Nice to know I’m not the only one doing soldering and other things with my torch on my stovetop! I have an outdoor space I can use when the weather is good enough, but the stovetop with ventilation hood is my only fairly safe option indoors. Keep up the great work!
Thank you so much for all your tutorials! One smithing tip. If you flatten the wire where your joint is you can bring the wires together much easier 😊 Val
The "line" where the ends meet disappeared much earlier on the second earring, and you kept heating the entire ring. Maybe you need a magnifier? I never had any trouble soldering with liquid flux & tiny squares of thin sheet silver. Never a separation. Maybe fusing isn't necessary?
I recently learned that when soldering or fusing wire, you don't need to heat the whole piece the way you do when you have a solid plate etc. You only need to heat the joint. I think it was on an andrew barry? berry? video about soldering without pickling if I remember correctly.
You’re just lovely! Lol! I don’t do videos but I’m learning how to do wire art and appreciate your approach to videos. Most times I feel like I’m listening to a professor - you sound like you’re talking to a friend all while being just as informative. is a nice change. Well done
Just lower your hand and brace it up against your table or bench pin then file the ends to make them flush. You'll have more stability and it will take less effort to get them to line up. I'm sure you filed in the air merely for the sake of the video, but I thought I would point that out. Thanks for the video. It was great information, with great visuals of the process. 🤗❤️
I have been watching Rhonda Coryell. I recommend her. She is a master. I am still not great with torch control yet and asked my friend how the heck are we supposed to "fuse" which is basically melting two pieces of metal together without melting them? I think that how you wound up with the fat and the thin metal. Thats what happens to me. She gets in and out. She will also direct the flame at the join. It is such a delicate operation. Good luck with your technique. Thanks for the effort!
I always thought you soldered your pieces. Great alternative technique and thanks for sharing, I always learn something new on this channel, you never disappoint! Love the opening! Keep up the awesome vids!
Also, the reason your first piece melted before fusing was because you kept heating the area that was looking shimmery while not giving enough heat to the other side. You can direct the heat exactly where you need it. That's all that happened, and with a little more practice, you should be able to fuse without melting the wire, but it's a fine line and when the metal starts to look shiny, that's about the time to let off. WIth the second one that got thicker at the join, you didn't let off soon enough, both sides melted, and the surface tension of the metal pulled the metal to the join which was the hottest spot. Also the most important thing for soldering or fusing rings etc is that you have a perfectly flush joint. You could see with the first one, that there was a little gap at the top edge. Solder wouldn't fill that gap and you've got the same problem with fusing. Anyway, good tries. It does take some practice. That's the only way we learn. Luckily for you, you have really nice video of what you did here, so you can go back and watch it again to see what was happening. I think that's a great tool. Best of luck. It's great to see so many people enjoying metalwork.
@@ZurickDesigns You're very welcome. I hope they could be of some help. I think you're pretty brave to do this, I'm assuming, without having taken classes for it. Also- I forgot to mention..fine silver can fuse, yes, but it's much softer than sterling. Sterling won't fuse. However, argentium sterling can be fused and is also very strong and can also be heat hardened like sterling, so it has some wonderful properties that give you the best of both worlds of fine and sterling silver.
@@andreameigs1261 I use Argentium silver for jump rings and also for balls on ear wires and anything else decorative like balling or graining. No flux is required and no rough texture on the ball.
I'm interested in making tensor coils a part of my silver wrapped quartzes and getting an added benefit from the jewelry. I was wondering if I could skip the solder, so I'll see how that goes. Maybe giving a little space between the flame and the crystal is necessary, but I like having a solid silver piece in stead of solder. Thanks for the demonstration!
The melting temp of silver alloy keeps dropping as you add copper… It bottoms at its lowest at 28% copper, and then it slowly begins to rise again, but it still stays under the melting temperature of fine silver
that file only works on the push stroke. try getting a jewlers saw, just an inexpensive one and saw through the join to make it flat enough. alternately you can sand with 600 grit wrapped onto a file or stick to smooth.
Needs to be pure metal. I’m using pure silver. Low melting point. I think you can with copper but it needs high heat and I’m not sure if it’s doable with a small torch.
@@ZurickDesigns thank you. I may give it a try to see. I’m not able to buy the correct flux or soldering materials local and I have been wanting to fuse pieces together to make ring bands and frames
