silver techniques | Eileen Moylan

Making Silver Earrings

04.20.2012 by Eileen Moylan //

Today I’ve been working on a pair of silver hoop style earrings. I could lie and say they are for a customer but the truth is I’ve decided to give myself a little Friday treat! This isn’t a regular occurrence…honestly!

I begin this job just like I would for any customer with sketching. I had a few ideas of what I wanted but there’s nothing like seeing it on paper to help me make my mind up.

I’ve decided to go with the middle design and alter the curve as I’m making them if necessary.

I begin by getting the silver wire the correct thickness. This just requires a few runs through my roller.

Then I cut the lengths of wire and begin curving. I have my lovely glittery pink half round pliers for this job. I usually wouldn’t use a pliers for this job but the silver has been well annealed this pliers has extra special soft curves so it won’t mark my pretty earrings.

Then I need to decide how much of a curve I want before I begin soldering. I just tape the wires together and see what looks best on me!

Once I’ve decided on the depth of the curve I can start soldering the wires together.

Well I had better get back to ‘real’ customers jobs…will post the finished product next week.

Have a good weekend.

Photos from the Workshop

03.20.2012 by Eileen Moylan //

You might have notice I took last week off from the blog. It wasn’t an intentional break, it was just that the making side of the business took over! There were lots of lovely jobs coming in to the workshop but here are some photos of just one to better explain my absence.

I’ll post photos of the finished product soon…

Synclastic and Anticlastic Forming

08.05.2011 by Eileen Moylan //

This is part two in a series on the synclastic and anticlastic Forming class I attended in Birmingham. To read part one click here.

The first two days were spent familiarizing ourselves with synclastic and anticlastic forming. At this stage we were all well settled into the workshop and were making use of our week in the jewellery quarter. It was brilliant to be in the middle of all the jewellery tool shops. Most of my lunchtimes were spent going from shop to shop buying tools. Which I happily dragged home in my bulging suitcase.

So on day three once we got the hang of synclast and anticlast forming we moved on to spiculums. A spiculum is made from a single piece of sheet metal which is formed into a tapering tube. This process involves hammering the metal until it rolls into itself forming a long hollow tube.

Once they had been hammered into a straight tube and soldered closed we were able to curve them. I found curving them the most stressful part of the whole exercise. You have to take this hollow tube that you’ve toiled over and gingerly bend it with your hands. It has too be well softened by annealing before you start. Once you feel you have curved it as much as possible before it buckles you anneal again. You continue like this until you get the curve you require. I decided to quit while I was ahead and opted for a gentle curve!

We also made open seam spiculums, which look very similar to the closed spiculums but are not soldered. These are made using techniques similar to anticlastic ribbons. We also got a chance to make a double helix, the same process used in Bronze Age Torcs.

We packed so much into the five days, I hadn’t expected to learn as much and be able to explore each technique. Cynthia was a great teacher, everything was brilliantly demonstrated and she patiently answered all our questions. She also brought along lots of her own tools for us to use. One hammer in particular I fell in love with (I know, I hear how sad that sounds!) so I’ve added that to my wishlist of tools. Having five days to refine my hammering skills was such a luxury and will definitely influence my future work.

Cutting Silver Part 2

04.11.2011 by Eileen Moylan //

This is part two in a series of how to cut out a design in silver sheet using a jewellers saw. To see Part One click here.

Here are some photos of the piece once the paper has been taken off. I began by using my file on the rough edges and removing the scratches with emery paper. I then give it a polish on the polishing lathe.

Cutting Silver Part 1

04.08.2011 by Eileen Moylan //

I’m going to go through the steps of cutting out a design on metal showing the different techniques and tools that I use. I’ll start with the design on paper and show how I transfer and cut this out on my sheet of metal. Because this is only a demonstration I’m just going to use a piece of scrap copper.

I’ve chosen a pattern with a lot of cutting out so you can see how to cut a small detailed area with a jewellers saw. I am only going to use a section of this pattern so I using a stencil to pick an area and mark it out.

Design glued to metal and piercing frame ready to go!

Once I have the design I glue my piece of paper on to the metal. I don’t always work this way. Often if it’s a pattern I might use again I will transfer the design on to the metal and save my original piece of paper to be used again. Once the paper is glued on I mark out the areas that will be cut out. With this design I’m going to cut out all the black sections.

Marking drill sections with centre punch

These black sections will have to be drilled through to allow the blade to get into these areas. So I am going to mark the centre of the drilling hole with a centre punch. I use this because a drill bit has a habit of wandering if it doesn’t start on a recess. The centre punch forms a large enough dimple to guide the drill bit. It’s important to use this when I’m drilling in such a small area where there’s no room for error!

I’ve drilled all the holes and now I’m ready to start cutting. I open one side of the frame so I can pass the blade through the drilled hole and reattach it to my piercing frame on the other side.

I’m going to make a video of the cutting so you can see how the blade moves along the metal. I’ll post that on Monday..

Spoon Part 4

03.04.2011 by Eileen Moylan //

This is part four of a series on how to make a spoon.

Click on the links to see Part one, two and three.

The spoon is nearly finished, all the cutting and hammering has been done. All that’s left to do is file and polish the piece. In this post I will go through the different stages of finishing as well as the tools and products I use.

