Posts tagged as:

ring

Project #2 - ‘S’ ring and bonus project

by Laurie Jane Kern on July 25, 2009

It has been a busy week, and I have only now had the time to take my projects out of the vibrator. I put them in last Sunday evening.

Yes, last Sunday I tackled the second project in the ‘Workshop’ book, which is to make an ‘S’ ring. This project builds upon and modifies the ring made in project #1.   Here is a picture of some of the ‘S’ rings I made

'S' ring

I then took this project further and decided, why not make them nest. So off I went and made more ring, of the same size, and just before I twisted the ’s’, I put then together with tape to hold them in position. After taping them together I put them on the ring mandrel and twisted. Here is the result.

Double S

Double S

But after that, I was looking at the book, and I noticed that at the end of project 1 there was a picture of a stone, in a bezel, mounted on the octo’ ring. I scoured the book but this was not a project that was listed.  It is on page 40 in the lower right corner of the page, if you have the book. This ring was a small garnet cab and was just calling to me.

Well, knowing how to make a bezel and I had some small garnet cabs in my stash, I then pulled out more wire, made 4 more octo rings, then made the bezels cups with an open back so light can come through the stones, soldered the bezel cups to the rings, and set the stones. I did find I had picked a bezel wire that was just a bit too big, but proceeded with the setting, liking the rustic dimpled look the setting ended up with.

Finally, after almost 8 hours of work [making 's', double 's' and garnet rings] I had over 14 items! Into the polishing tumbler they went.  Here are the garnet rings. The other 3 will go to friends: Elisa of Scotland, Janda the Fair Maiden of Tran, and Jean of San Jacinto.

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Project #1 - Octo Ring

by Laurie Jane Kern on July 15, 2009

This is the first project in the book Jewelry Making - Tips & Tricks, that I discussed in my last post.

The project is to make a ring from a piece of wire, not a wound link but a piece right off the spool or coil in the silver vault.

I cut four pieces of wire so I would be able to do a bit more practicing and see how consistant my work would be. You need a ring mandrel and a hammer for this, and also having a ring size measuring stick allowed me to measure the ring size before I hammered the 8 sides on each one, to see how the ring size grew.

Here is a picture of the result, after pickling and 4 days in the vibra-ora-torium!

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Ring-A-Ding-Ding-DING (part 3)

by Laurie Jane Kern on May 23, 2009

After I took the mount out of the pickle pot, I then soldered on the shank, back into the pickle pot it went and then I put it in the vibra-ora-torium, before I set the stone to make it really sparkle.

On Tuesday evening, I was ready to mount the stone. And then… we noticed I had missed soldering down one of the arms on the shank. D!@*n !!!!! Back into my office and I had it soldered in less than 5 minutes but it was then time for another round of pickle and tumbling

It is now, 9:30 on Satuday morning, and not only has the stone been mounted, it has been photographed and sent off to Elisa who emailed back a big OOOHHHHHH! I think she likes it.

So here it is, ALL DONE

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Ring-a-Ding-Ding (part 2)

by Laurie Jane Kern on May 17, 2009

Thursday night was the second part of the ring class.

I was able to finish the first one which has the jade cab.

It is now proudly parked on my right hand.

I hope to finish off the Sugalite this week, as I just took the ring out of the pickle pot - The balls and twisted wire are now soldered around the bezel.  The second ring is supposed to be for Eliza of Scotland though I am liking the mount and the Sugalite sooo much she might not get it!

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Ring-A-Ding (or part 1 of learning to make a ring)

by Laurie Jane Kern on May 12, 2009

Last week, I started a 3 session class at the Palomar Gem and Mineral and Gem Club http://palomargem.legendearth.com/.  This class is focused on making a ring using a bezel set cab and double half round wire for the shank.  In this class we are not placing the cab and silver setting on top of the shank, but working it into the shank.

In the first class most of us completed our bezel and soldering it to the base plate (if there is another name for this, I don’t know what it is, sorry).  The next step was to determine our ring size and cut the length for the shank. The actual length of the shank that is to be used is determined by taking the circumference of the ring size needed plus the thickness of the wire gauge then from this length you have to subtract the “length” or actual width of the silver setting for the cab as the setting becomes part of the shank.

But wait, we don’t know what the setting width will be yet. Why? - Well we have soldered the bezel to the backing but we have not trimmed the backing to be flush with the bezel and that is because we are adding  some decoration. I am putting some silver balls and twisted wire/rope around the outside of my bezel. Once that is done, I can cut away the excess silver.

Below  is a picture of the staged work. Yes, the over achiever in me is making two rings at once.

So this Thursday I shall be soldering down the rope, balls and cutting
away the extra silver around the bezel.  More pictures later in the
week.

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