.

Now keep the flame moving around the ring until you see it just start to change, then quickly hover it over the join and take it away immediately the silver flows.

Keep the flame there too long and it will melt into a ball. Then you just continue to melt the ring and add it to your ball collection.

This might grow considerably as you practice.

It’s o.k. 😉

You want to keep the flame moving around the ring as the whole ring should be brought to the same temperature. If you get a gap, or a thin area, where the join is you either had a gap there to begin with or you have heated one side of the ring a little more than the other and the silver has gathered there pulling itself away from the join.

It’s just practice.

You don’t need any solder or flux to fuse these fine silver rings together.

Now you are going to stretch the rings out using a pair of round nose pliers.

Try to keep the rings at the same place on the pliers each time you stretch one as you want your shape to be as consistent as possible. I use the tips about 2mm down. You can mark the pliers with a sharpie or tape if you need to.

It’s at this point in the game that you’ll discover if your joins are fused properly.

It’s good to find this out now rather than later, so either re-fuse the broken ones or add them to your ball collection.

Now squeeze the middle together.

And bend them in the center.

Use a length of wire, (I’ve used copper here), to anchor one end of the link and push the top ends together.

Now you can slide another link into the first.

To do this you may have to squeeze one end of the second link together slightly so that it fits through the hoop in the top of the first link.

Also you can push an awl, or your center punch, through the hoop you wish to thread the next one into to widen it slightly.

Now you just continue to make the chain until you get to the length you need.

Once it’s completed, anneal the chain by gently running the flame backward and forward over it until the surface of the silver just changes slightly, and then quench it.

For the next part you’ll need a draw plate.

I bought mine HERE, but you can find them anywhere, and any kind will do. I just drilled a hole through an old piece of wood before mine arrived.

Once the chain is annealed pull it through the draw plate to even up the links and make it look beautiful.

You just want to even up everything at this point and not stretch it so be careful which hole you pull it through.

The chain will be crunchy afterward so just loosen it up in your fingers and then voilà!

You are done.

Finish it however you prefer, I like to blacken mine, and then make something extraordinary with it.

Go on. You know you want to.

🙂

–

P.S. Remember Ann Cahoon has a great visual tutorial on chain making – HERE

–

And the winner is…

Published on 27th July 201513th October 2015 by coldfeetstudio

O.k so it’s not a winner exactly, but I felt that since we had talked about the chain I’m still impressed with myself for making, that it’s something of a big reveal to show you what I did with it.

And so, without further ado,

Open the curtains please…

The Bracelet.

Dah daaah.

Lol

Bit of a let down really.

Made myself chuckle though.

And

Just because I like you, here’s a new link.

–

Take a manageable length of 16 gauge sterling silver wire and hammer it flat and file the end.

Now make a small curve with your round nose pliers at the flattened end.

Still using your round nose pliers shape the wire into a link so that the small curve is on the inside.

As you close up the link push the wire past the end it’s to be soldered to so that when you wiggle it back into place the ends of the wire will be touching.

Annoying I know, but the two ends have to touch to solder.

As you form the link match it to a master link.

This way you’ll always be checking it against the same size and it will be easier to keep them consistent.

Now cut the link from the remaining wire

And make it a couple of friends.

When you have as many as you need pick solder the ends together.

With just the tiniest pieces of solder.

Now trim them and file the ends smooth.

And join them together with a soldered jump ring.

Then you can go to town with making another bracelet.

Because you’re on a roll.

🙂

–

Sorry that a few of the photo’s are bad quality, but you get the drift.

–

O.K. So while I’ve been gone…

Published on 24th July 201513th October 2015 by coldfeetstudio

Nothing what so ever has happened!

It’s just been a weird month that plugged into my hypochondriacal, so I’m going to die now am I, self, which only stopped yesterday afternoon.

Nope it wasn’t big.

Loads of people go through it.

BUT

I didn’t like it and I felt really really sorry for myself and really really annoyed that I was feeling sorry for myself and everything screeched to a stop as I planned for how I was going to react to my biopsy being positive.

Told you.

Hypochondriac.

Actually my doctor said that she had seen hypochondriacs and that I wasn’t one, but I’m pretty good at hiding my secret life of health anxiety so she didn’t know that I had already planned my funeral and given away all of my jewelry tools.

(Penny, you would have hit the jackpot! Especially as my imminent death didn’t stop me from buying more.)

