First attempt at making a silver sheet ingot

Carol Dekle-Foss

If you use silver or copper in your jewelry designs, at some point you will have to figure out what to do with your scraps. I've amassed about 10 ounces of sterling silver scrap and a MASSIVE amount of copper in about a 3 years time. It never appealed to me to turn in my silver scraps because I wouldn't be getting the amount invested in return. Especially now with silver prices so low and possibly dropping even more.

I've wanted to melt my silver into sheet ingots for rolling for awhile now, but honestly, I was too nervous. I had visions of it spilling and melting a hole in my toe! 

But.. I started thinking it's time. Time to do something with all the scraps I've accumulated and put them to use. So, with my husband taking pictures (making sure I don't burn the house down) I melted my first ingot yesterday! Yay! 

Here is how I did it and what I used. This is in no way a tutorial because I am still learning myself, but I wanted to share my results and a few things I learned along the way.

My supplies. 

The Ingot mold and Crucible I purchased at PMC Supplies on Ebay. I like the reversible one because you can make nice thick ring shanks. If you want to melt copper too, make sure you get the right ingot mold and crucible. 

Ohhh pretty flame. It's Photoshopped, I couldn't help myself! You get the idea though, you'll need a nice big beautiful flame!

The torch I use is a Smith Air/Acetylene torch, and for this project I used the #3 tip. 

First, I heated up the crucible and ingot mold. 

I then filled my crucible with a few pieces of silver and Borax. I guess Borax acts like a flux to help melt the metal quicker. After it started to melt, I added more pieces of silver.

Here we go!

When it started to get molten, I turned the crucible more to the side to get ready to pour. Anyone else see the creepy skeleton face?!?!!! WTH! Seriously. freaky.

And..pour quickly!

Ummm. yeah..epic fail. I poured too slowly and it created this interesting looking blob. Gotta pour fast!

I just reheated and poured again and got this. Much better. Although, I should have taken advantage of making the ingot shape smaller and it would have been a better shape. Oh well, next time!

So yeah..I made a boot. Hahahaha! That's okay, it's 20 gauge thick and will work well for backplates etc. Any suggestions on how to prevent cracking when rolling would be greatly appreciated. I did anneal it about 5 times. Maybe more annealing? 

What else have I been up to? I have a 2 day event coming up in September, so I have been preparing for that by making tons of earrings. 

I still have about 25 pairs to make, but here is what I've done so far.

I made these simple sterling silver earrings priced to sell at $18.00 each.  We will have to see how they do.

I then played with mixed metals and shapes by soldering together brass stampings to textured copper rounds.

I made these from some of my favorite ceramic beads my husband and I made.

I also played with a new shape and pattern for ceramic beads.

So that's what I've been up to! So what about you? Do you have tons of metal scrap just lying around? Have you ever done a metal scrap return? I would love to hear your thoughts.

Thank you for reading!

Fun with Foldforming

By Staci L. Smith

A little while back, Melinda Orr posted a link to this tutorial on fold forming.  (I highly reccomend watching it.)  I was fascinated.  It began my leaf making journey.  However, I really wanted to try to make that spiral shape they do in the video.  So she posted it again more recently, and I watched it again, and ran right into the studio.  Off to make that spiral shape into big, chunky hoop earrings, with a Staci Louise twist on them......I wanted to somehow pierce them through with balled end head pins.

First I made just a regular pair to get the feel for it.

I looked at them over and over to see where and how I could pierce the holes.  I couldn't drill after they were done, they metal is too thin and would crumble up.  Then it hit me.  So follow along with this little tutorial on how I made some cool pierced boho style earrings.  (Now I want to pierce all my metal with pins!!!!)

Materials and Tools:

hammer with one flattend end

steel bench block or anvil
chasing hammer or mallet
hole punch
flush cutters
butane torch with a large hot flame (I prefer the jumbo torch from www.cooltools.us for this, my other torches just didn't cut it for heat when balling the wire at the end of the project)
soldering block
files
steel wool or sanding pad (rough)
earwires

pickle pot with solution
26 gauge copper sheet

1.  Anneal two pieces of 26 guage metal, fold it in half, and cut your half circle (just like in the video).  (to anneal you heat the metal to a dull red, and quench it)

It was at this point I decided to punch my holes, but I had to re-punch them at the end too. I liked doing it first because it helped me to remember which was the folded end.  The folded end will become your bottom, and curved part, opposite of how you start out.

2.  Take a planishing hammer, or rivet hammer, and strike the folded seam repeated along its length with the thin straight side....overlapping as much as possible.  You want to keep your strikes at the halfway point or less of the metal.  Use your chasing hammer or mallet to flatten it.  Now flip it and repeat.  (note: since these were earrings I did both at each stage of instructions to save time)


3.  Now anneal again.


4.  And hammer the same way again.  It will begin to curve at the ends some where around this point.

5.  And anneal again.


6.  And hammer again, do both sides each time.  Repeat until you have the desired curve.  It will curve more once you open it up, and you can bend it into a little more of a curve as well.


7.  When you have your desired curve, anneal it again, and you can punch or re-punch your holes.


8.  Now I used a razor blade to open it up, and my fingers to spread it out.


9.  Then I flattend the ends with pliers and punched holes for the earwire to go through.


10.  File and sand the edges and rough spots.  You are sure to have some on the bottom.   Don't file away the textures, just any sharp spots.

11.  Now ball some sterling silver head pins.

12.  Drop them through the holes.

13.  Snip off any excess wire, leave just enough to ball (its ok if they are not even, fold forming is a very organic look and having your head pins ball differently only adds to that imperfection that nature offers)

14.  Take your torch and heat the entire piece a little, and then move the heat to the head pins until the other ends ball up.


15.  Quench and pickle.  It will be very oxidized by this point.

16.  Add your earwires.  I used handmade earwires, bent one end at a 90 degree angle and stretched them out to fit, and shape them.  Make sure they have spring enough to close, yet enough slack to move freely.  I had to really play with them to get it just right.  You can use either long or short earwires. 

17.  Tumble to strengthen the piece, earwires and all.


18.  Re-rough it up with some sanding pad or steel wool.


19.  Give it a liver of sulphur bath and then steel wool the high spots and clean up as desired.

TA-DA!  You now have pieced, boho hoop earrings!  I think you will find that you can use these techniques on many things to add texture, volume and piercings.  Remember to STRUT YOUR STUFF if you try this out.  We'd love to see what you make!

emerging from the fire

mary jane dodd

literally

and figuratively...

it is through the use of fire that i am able to best express myself... 

is there a medium or tool that if it were taken from you, you would feel as if you had lost your ability to speak?

what aspect of your work makes your spirit soar?

makes you feel like you have tapped into what you were born to do?

new toy

mary jane dodd

wall lenk pro torch

in my studio, i use butane, propane and mapp gases - each one having a hotter flame than the one before it... 


there are a variety of butane micro torches... and we find ones that we like... 


but this butane torch is a bit different - see the head? it reminds me of the one i have on my mapp tank for enameling... 


i will play with it and let you know what i find out - my focus will be upon use with copper and lower gauged sheet/wire - but you never know what you will learn!


and like other butane torches, i recommend using fuel that is 4x refined (or more) - you can get it at a cigar shop vs. a home improvement center or hardware store... often, those who work there might not know about the 'refined' part - but just ask to look at a canister and you will see it ...