Student of the Week-Beth Sugarman

by jeanettecaines on September 26, 2010

 Congratulations to our latest Student of the Week- Beth Sugarman.  Although my personal motto is “Too much is never enough.” this ring illustrates how beautiful simplicity can be.  It also illustrates how it isn’t so easy to make something simple.  Many students want to make rings with their bezels sunk down into the shanks but fitting and soldering often proves challenging.  Here is how to pull it off beautifully.

The first key is to solder the shank closed.  If you don’t solder it closed first you will never be able to truly get it beautiful and round.  After we make our bezel we roughly center it over the shank’s seam and draw it’s contours on the shank with a sharpie.  Getting the curves right will be vital.  I love using sharpies in Jewelry making because they mark without scratching and burn away completely in heat with no residue to interfere with fusing or soldering.  They also make the perfect annealing indicator.  For silver or 22k gold just scribble a line with a sharpie on your metal and start annealing.  When the sharpie mark disappears the metal is perfectly annealed.  Many jewelers tend to overdo the annealing which can damage their metal more than under-annealing.  We saw away just inside the bezel marks. Beth’s next job was to grind and file the opening for her bezel to slide tightly into the shank. This is the part that REALLY drives everyone crazy.  The opening must follow the contours of the bezel exactly and stay at a 90 degree to the rings axis.  I always tell my students this is their golden opportunity to really refine their filing skills.  We usually set up the ring in a table top vise so that all your attention can be on holding the file.  You can do the rough work on the flex shaft with a bur but the fine tuning part calls for slower and more careful work with a file for all but the most adroit with the flex shaft.  I suppose we will talk about Beth’s soldering methods on another day. Job well done!

jeanettecaines

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{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }

jeanettecaines September 28, 2010 at 5:50 am

Beth sawed out the solder joint. The sawing itself was pretty straightforward.

pamela September 27, 2010 at 10:27 pm

question-> was it difficult to saw the ring in place where the bezel was to go, and did you saw out your solder joint or keep it for ring sizing?

ps. I think that was a very difficult way to put in a bezel- congratulations. Thx for the sharpie tip- very useful!

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