Sooooo,

That’s about it folks.

I made it.

I’m still here.

And now that’s over I’m going to take my jewelry to the next level.

Again.

–

In other new.

My dad’s here so that has also slowed down my days.

But I did manage to finish a piece for Leslie.

I’ve also finished a second piece for Leslie to consider, but I don’t like it and can’t concentrate as much as I would like to at the moment on making something better.

And before dad arrived I made a chain.

My first.

And I was pretty darn pleased with myself.

I started on a double one, but got the gauge wrong and haven’t been able to start another yet.

If you want to make chains this is a really good dvd.

And they’re really not as fiddly as you think they’re going to be.

Of course I haven’t got on to the triple double o.m.g. one yet so I’ll have to get back to you on that.

Throughout my trauma Spud has slept.

Without a care in the world.

Just to rub it in.

But I still love her.

Even though I had to restock on phone charging wires and computer leads.

She doesn’t discriminate. P’s leads are as much in danger as mine.

And she comes onto the bed at all hours of the night when she decides she needs to spend a couple of hours purring next to a human head at decibels exceeding those made by a pneumatic drill.

It’s all good.

–

And finally, to all of my cyber friends who need a boost.

I have found our new motto…

May all your s#@* be amazing…

–

Another quickie…

Published on 3rd July 201513th October 2015 by coldfeetstudio

For anyone out there who would like a comprehensive tutorial on prong setting, bezel setting, and flush setting faceted stones, Ann Cahoon has one of the better demonstrations I’ve watched.

You can download it to watch immediately or purchase the dvd.

HERE

Enjoy.

Actually they have a lot of good dvd’s.

And here’s another piece I’ve just finished because I know you were wondering.

I’ve decided that my next pieces will concentrate on finishing and polishing.

Jane I know you asked, but I’m really not that good at it.

For the pieces I make with the leaves I simply buff the hell out of them using one of these

These

And these.

The bottom two make it easier to reach into the nooks and crevasses.

You can also use fine sandpaper.

I know steel wool will work also, but I threw mine away because it hurts.

All those tiny slithers of steel get into your skin and even if you wear gloves there are still stragglers on your bench etc..

They really hurt.

I know, I’m a weeny.

I actually find it very hard to finish my pieces.

My journey to correct this starts now…

stay tuned.

When I get frustrated I take it out on a perfectly innocent canvas.

Sorry canvas.

As you all may know by now I start a lot of paintings, but rarely finish any of them.

I’ve decided not to let it bother me and just enjoy the flow.

Perhaps I’ll get to finish this one as I’m pretty sure my acetylene is going to run out at any minute and I won’t be able to replace the tank until later next week.

Will I be able to make it…

dum dum dummm…..

–

And now…

Published on 28th June 201513th October 2015 by coldfeetstudio

I’m going to share with you my latest adventure into jewelry making where I seemed to have fire scaled the living daylights out of an innocent piece of silver…

I have to tell you the truth, up until now I hadn’t given much thought to fire scale.

I’d heard the word bandied around the jewelry channels often enough and yet, as with many things that cross my path, I didn’t think they were talking to me.

Those colourful papers with school activities and happenings would come home from school in the kid’s backpacks and I would just put them aside thinking they were meant for other mums.

Until I missed the event and wondered why no-one told me.

Yep. That’s the world I live in.

I think it’s called dissociative.

I call it happily going on my way and ignoring the stuff I don’t want to deal with.

Like fire scale.

Then, as I was making my latest piece, I was taken by how beautiful a piece of silver was that I had just soldered.

I mean, look at it.

And I was wondering if I could make a piece and somehow protect this finish.

But I believed it was just the flux having a field day with the heat and that it would just come off in the pickle.

Actually, I haven’t pickled that piece yet, so I still don’t really know.

Ah, the wonders of experiment.

Anyhow, somewhere in the back of my head the word ‘fire scale’ started to wake up, and now I think that’s what it might be.

Here’s a good article on fire scale.

–

So onto my latest piece.

Which might bore some of you because it’s pretty much like all of my latest pieces.

I bought a nice piece of Peruvian Blue Opal from Shirl.

I didn’t like the shape, but I liked the stone.

So I had a few drawings hanging around and decided to make one…

or two…

You know how it is.

