New Hoops, New Bangles And A Small Soldering Obstacle Overcome

After a frenzy of bangle making recently I had a couple of slow days so I grabbed the chance the make some new stuff. I have a long list of "things to make" but decided to go for a few pairs of hoop earrings with post fitting. I've sold a few pairs recently so they needed replacing.

I started with a couple of pairs in silver - a simple hammered pair and a flattened design with embossed pattern...

I oxidized both pairs but I think the embossed pair might have looked nicer left shiny... {will do that next time}. They do look lighter in real life than they appear in this photo.

I also made a pair of hammered texture hoops in bronze and copper. I'm liking bronze more and more these days. Grappling with the thicker gauges can be a challenge as it's a harder metal than copper but the lovely golden brown tones you get when you oxidize it then clean it up with wire wool are lovely.

The more golden brown tones of bronze.

The slightly more red tones of copper.

I made some "new" bangle designs too. I say new but it's not really new it's just a hammered texture that I haven't done before on a bangle. And I got to use my lovely Fretz goldsmiths hammer for the first time. I now know why they cost a lot more than some other hammers and why they are totally worth it.

And A Small Soldering Obstacle Overcome.....

Anyone who solders knows it can be tricky and especially tricky when you want to solder a tiny thing to a much bigger thing. Things melt. Up to now I have used stud post fittings that are attached to a pad. They make it easier to solder to the earring and can add more stability. You can still melt them though but I haven't done that in a long time. The last hoop earrings with post fittings I made had the post and pad fittings that I then trimmed as they were bigger than the end of the hoop wire. This time I decided I needed to just get over it and learn to solder the tiny posts to my hoops instead.

The tiny piece of wire that makes a stud post compared to the post and pad version.

Learning to solder the posts onto my hoops would be quicker, I'd have less finishing, if any, to do and it would also be cheaper. So I melted some solder onto the end of the post, positioned the hoop so nothing would move {very important} and held the post in my tweezers while I heated the hoop. Once the hoop was at the right temperature I touched the post to it and the solder flowed. It worked and the post soldered securely to the hoop. I just have to remember to move the flame away once the solder has flowed! I didn't melt anything so it was a success and another little soldering hurdle overcome. Yay!

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Hoop-La! My Love Of Hoop Earrings

Last week I have been mostly making.... hoop earrings with post fitting. Strangely I've never made this type of hoop before but it is a style I like to wear myself so I thought it was about time I made some!

I've made the hoops in sterling silver, copper and bronze using wire from 2.6mm {10g} up to 3.5mm {7g} and sterling silver earring posts with the pad. I use the posts with the pad attached as I find it easier to solder them to other things that way. The posts sit nicely in a hole in my honeycomb soldering board then I can position the end of the hoop using a third hand on top of the pad part for soldering. I then trim, file and sand the ends to remove any of the pad part that overhangs the end of the hoop. I do have some of the sterling posts without the pad which I have used before but being a bit shaky of hand at times I'm going to need to practice a bit more before using them on the hoops.

Bronze wire hoops with swirly texture pattern.

Apart from the thing I have about circles {I really like them in other words} the main reason I like making these hoops is the simplicity of them and their sturdiness plus how easy it is to make variations.

I've done various things to the wire such as flattening it and adding a pattern with the rolling mill, using leaf vein textures, adding silver balls and wrapping with sterling wire...

Copper hoops with leaf vein texture and fine silver balls. The round wire was flattened, the texture added then they were formed and the silver balls and posts added.

I used a stripe texture hammer on these copper and silver wire hoops. I think it's the first time I've ever used the texture hammer since I bought it several years ago! I hammered at a 90° angle to the wire which gave it a rectangle-ish almost faceted pattern that I really liked. I always thought the texture hammer was a bit of a waste of space but now I'll no doubt be using it again very soon :D

I also got a bit OCD with some masking tape to make these copper and silver disc hoops.

I flattened the wire then spent a fair amount of time cutting very thin strips of masking tape with a scalpel and ruler which I then very carefully stuck to the flattened wire. I then put it through the rolling mill again and ended up with this block pattern. The very thin strips of masking tape end up wider as they are compressed in the rolling mill and gave the copper a contrasting textured and smooth design.

I like the end result but next time to speed up the process I think I'll try flattening some 20g or 18g copper wire and wrapping that round the hoop wire before putting it through the rolling mill to create a similar pattern.

And I mustn't forget good old sterling silver..... leaf vein texture and ball pein hammer texture versions.

You've probably noticed I like making these hoops...

One problem I encountered as I made them was what to use to shape them if they are too small for my bracelet mandrel and too big for my ring mandrel. I managed with a wooden block and cylinder with a curve the right size for the pair that didn't fit but there is an answer in the form of a hoop mandrel.

Which of course I've just bought....♥

   

Give It A Twist - New Copper Bangles

One of my favourite jewellery makers to watch on YouTube is Soham Harrison. His calm manner and straightforward explanations make him very easy to watch. He posts new videos regularly and I caught up with some of them a while ago.

