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Sorry to Hijack this thread, but this is something I’ve been curious about since I started making jewelry a few years ago…
Silver casting is something I hope to get into someday too (when I can afford it!). There is not much fantasy jewelry out there that is not over the top… well, at least in my opinion. The number of dragon and other fantasy critter jewelry I’ve seen that is beautifully made and artistically pleasing is small. Even better if I could set them with small labradorites and such…!!
I have been considering, until I can get to a point where I can afford the set up to cast silver myself– you can make wax relief pieces and then send them away to be cast (like some people do with bronzes). The problem is that you have to know how many you want made at that time, and pay for them all up front. This can be really, really expensive for someone like me that lives ‘paycheck’ to paycheck. I don’t know if I could break even on such an endeavor.
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My art: featherdust.comI just know that if you started making jewelry with fantasy creatures, I know several people who’d buy them. I was planning to buy a few of your stone jewelry pieces, before I became broke. You’re certainly right that most fantasy jewelry looks cheap, and the artists don’t usually seem to know or care much about the anatomy of their subjects.
Quote:Have you thought about (or even know about 😀 ) PMC – precious metal clay? It comes in bronze, silver and gold in slip, sheet or lump clay form. It is metal mixed with a ‘binder’ that after forming you fire in a kiln or with a torch (kiln works better). The kiln burns away the binder leaving the metal behind. There is a shrinkage factor, but it’s improved over time so the size of your piece isn’t lost. I like the silver because it’s fine silver and not sterling, therefore it doesn’t tarnish. All the metals take patinas or you can leave them with a matte finish or polish them to a mirror shine. As far as ‘cleaning’ or finishing pieces cast with the lost wax technique, you don’t have to use a chemical process. The easiest I find, is to tumble finsh them. They go into a tumbler, like a rock tumbler, with different ‘shot’ sizes and come out beautifully. With the PMC I don’t have to worry about my boys around my torch for soldering or casting or the chemicals for finishing either (especially when they were toddlers and into everything). The problem I’m running into at the moment is that the price of metals is still on the rise, so PMC is getting more expensive… and kilns aren’t cheap either 😀 Does this help?
Forgot to add that with the PMC lots of different stones can be cast into place which is a BIG thing for me since I hate stone setting… Do you know how hard it is to get the stone seated correctly? Especially making sure the table is level so that the crown and girdle don’t slip out of the prongs and you loose the stone 🙄 Getting the seat right is a real pain in the you know what 😈 I also like the PMC because I don’t go through any saw blades like I do for sterling (I break lots of blades 😀 )
oh, yeah! I have some of that clay! I wonder where it is. The reason I got it was not to make jewelry, but to use to shrink small sculptures(this is the OLD stuff). It shrinks allot when it is fired.. but I don’t understand how you can fire it with stones in place.. doesn’t the heat affect them? -and why doesn’t the clay crack or shrink away from the stone?? It comes in slip form?? Can it be cast??
tdm
Hehe. I thought of PMC as I was reading the thread, too. It might be easier for small sculptures to be sculpted in cork clay, then paint PMC slip (a paste consistency, rather than clay consistency) over the cork clay sculpture, leaving a small hole in the slip. When the piece is fired, the cork clay burns out (the hole is to allow for the expansion of the air when the cork burns and to allow you to dump out the ashes). Then you have a hollow sculpture made of pure silver. The sculpture would have to be polished as twindragonsmum pointed out. It’s a bit labor intensive (requires allowing the cork to dry completely and painting several layers of slip, letting it dry between each layer), and I’m not sure how much detail would be kept, but it might be worth trying. It would keep down the cost and weight of the piece, I think.
As far as the kilns go, they’re really nothing special, so if you can find a kiln that reaches and holds the temps required, then you can use that. A lot of art schools and community centers have access to kilns, if you want to try it out rather than spending the money to get a kiln if you don’t know if it will work. I have someone nearby that will fire as much as you can fit in her PMC kiln (it’s rather small) for $5. She also has a tumbler that she uses for PMC. I don’t remember if use of the tumbler is included in the firing cost or not.
Ah yes, but with PMC each piece is OOAK, essentially. I’d want to make several of each design in a run. Plus my favorite gemstones are not able to be set and fired with it.
Also we have no where around here that would allow me use of a kiln. 😉
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My art: featherdust.comIf PMC is availible in slip form then you could design a mold and make multiples, similar to casting ceramics. Thought the kiln issue would still be there! 😉
This is a gold dragon ring and pendant I have would they be similar to them only more like a Windstone Dragon?
Jennifer wrote:Ah yes, but with PMC each piece is OOAK, essentially. I’d want to make several of each design in a run. Plus my favorite gemstones are not able to be set and fired with it.