First up I re-cut the stone to fit my design and polished it through all of the grits of the Jool Tool.

I do like how I can now adapt stones I’ve already bought, and for that I think the Jool Tool is worth it for me.

So here it is in its sketch.

I’m kind of over the big leaf design, but for some reason here’s another.

I made the opal, and it’s friend, a collar.

But felt that to just solder this onto a sheet of silver wouldn’t look good as it needed some more substance.

So I rolled out one of my silver pancakes that I’d melted down from my scraps.

Because I wanted chunky.

Decided where I wanted the dimension.

Used that sticky film paper

To cut out the shape.

And then decided it needed to be stamped.

I then soldered the collar onto it.

And that’s when that beautiful surface design happened.

The back didn’t look quite as good though.

That must be the copper coming to the surface.

Still kind of interesting though.

Because I wanted the stone to sit down further into the design I then cut the inside out of the bezel.

This also reduced the weight of the piece.

I try to saw as close to the inside edge as I can otherwise I’ll spend a lot of time filing away the excess.

I want the stone to pass easily through to the bottom.

Next I tidy up the edges of the bezel where the stamping may have distorted the shape and see how it looks on the sketch.

Now I solder it onto its new back plate, which is 22 gauge silver sheet, making sure to leave enough room around it to be able to give it a ‘step’.

Here it is trimmed to its final outline.

And now a much needed chip break.

I don’t usually eat them, but S brought me in some.

I think just to make sure I was still on the property.

You can see from the last photo (above the crisps) that I have traced a line around the inside of the bezel where I want the collar to fit against the stone.

I now also decide on the design I would like to put on the back.

I draw it onto the inside of the bezel because it’s easier to saw it out this way. I also always use a sharpie pen because I find that pencil rubs away as I’m sawing and so I lose the shape.

I don’t cut it out before I solder the first part of the bezel onto it because I want to make sure the design is exactly where I want it to be.

I drill the holes.

And cut it out.

And at the same time cut away and file the extra from the height of the bezel collar.

As you can see above I’ve already cut out the leaf shapes.

You can snip them out of scraps, but here I’ve used my saw as I haven’t got any scraps left.

They’re all repurposed pancakes now.

Oh well, live and learn.

Then I put them onto the sticky tape and use my chasing tool from Larry to make a leaf design.

Which I then solder onto lengths of 20 gauge wire.

I cut a length of 16 gauge wire for the main stem and soldered it onto the top of the bezel.

I then filed down the excess back plate to follow the curve of the stem.

And checked it on the sketch.

I wrapped the leaves around the main stem and soldered them onto it.

I do this very gently.

I move my torch in and out of the piece that I want to solder, all the time watching the surrounding area.

With practice you can see when another part is going to melt and so then I will quickly take my torch away, then bring it back in again slowly.

Depending on how many different solder points I have sometimes I will do this in batches in-between pickling the piece.

This is because often, before I can get to a different solder point, the flux has become grubby and the solder won’t flow so I can just manage three or four points at a time.

I just have to be patient (not easy for me) and go into my zen place.

If you are going to try this know that it is possible and just takes practice.

I only use easy solder for all of my joins from the beginning to the end of the whole piece and I am able to do it so keep at it.

🙂

I added some balls then pickled and sanded it, bringing it to its pre-finished state. Trying to get all of the excess solder and my new friend, fire scale, off and then I smothered it in Black Max.

Because I like to live dangerously.

Oh, and I decided on that little ball thing hanging from the bottom.

I buffed it a little bit and then set the stone.

I prefer to use the bezel roller.

I started with the square pusher thing, and did find that easier at first, but I like the smoothness of the roller.

It’s worth practicing with if you can take the pain of constantly pushing it into your fingers when you begin.

And voilà.

Yet another viney, leafy piece.

I really need to get some new designs going.

–

BTW

If you read the Ganoksin article on fire scale (linked above) you will have read this line.

“Traditional polishing apprenticeships lasted from three to five years”

No wonder I find the polishing part the hardest.

Aint got no time for five years though so I’m just going to have to keep on winging it…

–

Just a quickie…

Published on 12th June 201513th October 2015 by coldfeetstudio

I wanted to show you what I do when I’m buffing one of my pieces.

Full disclosure here that I’ve only just started to do this because I’m the SLOWEST learner IN THE WORLD!

You probably do this already so don’t rub it in.

