Almost two years ago, I took a class on etching silver, brass and copper. And then it all sat since I was focusing on Chasing & Repousse. 

This weekend I returned to the technique to have fun with the ladies at the Palomar Gem & Mineral club.  There were 6 of us most everyone etched copper with a salt solution since I think it was their first time etching. 

I decided to etch sterling silver and because Annie is allergic to base metals she wanted to etch fine silver and that was what the two of us did with my power supply. 

When I was at the club I etched the design in the second picture for myself on 18 gauge silver. I also did two pair of free form painted earrings. Annie was able to get several small designs etched which I gather she will work into other pieces of jewelry. 

When I got home, I etched two more pieces of 18 gauge silver. One should have been some music but the notes and bars of the music were so fine that PnP resist would not work. It was then that I decided a paisley pattern would work wonderfully.  

Since the shop elf  had been an electronics tech and worked with circuit boards before, he never seen this done with silver he did enjoy seeing the etching up close. 

After all of that I trimmed the silver, applied some patina; I domed the earrings and formed the cuffs. 

And here we are.  You know what comes next - Enjoy the pictures 

As with any art form, there are things that one must have.

Thus, over the past few weeks I have been purchasing tools and equipment which will aide me in making hollow forms.  I certainly have the tools and equipment for chasing and repousse work but having not done any raising in almost 3 years my collecting of the needed stuff has fallen woefully behind. 

We all know that I have hammers and stakes for this but as I learned from Liza, there are things I don't have and need.  

So what have I bought:

• Wood mallets for making wood raising hammers, in various sizes
• Wood stock for making wood stakes
• Contour Gauge
• Scribe Gauge
• Digital Calipers
• Inside Calipers
• Scribing Compass
• Brass Circles 
• Copper Circles
• Multi-Purpose Vise (the kind that has two sets of jaws, one straight and one for pipes AND allows you to rotate the jaws)

All of which arrived last week in several boxes and cluttered the floor. This has now been put away.

Then next piece of work is a technical drawing for the tumbler. Liza says I don't needing since I have the inside template we cut while I was at her studio. From that I could cut the wood stake. 

Would any good engineer who wants to follow the 'process' do that?? I say no and I certainly can't.  

So technical drawing it is. 

From the drawing, I can cut the templates (the different diameters and the profile) for making a wood stake. IF all of that is correct, which will be verified after I raise another tumbler, I can then give the drawing to a machinist (read that as Kevin Potter) to make steel stakes.  

I have the drafting paper, pencils, french curves, T-square and other drafting tools. But IF i need another copy of the drawing or want to send it in an email, I would have to scan it. So, I am taking this opportunity to learn a simple CAD (computer aided design) program which will give me a digital drawing.  

I am evaluating a few different programs that run on my Mac - cost, ease of use, yet enough features to make my life easy, stability (one keeps closing on me!), user documentation, and file formats in case I want to export to a drawing program or send the actual file to someone else that uses CAD besides creating a PDF.  

I think that next weekend I will be able to cut my templates and start cutting the wood stake.

A bit late but better than never.

It has now been a month since I went to The Nechamkin Silver Studio to do a SEVEN day private workshop with Liza Nechamkin.  If you don't know, Liza went to work at Tiffany's after college and was there for 10 years +/- if I have my numbers correct. She knows her silversmithing stuff!

I did post two mini movies that show what I did they are/were about raising a tumbler and using a snarling iron and chasing a cup (also a tumbler but this one was spun).

Then work got very busy so this post was put on hold until now. 

So let me tell you about the workshop.

SEVE DAYS \0/ (that is a happy dance with arms raised) of metal work with one of my favorite silversmith. Yes, SILVERSMITH, not a person who only makes jewelry in silver.

We started by looking at a spun cup for size and dimensions. Then I made a template for the inside and outside profiles and determining the size of the circle to raise it. Then it was onto raising the copper into a tumbler. 


I started raising with a metal hammer on a wood stake. When I was half way raised, I switched to a wood hammer on a steel stake. I never did any raising with a steel hammer on a steel stake. There are advantages to each combination that have to do with speed, stretching, forming and what you have available to work with. 


When the cup was fully raised, I then scribed a trim line and the extra height was cut off the top. The rim was sanded flat and then I moved on to planishing. This was done on a steel stake so the inside would also be planished. I started with an aluminum hammer - who would have thought that!; since it is light and yet is still metal that will help smooth out the surface. 

After the planishing, Liza did the final polish and explained the process. The next time I go, I will be doing the polishing!!

This was the first 4 days. 

For the next three days, we worked on using snarling irons in lieu of repousse cause you can't get your hands, hammer and tool inside a tumbler; and then chasing the cup.  

First we filled the cup with pitch and place it in the pitch pot. The design was chased and the areas where the snarling iron would be used were identified.  The pitch was removed and we moved on the snarling iron.  The cup, because it was copper, was NOT annealed as it would have bent out of shape when using the iron; the cup would have been waaayyy to soft.

After the snarling was done, we filled the cup with pitch, again. While that was cooling, one of Liza's friends and ex-coworker came in to do a spinning demonstration. Tom is a master spinner (he worked at Tiffany's too) and we got geeky on the mechanics of how to spin metal. It was way cool!!

When the demo was concluded and the pitch in the cup had cooled, we then started chasing on the cup and discussed how to "model" the design: adding textures to make it look real and background textures to make the design stand out from the primary surface.   Actually,  I never finished  a single a leaf, set of berries or the vine near the leaf I was working on but it was the time we discuss all of this that is very valuable. 

My report card for the chasing part of the workshop.

Yes, I know this is a blog post but I am doing this now, cause I will be too busy this weekend to do a "real" post.

Why?

The software I have been developing since April is finally going live on Friday so all weekend, the team, will be making sure it works. 

EXCEPT for me, on Saturday I am teaching another workshop for Introduction to Chasing & Repousse.

I hope to tell you about my trip to The Nechamkin Silver Studio next week.