Making A Hollow Form Pendant With Turquoise Cabochon

I recently finished my first hollow form pendant with a bezel set cabochon and actually remembered to take photos this time (!) so I thought I would share how I did it.

I decided to make a fairly small round shaped pendant and set an 8mm turquoise cabochon onto the front.

I started by forming the frame or wall of the pendant and made the bezel at the same time. After soldering I shaped the frame on a ring mandrel to round it up. I then cut a small piece of sterling sheet for the back piece so it was about 3mm bigger than the frame all round. I flattened and sanded the sheet so there was good contact between the frame and sheet.

Using steel t pins pushed into a fibreboard soldering block I secured the frame to the base so there was good contact all round. You could use binding wire instead of t pins or as it was a small sized piece just pushing down with a soldering pick probably would have worked ok. I just like to have a hand free when I'm soldering if possible just in case! I think I overdid the amount of solder to be honest but I'd rather do that and know the join will be good all the way round than have to redo it. Any excess solder will either be inside the pendant or removed when the base is trimmed anyway so there won't be any cleaning up to do.

I've recently changed the flux I use from Auflux to Easy Flo as I prefer the paste consistency of the Easy Flo. The Auflux works fine but being a liquid it runs off pieces and I was having to reapply it several times before starting to solder so decided to try a paste version which is what I got used to using at night classes at college.

After pickling the base and trimming it slightly I prepared a piece of etched silver for the top. I decided where I wanted to put the bezel and allowing for the overhang I drilled a ventilation hole in what would be the middle of where the bezel would sit which would be hidden later by the cab. The hole is necessary to allow hot air to escape during any further soldering or there could be a risk of the pendant exploding.

I used the t pins to make sure the join was tight and probably too much solder again! I find the residue left by the Easy Flo flux makes it hard to see if the solder join was complete. It looked like there was a gap but once it was out of the pickle I could see it was ok.

Making a hollow form with a hole in it means any liquid will get into the middle and must be removed! After taking it out of the pickle I ran it under the tap so the flow of the water hit the hole and helped to force the pickle out. I then left it to soak in water and bicarb for about 15 mins while I got the bezel ready for soldering to the front.

You need to remove as much of the liquid in the centre as possible before soldering again. Shaking the pendant and blotting the hole with kitchen roll helps but if you are in hurry then you can dry it in the oven set at it's lowest temp for about 10- 15 mins. Or you could do what I did and leave it to dry while you have your lunch and watch Bargain Hunt and the News. I really do live life on the edge.

Once it was dry I applied flux to the whole of the front of the pendant when I soldered the bezel to help protect from firestain. I couldn't see any firestain on the front but I did get some on the edge and back of the pendant. More about this later! I pickled the pendant and after rinsing and drying I trimmed the edges and filed and sanded them. I then made a bail for hanging and soldered this onto the top of the pendant.

In hindsite the way I set this up probably wasn't the best way to do it! What happened was......... the solder flowed at the front of the bail (you can see the piece of solder in the photo) and I turned it over to flow the solder on the back. I supported the front of the bail with my pliers to stop it dropping when the solder flowed on the back but I must have pushed the pliers too hard under the bail as it tipped upwards when the solder flowed on the back so I had to reflow the solder and reposition the bail. I got there in the end but I think soldering the bail on the back first then turning it over to solder the front would have worked better.

If you were wondering what the white stuff around the bezel was in the photo it's Tippex which stops solder from flowing. I put it around the bezel solder seam as I was using easy solder again for the bail just in case the easy solder around the bezel decided to reflow. Make sure you let the Tippex dry before soldering as it gives off fumes and can ignite sometimes.

Now I'm enjoying making more pendants I will need to turn my thoughts to bail design and how to make them more interesting. Being an earring person I've never had to think much about bails before!

Firestain!
I mentioned firestain earlier as I noticed it on the sides and back of the pendant. It shows as a grey/purple mark when you start to sand/clean up the silver. It's formed by the oxidation of the copper within the sterling silver not just on the surface and can't be removed by pickling unlike firescale. Too much heat in the same spot can cause it. Anyway it happens. There are ways to prevent it such as coating the sterling silver with a protective layer such as Firescoff or using Argentium silver which doesn't form firestain. Thoroughly covering the sterling silver with flux before you start soldering can help too.
I managed to remove it by using a sanding disc with my Dremel but this does create a lot of extra work. I decided that using a scotchbrite bristle brush with my Dremel to give the silver a satin finish then oxidizing it worked fine in disguising the slightly darker areas so I didn't stress too much over it!

These are great for a satin finish but make sure you wear glasses/goggles as they love to fire their bristles everywhere if you catch the edge of a piece!

The finished pendant

Silver Hollow Form Pendant and Earrings

I recently finished my first sterling silver hollow form pendant. In my last post I said how much I love the look of hollow form pieces - the 3D solidness of them despite being hollow. Anyway I still love them after making my first version in silver!

I didn't take any photos this time but I promise to do so next time when I'm planning to make another one with a bezel set cab on the front. I used 24g/0.5mm sheet that I etched using nail varnish as the resist to create a dot pattern. I used a small brush for the nail varnish and managed to get it all over my fingers (course I did). I discovered you get a neater, rounder dot (which is so important to me because I'm slightly weird!) if you load the brush so it's almost but not quite dripping, hence the messy fingers. I bought some 5mm 24g/0.5mm strip from Cookson Gold for the frame or walls of the hollow form which is a bit extravagant I suppose as I could cut it myself but it just makes it a bit quicker to do.