I begin by filing the edges to even out any roughness. Once I’m happy with the shape of the spoon I remove the file marks with emery paper. I use different grades of emery paper from 320 to 1000 so I have less work to do on the polishing lathe.

Then I polish the spoon on the lathe. This is done using two different mops. The first is a roughing out mop which takes out the scratches and marks. This mop is made from numerous circular layers of fabric that are stitched together at the centre. The mop is used along with a polishing lustre. This is an abrasive compound that comes in a bar and is applied to the mop. While this initial polishing removes marks left from the emery paper it doesn’t bring up a bright reflective finish.

The next stage of polishing on the lathe uses a softer mop which is made up of layers of soft fine fabric. This mop is used along with a polishing rouge. Jewellers rouge is a red coloured compound bar that is used in the final stages of polishing. This rouge like the luster is used on the wheel to refine the surface. The rouge helps to obtain a fine mirror finish on the metal.

Because of the shape of the handle I use a small mop on my drill to get into the areas that the larger mop can’t polish. Like the polishing lathe I use the same lustre and rouge to bring up the finish. Now that all the marks have been polished out and the metal is bright and reflective I can clean the piece in the ultrasonic.

I’m going clean the spoon and set it up to be photographed over the weekend so I’ll post the results on Monday.

Spoon Part 2

02.16.2011 by Eileen Moylan //

This is part two of a series on making a spoon. To see Part 1 click here.

Having cut out my spoon pattern I take the rough edges off with a file. I also rounded some of the edges slightly.

Because I will be doing a lot of hammering and forming on the bowl of the spoon I annealed the metal so it would be softer. Annealing is the process of heating and cooling the metal to soften it and make it easier to manipulate. To see my video blog on how to anneal metal click here.

Once the spoon is annealed and cleaned it is ready for sinking. Sinking involves hammering a flat piece of metal into a concave shape which has usually been carved into a tree stump. The bowl of the spoon is held over the dip and hammered into it using a mallet. The mallet hammers the metal without marking it.

The spoon is now taking shape so it is then put on a spoon stake to give the bowl of the spoon more depth and form. This is hammered using a planishing hammer. This highly polished hammer face is used to refine the form and surface on the stake. The stake that I am using for this is called a spoon stake as it is the shape of the bowl of a spoon. This domed stake is held in a vice.To see my blog post on some of my other stakes click here.

The way I hammer the piece is to start in the centre and work clockwise around the bowl until I get to the edge. When the entire bowl has been planished on the stake it is time to anneal it again. After annealing the spoon I will do some more work on the stake and then begin work on the handle. Part 3 to follow…

Models for a spoon

01.24.2011 by Eileen Moylan //

At the moment I’m making a simple child’s spoon to give me the opportunity to try out and show off my new stakes. Through this process I will demonstrate the various techniques used such as sinking, planishing and annealing. The first step involves designing and making a pattern for my spoon.

As with all of my projects I start out by doing my designs on paper and photographing then to play around with the angles and the curves. I have decided on a simple spoon shape so these photos show variations of curves and handles.

Having decided on the design I will use this pattern to outline the shape on the metal. The next step is to cut out this design in metal and using a technique called sinking create the bowl of the spoon.

Etching with acid

01.21.2011 by Eileen Moylan //

One of the great things about having more space in my workshop is that I can try out different silversmithing techniques. Since I have the place nearly set up I’ve decided to try my hand at acid etching.

Acid etching is the process of using acid to cut into the unprotected parts of a metal surface to create a design. I plan to acid etch on silver but it can also be done on copper or brass. The chemical used to etch into silver is Ferric Nitrate. It comes in crystals that are then mixed with water.

The silver is cleaned and the resist (protective coating) is painted on leaving areas exposed to form the design. You can use lots of things as a resist. I will be using things like permanent markers, nail polish and brown tape. Once this is done the silver is submerged face down in the ferric nitrate solution and the acid goes to work eating away at the exposed silver. The design will be made deeper depending how long you leave the silver in the solution, so it is usually checked every 30 minutes. (Picture credit).

This little experiment isn’t going to be like one of those cookery demonstrations where after a little feeble mixing they declare here’s one I made earlier. If this doesn’t work you’ll see the pictures to prove it, so wish me luck!

I’m going to gather everything I need over the weekend so I should be ready to start next week.

Cake Slice, The Next Step

01.17.2011 by Eileen Moylan //

This is part three of my cake slice project. Part one here and part two here.

I use my modified paper template (from part two) and stick it temporarily to my sheet of copper. Why copper? As this piece is for myself I want to keep the costs down. The final product will be silver plated. Of course I would prefer to work with silver as it is softer and easier to manipulate.

With the paper secured I then draw around the shape with a scriber. Once the shape of the cake slice is transferred onto the copper. I begin cutting it with my piercing frame. As the metal is quite thick I use a slightly heavier blade to avoid the blade breaking.

Cutting out cake slice with piercing frame

When I have finished cutting I then start filing the edges. The more accurate the cutting the less work I have filing. With this piece I want to curve all the edges slightly especially around the handle.

Now that I have my piece cut out and filed I can begin hammering and shaping. See you for Part 4!