When it’s finished but before I put the stone in I give it its black dunk or liver of sulphur spa treatment and buff it up as much as I can.

Then I set the stone and cover it with masking tape.

I trim the excess tape away with an xacto knife

and then really go to town on it.

I don’t buff it completely before putting the stone in because I don’t want to harden the collar too much, but I’m pretty sure you can do it all before the stone goes in.

I just like to make it harder on myself.

It’s more interesting that way.

I started to use these some time back.

I like to use three of them together for the general buffing, after which I soften the look up a bit with a fine buffer.

Either this.

Or one of these.

And I use one of the yellow wheels on its own to just touch up the top edges of the bezel collar to give it a pop.

You can just use a general burnisher for this also.

🙂

–

A little bit for Linda and then some for Deborah…

Published on 10th June 201513th October 2015 by coldfeetstudio

As usual I started off with the good intention of photographing everything I do to cut a cabochon, but then forgot.

Sorry Linda.

Sometimes I didn’t forget, but didn’t want to lose a hand.

You understand I’m sure.

Talking of hands I was listening to NPR yesterday and it was actually about how they can do hand transplants now,

but even so I didn’t feel like chancing it…

–

I start out by buying the slabs already cut.

Mainly from Natalie, because she’s got loads of them and her shop is laid out nicely so I don’t have to search around forever and get frustrated because I don’t really know what I want.

Then I take them to my new trim saw which always makes me feel irritated because somewhere in the back of my mind I have a feeling I had one before which I never used and at some time must have thrown away.

This is why you never throw out anything people!

It’s not hoarding. It’s common sense.

Saying that, I did manage to take six boxes of craft books (not that I have a problem with collecting them of course) to the charity shop yesterday.

I had to listen to S moan and groan all the while as he took them to the car. He even showed me his box wounds afterward, but why else would I have had him if not to lug things around for me is what I want to know.

So I got the trim saw from Rio Grande although I’m sure you can get it anywhere.

Armed with a mask, a pair of safety glasses, my old pottery apron and a towel hooked around the front of my neck I proceed to cut the slab into manageable sizes.

Not quite as cute a look as I usually go for, but as the saw spits out water faster than I can put in it it was that or catch pneumonia and I’ve already got a bit of a cough…

Although I’m fairly sure that they can reattach fingers more easily than hands you’ll see I prefer to push the slice through with a slab of wood.

Again a seemingly useless scrap which I was loath to throw away and yet proved itself to be of vital importance.

These are the manageable pieces.

Gaspeite aka The Motherlode, Tiger Tail Jasper, The Australian Crazy Lace and a Jasper gift from Natalie as she probably knows that I don’t know what I’m doing and need all the help I can get…Thank you Natalie.

Next I mark out the shapes I want to go for with a sharpie.

I used templates for the first four shapes and winged it for the gaspeite.

You can probably tell.

Then still with the trim saw I try to trim as much rock away as I can because I don’t want to wear out my grinding disc more than I have to.

And so on to the Jool Tool Extraordinaire.

I’m in two minds about the Jool Tool.

I think it’s a great little tool, but I think if you want to make cabs for a living and not just the odd one here and there, you’ll probably want a ‘proper’ lapidary machine thingy.

Like this

Oh hell. I just found this.

Save me now.

So back to the Jool Tool Extraordinaire…

This is the diamond grinding disc which I use first.

It screws onto the spindle on top of the Jool Tool.

You can see I cleaned it for you 🙂 It was either that or the bathroom…

no brainer really.

And the idea is that you push the stone onto the disc from underneath.

The neat thing is that the discs are designed so that you can see through them as they are spinning and therefore you have more control over what you’re doing.

The speed of the disc also keeps the stone cool which is nice.

You keep the stone wet as you grind it. You can just see the little water tray underneath the wheel.

Here they are after their first round with the grinder.

Next I like to mark half way down the side of the stone and on the top for guide lines and then I sand off the edges.

Jool Tool + finger nails means never having to get a manicure again.

Priceless.

O.K. so here’s where I forgot to continue photographing.

🙁

Basically you continue to grind the stones in this manner until you get the shape you want. After that it’s just a matter of sanding the stones through all of the grits available until you get a nice finished shine.

For instance after the diamond wheel you go through the coarse, medium, fine, extra fine, 3,000 microns, 5,000 microns, and 50,000 microns sandpaper wheels. Then you use a fine cerium oxide wheel and finally a felt wheel with a polishing compound on it.