One of the videos showed how to make twisted bangles using round wire. I make a lot of bangles in copper and silver so I'm always on the lookout for new ideas and I really liked the look of them.

They are very easy to make and basically involve annealing a length of round wire before flattening three sections of it using a rolling mill or hammer. You then anneal the wire again, fix one end into a vice and grip the other end in locking pliers and twist. The whole piece of wire turns creating twists in the flattened sections. You then cut the wire to length and make a bangle as usual. A really simple idea with very pretty results!

Here's a few I made......

...with a single twist. This was my first practice bangle with just one twist and the wire left round but given a hammered textured with the round end of the ball pein hammer.

A triple twist bangle with two hammered textured bangles.

Triple twist bangles that I will be selling singly.

I'm currently in the middle of making a pair of copper twist hoop earrings with one twisted section at the bottom. You can see I'm really getting into the twist thing! I'll photograph those as soon as they're finished.

I'm also very pleased to announce that I've finally worked out how to use locking pliers correctly. I always thought you had to tighten the screw all the way for them to work and then wondered why they didn't grip anything properly when I did it that way. Now I know you tighten the screw just enough to be able to squeeze the handles closed and then they will grip things perfectly! {I had to watch a video on YouTube to figure that one out, oh dear :D}

Making Hollow Forms With Non-Conforming Dies

This term at jewellery night class we are learning about hollow forms, boxes and hinges. I'd prefer to try hinges at home myself where I can see better so I decided to try making hollow forms using a non-conforming die.
 A die is a tool that is used to shape metal. A non-comforming die consists of one part as opposed to a conforming die that consists of two parts such as a dapping punch and dapping block where the metal fits between the two and is formed into a domed/concave shape.

The die I made is called a silhouette die and consists of a shape cut out of the middle of a non-compressible material such as wood or acrylic. I cut this out using a jigsaw then filed it to smooth the shape a little. The hollow form will be formed by pushing the metal into the cutout.

The college doesn't have an hydraulic press so we were going to form the metal by hand using dapping punches which meant the next step was to make marks for the screws which would hold the metal in place.

After annealing a piece of 26g gauge copper that I'd added a spiral texture to using my Bigshot (pre rolling mill) I screwed it into place over the die with the screws just catching the edges rather than going though the metal. As you can see from the holes I overdid the number of screws a bit. I thought there would be a lot of pull on the metal as I formed it but surprisingly there wasn't.

I used dapping punches and a mallet to push the metal into the oval-shaped hole I cut out, removing once and annealing it in the middle of the process (all those screws!) I carried on forming it and ended up with quite a deep impression. The spiral texture was stretched a bit and was less obvious but it was still there.

The next step would be to flip the die over and do it all again with another piece of metal to create the mirror image back part of the hollow form. That was the plan until I noticed there was a split in the metal near the top! I'd gone just that bit too far with it and being very thin metal it gave way.

It was a shame but it was my first attempt and that is how you learn. Practice make perfect as they say! I have the die and screws at home so I'm going to repeat the process with some 22g copper and not take it as far this time.

The plan once I've formed the two halves is to trim around the outside of the shape on one half which will then sit inside the other half for soldering the two parts together. Then the excess metal is trimmed, filed and sanded to produce a neat solder line. A hole needs to be drilled somewhere to allow the hot air to escape from the middle of the hollow form during soldering to avoid it exploding. This could be holes for threading a chain through or maybe part of the design.

Hopefully if it all goes to plan this time I'll be posting my finished hollow form piece (without any splits) soon :D

Silver And Copper Bangles With Coils

My continuing love for making bangles now includes bangles with added coils. It's one of the things I attempted with the very first bangle I made a few months ago....

I tried to solder the coils using paste solder on this one as I thought it would be easier but it just didn't work - the paste solder just burnt and formed a lump and refused to flow so I went back to using strip solder. That worked better but positioning the tiny pallions was a bit tricky "back then" and I ended up with a bangle a little bit out of round.

Since then I've learned to pick solder which makes life so much easier! Pick soldering is basically melting the solder into a ball which will then stick to your soldering pick meaning you can position it in tricky spots more easily. Once your metal is up to the correct temperature you place the ball of solder on the join and it flows immediately (in theory!) It doesn't always flow immediately but it will stay in place and is a much quicker way to solder than positioning small pieces of strip solder on an awkward join then watching them slide off as the flux bubbles. I use this method to solder all my bangle joins and to solder on the coils on my new bangles.

 The oxidized sterling silver version three of which I am (yes I really am) going to make for myself "soon" and a copper and silver version...