I found the soldering easier to do than on the copper version. I use steel T pins to hold the frames down firmly onto the sheet and I did sand the sheet this time as well as annealing and flattening it with a rawhide mallet. I also used a different flux than usual - Tenacity 5 instead of Auflux. I like Auflux but being a liquid it tends to run everywhere so you need to apply it several times to make sure everything is covered. The Tenacity flux is a powder you mix with water to a paste consistency so it stays put. Incidently I discovered there is a burlesque dancer called Tenacity Flux - good name!

The solder flowed well all round both frames so I didn't have to do any further soldering to fill gaps. One problem I did encounter was fire stain - that greyish/purple staining caused by oxidation within the silver because of too much heat in one spot for too long. I did struggle with the Tenacity flux to know if the solder had actually flowed - it behaves slightly differently to the Auflux and I didn't notice the solder flow so probably held the heat on the silver for too long causing the fire stain. I did manage to remove it with sanding discs and my Dremel so it wasn't a catastrophe plus using liver of sulphur would help cover it up too if you didn't want to sand it out.
I did my usual and started finishing the pendant before I'd finished soldering on the bail and heart so had to sand the edges twice to remove the fire stain. One day I will learn to leave the finishing till after I've finished soldering! The heart was made from a fine silver ball that I hammered then filed into a heart shape. I think it adds a touch of cuteness to the pendant. The final shape of the pendant kind of forms itself - I start off with a shape for the frames them tweak them once they're soldered until I'm happy. I prefer free-form but I do want to try more of a flower/wavy edge shape soon.

The pendant feels fairly substantial at 6.2g despite being made from a thin gauge of silver which is handy as it means I won't need to get it hallmarked. I made some simple silver hollow form disc earrings too....... slightly easier than the pendant!

I was busy helping to paint the living room and dining room last week so didn't get a chance to make anything so you can probably guess how much I'm itching to get my torch and some metal out and start playing again this week.

My next post will be about how I made a hollow form pendant with bezel set cab with the promised photos :D

My First Copper Hollow Form Pendant And The Mistakes I Made

I finished my first "proper" copper hollow form pendant last week. I say proper as I'd made 1.5 practice pendants beforehand to get the feel of doing them. The half was my first attempt and it went ok up to the point where I pierced out the hole in the centre after soldering the first piece of sheet to the frames. After piercing out the hole I then for some reason started to pierce out the rest of it which would have left me with basically the frames again (!) I did realize my mistake quite quickly.............
My second attempt went much better apart from quite a few gaps in the solder seam on both sides despite soldering one side FOUR times! Resoldering one area to fill the gap caused some other areas of solder to reflow and the solder to run off completely leaving even more gaps! I quickly decided I needed something to hold the frames and flat sheet together so the join was tighter and ordered some T pins...........

 First attempt....... looks ok-ish from this angle

Gaps in the solder seam

Despite the smallish gaps which were a bit annoying the pendant did look ok and I finished it by making a coiled wire bail and soldering it to the back. I then thought the coil bail stuck out too much and had a bit of a brain storm and decided to hammer it so the three coils were more oval shaped than round and you can probably guess where this is going........

 
Hammering the bail did flatten the coils nicely. It also very nicely created a dent in the back of my HOLLOW pendant. Sigh.... I won't do that again........ever :D
 

I did manage to finish the third pendant without too much stress or dentage. The T pins did help a lot with keeping the join tight although I still had to solder a second time to fill a gap on one side. I used some copper I textured at college with a skeleton leaf for the front and soldered two flattened fine silver balls onto the front.

 Close up with no solder gaps!

I finished the pendant with a copper bail which is the first time I've ever made this type of bail. It was a simple "p" shape soldered at the top and back. I was quite pleased with how it turned out once I decided how to hang it. I was originally going to place the bail so the pendant hung the other way but I needed some space for the silver dots towards the bottom so went for the wider option.

Coming soon....my first version in lovely silver :D

More Bezel Setting Practice And Hollow Form Earrings

I wanted to do a bit more bezel setting to improve how long it takes me to do. I am getting quicker at it, really! I sometimes "waste" time cleaning/ filing/sanding bezels up then change my mind about what I'm going to do with them and realize I will have to sand them again after another lot of soldering. Oh well :D

I thought I'd try decorating one of the bezels by stamping. I wasn't sure if it would work as the bezel wire is pretty thin at 0.3mm so I stamped fairly lightly. I didn't want to risk stamping too heavily and the bezel splitting and I also left a gap where the join was going to be. I think it worked ok with these simple turquoise cabochon earrings.

I stamped in the gap I'd left after soldering but not directly over the solder join. I think the stamped effect looks "right" with the turquoise.

I'm currently practicing making hollow form pendants in copper and will move onto silver in the next couple of days. I love the 3D look of hollow form pieces - they look so solid but are lovely and light.
I made a pair of simple hollow form earrings in copper recently before I started on the pendants. Simple as in a domed disc soldered to a flat base which is then trimmed and finished.

The pendants I'm making consist of a frame plus a smaller frame in the centre which are soldered to a flat sheet on both sides. The middle of the smaller frame is pierced out after the first side is soldered and the edges are trimmed at the end. They are a bit tricky to solder to make sure the solder join is complete all the way round on both sides and around the smaller frame in the middle but I'm getting better and will post about them as soon as I've made a couple in silver.

I soon discovered when I made these earrings that it's important to make sure you rinse all of the pickle out of them. You need the hole to prevent the piece from exploding when you solder the earwire (or anything further) onto them but that also means they get full of any liquid you put them into! I find leaving them to soak in clean water and bicarb for 15 minutes after I take them out of the pickle does the trick.
I've also started using hard sterling wire for the earwires instead of dead soft and find it is a bit sturdier for this type of earwire despite being annealed when it's soldered and it worked out slightly cheaper than the dead soft which is always a good thing!!