It really doesn’t take that long and it can be quite calming.

I’ve found I like to do it when I’m having a, oh my god I can’t go on, moment as it’s mind numbing yet productive.

But that’s just me.

Here’s what I did with the Gaspeite cabs.

I drew the sketch.

Around the cabs.

Set the collars.

Cut the back plate away so that the stone sits deeper into the piece for more dimension.

Soldered this onto a new back plate

Made some balls.

Worked on the bottom vine.

Cut a design out of the back and attached a hoop for the bottom vine to hang from

Checked it on the sketch.

Started on the top vine.

Cut some leaves.

And soldered them on to wire.

Soldered the balls onto the larger wire.

And placed the smaller vines around it.

Rechecked it against the sketch.

IMG_5933 - Version 2

Not too bad.

And now it’s off to its forever home.

Thank you Deborah.

–

From funk to determination.

Published on 15th April 201513th October 2015 by coldfeetstudio

Yep the ol’ funk still.

If you’ve been reading my blog for any time you’ll know I get them.

I’m a funky kind of person – and not in the good way 😉

Well this one’s just been lingering around trying to make itself more important than it really is, and I’ve been plodding along almost going ‘there’ (yes you know where), but then writing my blog and laughing at it like this,

Hahaha!

It works. I laugh at, and with, myself through this blog, and, for me, that brings everything back to a level I can work with.

So yesterday I was in the studio having one of my, why am I bothering doing this, nothing really matters, I’m just so bored with it all moments.

You know, general wallowing and floundering around, looking at all the stuff on my table and not wanting to do anything.

But, knowing that I just needed to get on with something, anything, to work through the funk, I decided that I was going to make a piece similar to this one.

Because I had another of those nice little coral flint whatever stones just left hanging there with nothing to do.

It was one of a pair that were sold as earring stones, but, thoughtless me, split them up and now they’re lost twins.

O.K. So…

No writing now, I think I’ve managed to get all the melodrama out.

Let’s see how long I go without having to say something.

Mwahahaha.

Too pointy so I changed it slightly.

Now I’m playing around with it as I never really do know what I want to happen next.

Finally decided.

Added the bail.

Cut the prongs.

Added some extra little balls along with the prongs.

Not quite like the one I was going for.

The darn prongs got on my nerves a bit, but I finally remembered I had bought some of that Rio Chil Gel a while back and decided to give that a go.

Bit of an overkill with that ginormous syringe though for those tiny prongs 🙂

It really works well so try that out if you want to stop something melting five hundred times before you finally clue up.

And that was when the determination kicked in.

Up until then I had been making the piece by rote really, not really putting my back into it. But… when those darn prongs kept melting and I finally decided to walk away and give up because I would never be able to do it, I suddenly felt my bloody minded side kicked in.

Where had it been all day?

Probably slinked off somewhere to have it out with the funk is all I can think of because it came back with a vengeance and, before I knew it, those prongs were set and finished.

It was a beautiful thing.

😉

Here’s a little video of me making the leaves. Don’t know if you can really see what I’m doing, but hey, I was in the funk at the time, so it’s all I have.

😉

–

You can relax now…no soldering for this one.

Published on 30th March 201513th October 2015 by coldfeetstudio

I made these yesterday and have decided to keep them for myself as, according to P, they go with my black heart.

I rarely wear jewelry so hey for me!

I call the one in the middle, Peas be with You.

So if you want to make one

It’s very simple, and I only got two injuries making three bracelets, so there’s a bonus right there.

Remember those 1 x 6″ sheets of silver I bought by mistake? Well I cut them lengthways so I had two 6 x 0.5″ lengths. (You may need a length longer, or shorter, depending on your wrist size)

Then I heated the edges until they melted.

This takes a little time and it seems that the silver likes to melt as the edge is being pushed by the flame rather than heating it face on.

Now bend the piece lengthways over the edge of your block.

Either this way.

Or this way, depending on what works best for you.

And finish bending by gently hammering.

Or squishing.

Until you have a folded bar.

Don’t hammer the fold flat, you’re just bending the edges together.

The trick to making this bracelet is in the annealing.

Each time you work silver it hardens. Heating the silver softens it so that you will find it not only easier to manipulate, but also less likely to split as you bend it.

