Over 20 years ago I made a kinetic earrings in copper. Then in 2016 I made them again but I used gold and silver.
Sometime after moving here to Texas in 2017 I lost one of the gold ones and the remaining one was sitting in my jewelry box waiting for me to make another, single one, so I once again had a pair.
I finally did that about a week ago.
I pulled out the left over 18Kt. sheet and wire and a piece of sterling silver. I then printed the drilling template and glued it to the sheets followed by drilling the holes, deburring them, and cutting out the disks and forming the domes.
Then came the nervous part - soldering the two halves together. Gold is soooooo expensive now that I was terrified of melting either half and ruining it.
But I stayed calm and carried on!
I first soldered some medium solder on the silver half near the rims in about 5 places. I actually pickled the piece too. I then fluxed really well on the inside of the silver and gold pieces and placed them together and held them their with cross clamping tweezers followed by fluxing the seam on the outside. Using the propane/oxygen torch I then slowly heated the bead until the flux turned glasses and then focused the heat on the seam until I saw the silvery line of melted solder show through in one place. I then started heating the rest of the seam until I had done the entire thing.
SUCCESS!! and not a single melted spot.
I cut the existing bead off the silver hanger and off the existing ear wire. I would make new ones so the earrings matched.
As the bead rested in the pickle I used the 20 ga. 18Kt. wire to make new ear wires and I made silver circles to slip the bead(s) onto which would then be attached to the ear wires.
Sometime after moving here to Texas in 2017 I lost one of the gold ones and the remaining one was sitting in my jewelry box waiting for me to make another, single one, so I once again had a pair.
I finally did that about a week ago.
I pulled out the left over 18Kt. sheet and wire and a piece of sterling silver. I then printed the drilling template and glued it to the sheets followed by drilling the holes, deburring them, and cutting out the disks and forming the domes.
Then came the nervous part - soldering the two halves together. Gold is soooooo expensive now that I was terrified of melting either half and ruining it.
But I stayed calm and carried on!
I first soldered some medium solder on the silver half near the rims in about 5 places. I actually pickled the piece too. I then fluxed really well on the inside of the silver and gold pieces and placed them together and held them their with cross clamping tweezers followed by fluxing the seam on the outside. Using the propane/oxygen torch I then slowly heated the bead until the flux turned glasses and then focused the heat on the seam until I saw the silvery line of melted solder show through in one place. I then started heating the rest of the seam until I had done the entire thing.
SUCCESS!! and not a single melted spot.
I cut the existing bead off the silver hanger and off the existing ear wire. I would make new ones so the earrings matched.
As the bead rested in the pickle I used the 20 ga. 18Kt. wire to make new ear wires and I made silver circles to slip the bead(s) onto which would then be attached to the ear wires.
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