I made this heart out of 16GA square sterling. I'm so very pleased with myself! you can't tell where I soldered it. I soldered it in the most natural spot.. at the tip of the heart. I shaped the 16GA in a heart shape, then soldered, then filed and sanded down the rough edges and the line from the soldering, then hammered for texture, then polished and tumbled it. These are bad pictures, but it's gorgeous, it just shines and looks so good! The last picture shows the back. 2ND item is experimenting with copper tubing. I cut about a 1 inch chunk of the tube, filed and sanded the edges, then wound 18GA half-round wire round it, and then soldered them together. My technique isn't perfect, the sterling and/or the solder "leaked" on the copper parts, which I tried to clean up with my dremel, but this shows huge promise and I"m going to try again. I think next time I'll just tack the ends with solder, less likely then to leach sterling everywhere. I want to make enough tubes to make a necklace. And I want to get my hands on larger tubing. I've been playing around with fusing also... This stuff is so much darn dang fun!!!!!!!!!
I made this heart out of 16GA square sterling. I'm so very pleased with myself! you can't tell where I soldered it. I soldered it in the most natural spot.. at the tip of the heart. I shaped the 16GA in a heart shape, then soldered, then filed and sanded down the rough edges and the line from the soldering, then hammered for texture, then polished and tumbled it. These are bad pictures, but it's gorgeous, it just shines and looks so good! The last picture shows the back. 2ND item is experimenting with copper tubing. I cut about a 1 inch chunk of the tube, filed and sanded the edges, then wound 18GA half-round wire round it, and then soldered them together. My technique isn't perfect, the sterling and/or the solder "leaked" on the copper parts, which I tried to clean up with my dremel, but this shows huge promise and I"m going to try again. I think next time I'll just tack the ends with solder, less likely then to leach sterling everywhere. I want to make enough tubes to make a necklace. And I want to get my hands on larger tubing. I've been playing around with fusing also... This stuff is so much darn dang fun!!!!!!!!!
1 comment:
That makes a sweet bead. I was in Home Depot or one of those stores a few months ago and bought refrigerator coil to do the same sort of thing to. Unfortunately, I can't play with fire yet, lol. Great idea. Good luck with it.
Lois
http://www.abeadedaffair.com
Post a Comment