So now you will gently heat up (anneal) the bar of silver until it turns a dull red colour and you can either leave it to cool on its own, or quench it in water.

For this purpose I’ve found that either works o.k.

Now you can take a bracelet mandrel or anything that you can form your bracelet shape around and, with the rough edges facing upward, gently ease the silver around the mandrel.

The metal is so soft at this point that you can do this easily with your fingers.

You don’t want to push the metal too much and you will begin to feel when it has started to become hardened again.

This is when you stop and anneal the metal once more.

Continue doing this until you have formed the bracelet shape you want.

This can take three of four goes.

You may need to use a raw hide hammer toward the end of the forming. Don’t hit the bracelet too hard, but gently tap the ends around the form.

If the silver twists just gently tap it back into shape, and anneal when necessary.

When you have your finished shape anneal the piece once more.

Again the metal will be soft enough for you to now open up the bracelet.

Don’t do this though.

Because it hurts.

Keep about three-quarters of an inch at the two ends closed and snip them into a round which you will sand smooth so that you don’t cut your wrists each time you try it on.

Not that I’ve done that because I’m too impatient or anything.

Now take your raw hide hammer and gently tap the bracelet all over.

This isn’t shaping the bracelet, but hardening it again so that you can put it on and take it off without the silver bending out of shape each time.

Now fill the inside with silver black.

You can use liver of sulphur for this but I prefer using the most highly toxic chemicals I can find.

Look at that lovely radioactive green liquid. We used to have curry for school lunches on Fridays with a juice that ran out that neon colour. Looks bad but it was my favourite.

Could explain a lot.

So,

Rinse off the bracelet, buff its outsides, and you’re ready to go

🙂

–

Now we will take you back to our normal programme…

Published on 23rd March 201513th October 2015 by coldfeetstudio

I think something more to do with the actual making of jewelry rather than just the showing and telling bit, although I never did get to do that at school and am just beginning to see what I missed out on.

I know, poor baby, that was a huge chunk of my childhood down the drain right there.

It happens.

I got over it.

Actually I didn’t because I didn’t know there was anything I had to get over, but I will tell you that I have learned a lot sharing with you here and I recommend putting yourself out there to everyone.

O.K. I’m rambling. You didn’t know I did that did you?

–

Stone Setting…

Ticks me off.

I’m not talking about the cabochon settings I do as I seem to have those down now, but rather the shiny, let’s put one of those in a ring settings.

This is how it usually goes when I want to try something new.

I think about it, think about it, and then I think about it some more. Sometimes for months. The cabs, perhaps a year. And then suddenly, before I even know what hit me, I start making them all of the time and voilà, I’m in the cab club.

Well the other shiny kind of stone setting has been roaming around in the back of my head now for quite some time.

I’ve dabbled, and generally get by, but I cannot tell you that I can wake up in the morning and say, right then, time to set a shiny stone into one of those ring settings, and then go into the studio and set that darn stone with the confidence that it will work.

So this is my mission chaps and chapesses. (Are there really any chaps reading this drivel?). The mysterious world of stone setting.

–

I’ve got a few books on the subject. Well, I’ve got quite a lot really as I love looking at the pictures.

But this time it might actually be time to read them.

Although honestly I’m a visual learner, so I might have to change my mind about this later when all the words start running together and I get brain fog.

I learn by seeing, trying, messing up, figuring out where I went wrong and trying again.

Probably could save a lot of time and energy just by reading the darn books, but where’s the fun and frustration in that?

Here’s one of my books.

Some of you probably have it.

Now, the setting I want to tackle first is the flush setting.

I think that’s what they call it.

Hang on, let me have a look.

Nope, it’s tube setting. Similar I think, but not quite the same.

O.K. I was going to show you a pic in the book, but then I realized that was probably illegal.

I’ll just have to draw my own for you, bear with me a mo…

So here’s the plan.

I’ve got some stones which I bought from Rio back when I first starting thinking about it.

I was a little annoyed by this as I was still in the throes of perfecting my cab setting skills, but I went ahead and bought them anyway as I just had to have them.

No hope for me really.

As I said, I have had a few successes, but I really want to get to the place where I have alllllll successes.

I’m needy that way.

I’ll try to walk you through my trials and errors, but sometimes holding the camera while soldering, bezel pushing, filing, etc., can get a bit tricky, but I’m all about overcoming challenges 😉

So watch this space…

–

In other news.

