Jewelry 101: Making Headpins
Posted by Leah on Aug 8, 2007
I enjoy making my own silver head pins by melting a ball of metal at the end of a piece of wire. It’s fairly easy to do, and enables you to always have the length you need in the gauge you need for a project.
I use a slightly different technique depending on which type of silver I’m using - sterling, fine, or Argentium. Whichever metal you use, you will need a torch. I use a propane torch, but butane torches also work, although for thicker wire it can be hard to get the flame of the butane torch big/hot enough. Other options are acetylene/oxygen and oxygen/propane, but butane and propane torches are cheap & available at the hardware store.
Using fine silver is the easiest, because you don’t need flux or pickle, just a torch and some tweezers to hold the wire. A heat-resistant surface to let your headpins cool is desirable, and always be safe and use proper ventilation and eye protection when using a torch. Cut a piece of wire slightly longer than you want your headpin to be - maybe 1/2 inch longer. Hold one end of the wire with the tweezers, with the other end of the wire pointing down. Point the torch flame at the end of the wire that is away from your tweezers, and watch a little ball of metal appear! The longer you keep the torch there, the bigger the ball will be - but if it gets too big, it might fall off, so be careful.
I like to use Argentium silver for making headpins. With Argentium, I use basically the same process, except I used the tiniest little bit of flux on the wire end where I’m making the ball. If you use too much flux, you’ll have flux residue, which has to be removed, but if you use just enough, you’ll end up with a nice looking head pin that doesn’t require clean-up at all. If the wire above the ball gets slightly discolored, quickly passing the flame over the discolored part will usually turn the wire silver again.
With regular sterling silver, there is always some clean-up involved, unless you are going for the oxidized (black metal) look. I don’t bother with flux, and start by following the same process as for fine silver. You end up with a head pin that has a very blackened end. This can be cleaned up by soaking in pickle, or by using an abrasive to polish off the oxidation. I like to use a piece of a green kitchen scrubber sponge to polish off most of the oxidation, leaving a slightly rough look. If I want my headpins to be perfectly shiny, I don’t usually use sterling, since it’s easier to get nice shiny head pins with fine silver or Argentium, but if you want clean and shiny sterling head pins, use pickle to remove oxidation, and then toss the finished head pins in a tumbler with stainless steel shot and water for a few minutes.
You can also make head pins by bending the end of a piece of wire into a nice looking shape, such as a spiral. All you need for this method are some pliers and a little practice bending the wire into the shape you want without marking it. When I make head pins this way, I like to lightly hammer the shape I’ve made to harden the wire a little bit.
Jewelry 101: Finishing Wire Ends
Posted by Leah on Jul 31, 2007
I make a lot of jewelry using wire - in fact, nearly everything I make incorporates wire in some way, even if it’s just a wire head pin or an earwire.
One problem beginning wireworkers have is that when you cut a piece of wire, the ends feel sharp and jagged. To make wire jewelry look and feel smoother and more finished, it is necessary to smooth out the ends of the wire.
Luckily, this is not difficult, it just takes a little bit of time.
Here are just a few ways I’ve smoothed wire ends:
- Using a cup burr - cup burrs are used with dremel-type machines or flex shafts, and come in different sizes for different wire gauges. If you use a cup burr to smooth the end of your wire, they will become slightly rounded, so this is a good method for finishing ear wires. Cup burrs & flex shaft machines are available through jewelry supply companies - but there are several simple methods that don’t require special eqiupment.
- Using sandpaper - wet/dry sandpaper can bu used to smooth out wire ends. I especially like the sanding pad that are sold at hardware stores. A relatively fine grade - 300-400 - will work well.
- Jeweler’s files or needle files from the hardware store - using files is quick and easy and with a little practice, you can get very smooth, flat wire ends using files.
- Sharpening stones - a lot of wireworkers I know swear by using sharpening stones. There are special stones made for sharpening fish hooks that have a little groove, and you just swipe the wire through the groove a couple of times for a smooth, slighlty rounded end. Flat sharpening stones also work, but won’t automatically shape the wire end the way the grooved stones do.
- Fingernail files - this is one of my favorite tricks, if I’m working away from my studio. Fingernail files are great for smoothing wire ends, and they come in many different grades, and are easy to find at drug stores and grocery stores.
Jewelry 101: Flux
Posted by Leah on Jul 19, 2007
I’m writing a series of short articles on jewelry making basics, called Jewelry 101. You can click on Jewelry 101 under “categories” in the right-hand column to see all the articles (this one is the first). Even if you aren’t interested in making your own jewelry, it might be interesting to learn a little bit about the basic tools and processes I use to create jewelry. Now, on to my first topic: flux.
Flux is a liquid or paste applied to metal when heating the metal. There are many different kinds of flux on the market, and they all work for different temperature ranges. In jewelry making, when using a torch to solder or fuse metal, it is important to get a flux that is intended for use at very high temperatures. This means that flux sold for use with soldering irons probably will not withstand the amount of heat a torch gives off, so make sure that the flux you buy is appropriate for use with a torch.
Flux protects silver from firescale while heating, and prevents oxidation of metal. It is always used when soldering, as the solder will not flow properly if flux is not applied to the solder & the area it should flow into. Flux can be applied with a paintbrush, and should be applied before heating the metal. As you heat the metal with your torch, the flux will bubble and then start to look glassy. If you notice that some of the metal is not covered with flux, you might want to add a little more and then re-heat the metal.
Flux is almost always used when heating sterling silver, whether soldering, fusing, or annealing, because it helps prevent firescale from forming. It is not necessary to apply flux to fine silver when heating it, since fine silver does not get firescale. However, if fine silver is being joined with silver solder, you should apply flux to the solder and the spots that will be joined with solder.
With Argentium sterling silver, some people don’t use flux except for soldering, while some people also use flux for fusing. It is not necessary to use flux when annealing Argentium. In my personal experience, a tiny bit of flux (less than I’d use with regular sterling silver) helps a lot if I’m fusing or making ball-end headpins with Argentium.
Flux is also used when soldering gold. Since I have limited experience soldering gold, I won’t comment more on that right now. If you want to use silver solder to solder copper, using more flux seems to help, since copper oxidizes easily.
I use liquid flux. A brand I like is Batterns, and I also like a very similar product called My-T-flux. Some jewelers prefer to use a paste flux, but I find that it’s harder for me to see what I’m doing if I use paste flux. Whatever you decide, I recommend buying flux from a jewelry supply company - and make sure you get one that is intended for use with a torch. I’ve heard that people have had success making a paste flux from denatured alcohol and borax, but I’ve never tried this myself.
After you complete your soldering/fusing/annealing, you might notice that there is some glassy flux residue all over the metal. This can be removed by soaking the metal in an acidic solution known as pickle. I’ll be writing about pickle in a future article, so stay tuned!