Excitement Alert!!
I'm very pleased to announce I am now the proud owner of a rolling mill. Yes! I have one at last and it's a Durston! Ever since I discovered rolling mills and what you could do with them I have coveted one but a look at the prices soon changed my mind and I made do with other ways of texturing my metal. I have been using the rolling mill at the night class I go to but the rollers aren't properly aligned so you only get half a texture most of the time. I did ask the teacher if it could be sorted but apparently they can't fix it so that kind of pushed me into thinking about getting my own rolling mill.

It was then a case of arguing with myself over whether to get one of the cheaper versions or to splurge and go for a Durston. I didn't want to get a cheaper one and regret it but the Durstons are so expensive and I didn't know where I was going to put it when I was using it or where it would go when I wasn't. Not having a workroom or bench causes problems like this! I don't have anywhere to fix it permanently but decided to worry about that when it arrived. So I went for a Durston in the end as a reward for not smoking for over a year now. I'm slightly embarrassed to admit I smoked in the first place to be honest as it's such a stupid thing to do but I've stopped and I feel so much better for it plus I've saved myself over £2,500 that would have gone on fags in the last year or so. So spending nearly £400 on a rolling mill was sweetened a little by that thought at least.

Here it is - I solved the fixing it in position problem by using two G-clamps and attaching it to the worktop in the kitchen. That really is the only place I can use it but it's very sturdily fixed and quite safe to use. I need to open the cupboard door to attach the clamps but I didn't think you would want to see the contents of my cupboard :D

It works wonderfully evenly and I've tried out a couple of leaf skeletons on copper and silver which came out really well. I know it's going to get a lot of use and I am thinking of selling textured copper discs in the future too.
As for somewhere to keep it when I'm not using it or gazing at it lovingly... I have acquired part of another cupboard in the sideboard. Me and my jewellery making equipment are slowly taking over.........

Spots, Studs, Etching and Hoops - New Earrings

I've been pretty busy recently with findings orders and copper bangle orders - some of them from my website which is slowly picking up buyers thank goodness (patience is a virtue!) So now they're done and I've got a bit of time I thought I'd better get some earrings made for my shops.

I decided I like the spotty look you get with nail varnish and etching so I went for some spotty silver and copper studs first ..........

Then I used some more etched copper I've had waiting in the wings until it found it's true vocation in life.....

in other words a couple of pairs of simple, quick to make earrings!

Then I felt all hoop inspired and made a few pairs of silver hoops with added lampwork and ceramic flower beads. I do love a hoop :D

So now that I have a few new items to add to my shops and website over the next week I can relax and get on with the next thing that's running round my brain which is..........enamelled supplies for people to use in their own designs. It will be mainly discs at first in a choice of colours and a couple of sizes. I'd love to include enamelled headpins but when I tried enamelling headpins a long time ago the results were pretty varied with lots of them cracking and bits of enamel falling off sometimes minutes, hours or days after they were made. I've read this is normal for other people too so they won't be featuring in my enamelled findings range as they would be too unpredictable and stress inducing!

So now you know what I will be doing over the next few days!

Summer Colour - Enamel Flower Earrings and Pendants

After a few weeks of concentrating on metalwork making hollow form pendants and earrings I needed a burst of colour so out came the enamel powders and some pretty pre-cut copper flower blanks. Yes I could saw out the flowers myself but I didn't :D
I felt like mixing up the colours a bit by sifting a mixture of opaque enamels together and firing at the same time. Previously I would only do one colour and fire it then add another colour, fire, then another colour but mixing the second layer of enamel colours saves time and doesn't do any harm. Mixing two different enamel powders won't result in a new colour as such, eg. mixing red and yellow won't produce orange but a speckled blend of red and yellow. Mixing similar shades is good as the different coloured speckles aren't as obvious so the end colour looks more solid. It gives you more options.

The earrings above are a base layer of seafoam then another layer of seafoam mixed with lichen and pea which produced a lovely sea green shade with sprinkles of brown and cream added on top.

I made a pendant with the same colours but this time I mixed the seafoam, lichen amd pea enamels and put them in a pot. The resulting colour was slightly different to the earrings but that's the fun of mixing your own blends - you don't know how they will turn out until you fire them the first time. You can then add another colour in the second layer to change the overall look if you want to. As I'm writing this I've had a sudden urge to try to achieve an ombre effect with similar shades of enamel. I think applying the enamels wet with a brush will be the way to go. This idea obviously need some thought.........

These bright young things, currently on their way to Oregon, are a mixture of sunset orange with sprinklings of scarlet, pink and brown. The pink completely disappeared in the orange and the brown is very subtle too (in other words you can hardly see it!)

I was asked to make the pendant for a custom order which means I'm now out of the cute flower blanks. I did create a few templates just in case I had a sudden rush of blood to the head and felt like sawing out my own flowers which I may do as I now do enjoy sawing which is something I never thought I would say, or I might just buy a few more which would be much easier if a bit more expensive!

I wanted to use up some sterling beads and spacers I've had for ever so combined them with some more mixed colour enamel discs and "lily pads". It's nice to do a bit of wirework every now and then!