You remember those snipings from the bridesmaid earrings.

There was a lot of them.

Well they took a holiday at the charcoal block spa and salon.

And now they’re sorted and ready to go party.

Shame I’m doing stone setting now.

And here’s a photo of The Rodent for Angie.

Yes, I know he looks all cute and stuff, but

He’s still a rodent.

Actually there’s a debate as to whether guinea pigs are in fact rodents.

Frankly I don’t care.

He might be cute, but he hounded his poor little black friend to death, literally, by using Thor, RIP, as his sex slave, but that’s another story…

It’s always the good looking ones you’ve got to watch out for isn’t it.

And finally, the show and tell.

Petrified Wood Opal. (I know, who knew?)

–

And for your continual enjoyment.

(O.K. so maybe the show and tell wasn’t last)

Soldering jump rings.

Exciting, right?

Here’s how I like to do it.

Place all of the jump rings facing the same direction as sometimes, once you start heating them, you can’t find the area you want to join.

This way you have a heads up.

Use a little flux.

Cut loads of pallions of solder wire, or use chips, whichever you prefer.

And heat them gently until they form little balls.

You can then pick them up with your pick (see what I did there), and place them easily on the join to be soldered.

The balls have to be hot, as does the pick, to be able to do this.

I leave you now with your very first look at the top of my head.

Oh, and sorry about the sniff. Got a bit of a cold.

Go on. You thought I had long golden locks didn’t you…

–

Good Grief

Published on 9th October 201313th October 2015 by coldfeetstudioblog

Just when I thought I was safe.

Just when I was going to buckle down and finish Hope’s quilt.

I had to go and watch this.

(here)

Man!

Well fortunately I’m just an evening quilter so once I get the back done and sandwiched I’ll be able to get back out to the jewelry studio.

Too much to do and not enough time.

Better get started …

–

New chain.

Published on 16th September 201313th October 2015 by coldfeetstudioblog

1.5″ lengths of 18 gauge fine silver wire.

Wrap around a mandrel as below.

DSCN8770

Join together

Ball up the ends with your torch.

Fuzzy photographs. Sorry.

Give it a friend.

Repeat

Repeat again.

Until desired length.

As this is fine silver the ends ball up perfectly, but the links are very soft.

So, tumble to harden.

By the way.

This is what I did with the other half of the amethyst.

Happy Monday 🙂

–

I have a new link, and I’m not afraid to use it.

Published on 2nd October 201213th October 2015 by coldfeetstudioblog

Start by cutting the wire. This time I used 18 gauge sterling silver which I cut into 1″ strips. This makes a small link just under half an inch long. I did want a chunkier feel but I’ve run out of 16 gauge wire, and 14 seemed too thick. I’m still bummed out that they don’t have 17 or 15 gauge at Rio, they obviously don’t know that I need wire in every size.

Hammer the ends of the wire slightly,

and sand them.

As 18 gauge wire is fairly thin I used this nail file,

which I stole from my daughter. It works perfectly for small jobs, especially sanding the ends of ear wires. I have noticed, however, that the black ordinary ones seem better than these decorative ones. I know, weird, right.

O.K. now follow closely.

With round nose pliers or your super cool multi whatever pliers turn the end of the wire as in the photo.

Now bend the wire in the opposite direction using a slightly larger part of the pliers.

Now do the same at the other end.

Notice that the curve at the new end looks as though I’ve done it the wrong way round. Don’t be fooled.

Now complete the next curve, as you did the second at the other end, to make the link.

Confused?

I’ll draw a picture.

Rest assured, once you’ve done the first one, or three as in my case, it gets easier.

You might find that the link has bent out of shape somewhat depending on how well you managed to push the wire over the pliers with your fingers hurting so much, (there’s just something about bending those hard little pieces of wire that does a girls hands in), but, you can take your flat nose pliers and easily straighten the link up.

Now gently squash the middle part together with your round nose pliers.

and use that special little trick to bring the link together more if the ends don’t completely touch the middle.

Now make it a friend.

I joined my links together with a small jump ring

but you could also join the two together before closing the link.

Then I hung aquamarine beads from it and made it into a bracelet.

But!

Before you get excited,

here’s the thing.

This chain is really nice but I had to do a lot of sanding to shave down some of those curved ends.

See them?

As I ran my finger over it I could tell that without eliminating some of the end curves the chain would constantly catch on your clothing and it would be really annoying. It took me a long while to get the chain to the point where I was satisfied that it wouldn’t catch. As a consequence this bracelet is 5 billion dollars and cheap at half the price. (Does anyone even know what that means … )

As well as sanding I used my flat nose pliers to push the end flatter to the middle part of the link and that seemed to work quite well. I was thinking of balling up the ends of the wire next time to see how that turns out but I’m not sure if I’ll like it as much.

Stay tuned, I can feel in my bones that there’s more link excitement to come.

–

Here’s B beginning her second day at work.

And no, her desk is not in the toilet. At least I don’t think so …

–

The tale of two links.

Published on 10th September 201213th October 2015 by coldfeetstudioblog

Wondering what else you can do with those links?

You remember the ones.

Well fret no more.

To find the post with instructions on how to make these click HERE, however, I will recap.

First make the links.

This time I used 16 gauge sterling silver wire and I worked on them in a slightly different way than the first post – just to keep it exciting.

Cut 1″ lengths and hammer each end as before.

Then bend them over your super neat pliers and bring the ends together with flat nose pliers.

You will notice, with some frustration, that the two ends wont come together completely flat. Things like this bug the bejeezus out of me,

so,

gently squeeze together the round end of the loop just enough to bring together the flat ends.

It doesn’t seem much but this solves the problem. Just be sure not to squeeze the loop so much that you flatten the round end too much, you still want a nice looking loop at the finish.

This is where I changed it up.

The first time I made the links I drilled the holes in the ends before I made the loop. This worked very well for me but you have to make sure the holes line up after you bend the silver into the link.

This time I drilled the hole after I made the link.

Now, apparently I drill the same way I fish.

When I get a bite I reel the thing in as fast as I can until the fish is almost speared on the end of the rod, then I whack the hell out of it with the priest until it’s absolutely dead. Not the mostly dead as in my last post you understand. All dead. I can’t stand playing with it by casually reeling it in. I can’t stand its not knowing I’m going to whack it on the head. I just don’t want it to see it’s coming.

This is why I don’t fish any more.

Back to the jewelry.

When I drill I tend to push that bit down into the silver like there’s a race on. There’s no messing around, I just spear that thing like I don’t want it to see it’s coming.

Yesterday I found out, once again, that my fishing technique is not necessarily the best approach to drilling.

Feel free to learn from my mistakes, they might just save your life someday.

NOTE:

If you are not holding the link tightly enough (I use an old pair of pliers so as not to get my fingers too close) and you jam that bit down like someone who wants to get catching a fish over with as soon as is earthly possible, you will likely take your eye out.

In this instance the bottom end of the link didn’t want to stay put as the drill came down through the first end. Because I was happily going full guns with the drilling the link caught up in the bit and whipped itself out of the pliers. This has happened before (I’m a slow learner), but this time, and I don’t really know how, the link flew off into the room. A Final Destination moment for sure.

I quickly found out that, in this instance at least, slowly but surely wins the race and that, however much I don’t want to admit it, my high school metalwork teacher was right. Always respect the machines, however small and innocent they appear.

Moving on.

Once the holes have been drilled take out your preferred sanding tool and even out the ends into perfect rounds.

This is my tool of choice,

Next you will need some 18 gauge sterling silver wire which you cut into just under 2.5 cm lengths and bend in half.

Thread the loop into two of the links.

Now comes the tricky part, although if I did it, you can too.

Hold the links in your soldering tweezers and ball up the ends of the wire with your torch.

This is only tricky because you have to be careful not to heat up the flattened ends of the links too much else they melt too.

It’s also tricky if you have short tweezers. Then you’ll find you burn your fingers constantly until you wise up and buy a longer pair. Took me a year. Told you, slow learner.

Hold the new link with a pair of round nose pliers and bring together the balled ends slightly with a pair of flat nose pliers until you have a good shape

Carry on joining the links

until you have a bracelet length, or a length for whatever else you want to use a chain for. (See that link that hasn’t come completely flat together? Annoying).

Now, if you had thought ahead you would have already made your clasp before you closed up the last link. If you’re me, however, you wouldn’t have,

so,

find some 16 gauge wire and wrap a small loop from the end of it around the last link.