Also we have no where around here that would allow me use of a kiln. 😉
Quote:You can make a run of as many of the design as you want. The mould would be similar to the plaster, two piece sort used in ceramics or if your piece will have a flat back to it, then the mould is a one piece ‘push mould’; you pack the clay into a one sided flat mold, wait till the clay dries abit, pop it out onto your drying surface and fill the mold and repeat. Make as many identical pieces as you need! 😀 There’s also some neat stuff that will help size the mould down it you want the piece to be smaller. It’ll have all the same detail but the item won’t be as large. You don’t have to have a kiln to fire the pieces; it can be done with a torch; even the sort that you get at the grocery store for crisping the tops of creme brulee… they aren’t too spendy… Good luck! 😀
twindragonsmum 😀What is the stuff that sizes molds down? We have tried some things, but they seem to distort the sculpture a little.
tdm
ghostndragon wrote:Hehe. I thought of PMC as I was reading the thread, too. It might be easier for small sculptures to be sculpted in cork clay, then paint PMC slip (a paste consistency, rather than clay consistency) over the cork clay sculpture, leaving a small hole in the slip. When the piece is fired, the cork clay burns out (the hole is to allow for the expansion of the air when the cork burns and to allow you to dump out the ashes). Then you have a hollow sculpture made of pure silver. The sculpture would have to be polished as twindragonsmum pointed out. It’s a bit labor intensive (requires allowing the cork to dry completely and painting several layers of slip, letting it dry between each layer), and I’m not sure how much detail would be kept, but it might be worth trying. It would keep down the cost and weight of the piece, I think.
As far as the kilns go, they’re really nothing special, so if you can find a kiln that reaches and holds the temps required, then you can use that. A lot of art schools and community centers have access to kilns, if you want to try it out rather than spending the money to get a kiln if you don’t know if it will work. I have someone nearby that will fire as much as you can fit in her PMC kiln (it’s rather small) for $5. She also has a tumbler that she uses for PMC. I don’t remember if use of the tumbler is included in the firing cost or not. wow,all this stuff I didn’t know!
If you ever want to try it out and don’t have access to a kiln, let me know and you can ship it to me. I’ll take a piece to the person I have access to and have her fire it. I’d even pay for the firing. Of course, it would be easier if you had a place there. But I’d certainly be willing to help out if I can.
I can’t remember the name of the stuff that sizes down the mold… I’ll look it up and let you know. I do know it’s really easy to use and it’s a cold cast method, which is nice. I’ll let ya know shortly…
twindragonsmum 😀
tdm
twindragonsmum wrote:Quote:Have you thought about (or even know about 😀 ) PMC – precious metal clay? It comes in bronze, silver and gold in slip, sheet or lump clay form. It is metal mixed with a ‘binder’ that after forming you fire in a kiln or with a torch (kiln works better). The kiln burns away the binder leaving the metal behind. There is a shrinkage factor, but it’s improved over time so the size of your piece isn’t lost. I like the silver because it’s fine silver and not sterling, therefore it doesn’t tarnish. All the metals take patinas or you can leave them with a matte finish or polish them to a mirror shine. As far as ‘cleaning’ or finishing pieces cast with the lost wax technique, you don’t have to use a chemical process. The easiest I find, is to tumble finsh them. They go into a tumbler, like a rock tumbler, with different ‘shot’ sizes and come out beautifully. With the PMC I don’t have to worry about my boys around my torch for soldering or casting or the chemicals for finishing either (especially when they were toddlers and into everything). The problem I’m running into at the moment is that the price of metals is still on the rise, so PMC is getting more expensive… and kilns aren’t cheap either 😀 Does this help?
Forgot to add that with the PMC lots of different stones can be cast into place which is a BIG thing for me since I hate stone setting… Do you know how hard it is to get the stone seated correctly? Especially making sure the table is level so that the crown and girdle don’t slip out of the prongs and you loose the stone 🙄 Getting the seat right is a real pain in the you know what 😈 I also like the PMC because I don’t go through any saw blades like I do for sterling (I break lots of blades 😀 )
oh, yeah! I have some of that clay! I wonder where it is. The reason I got it was not to make jewelry, but to use to shrink small sculptures(this is the OLD stuff). It shrinks allot when it is fired.. but I don’t understand how you can fire it with stones in place.. doesn’t the heat affect them? -and why doesn’t the clay crack or shrink away from the stone?? It comes in slip form?? Can it be cast??
Aack! Sorry it’s taken so long to get back to you… In answer to casting stones in place; some stones do better than others, some you don’t want to use at all because the heat will damage them and some you have to experiment with… which can be fun but frustrating if you’re using a particularly expensive stone. For some reason, man made stones seem to work really well but I don’t care for them, I prefer natural stones. The following work well (so far) chrome diopside (I lurv green), most garnets (haven’t tried black garnet yet), moonstone – rainbow, peach and silver moonstone are kinda iffy – some do fine, others fall apart, green or white topaz but not blue, tanzanite (which works better for pendants and earrings rather than rings as it is a soft, brittle stone and is easily fractured, peridot is good, and of course diamond is wonderful! If you want diamond sparkle without the price then go with cz – just remember that if you’re going by carat weight rather than millimeter size, cz will be a smaller stone as it is heavier chemically than diamond; the only way to tell cz from diamond is to weigh it.
I’ve no clue why the PMC doesn’t crack or pull away from the stones when fired. If you are unsure about firing a stone in place you can set a bezel cup or prong setting or bezel wire in the unfired wet clay and set the stone after the piece has been ‘finished’ (polished, patina-d or whatever).
PMC does come in slip form and it can be cast. If you’re working with lump clay, you can throw it on a potters’ wheel – messy but fun 😆 If you’re working with slip, it can be cast like ceramic slip in a plaster mould – dump the slip into the mould, let the mould absorb some of the water out of the clay until a ‘skin’ is formed, pour out the excess PMC and you’re left with essentially a hollow form that you’ll need to fire in alumina hydrate so it won’t colapse.
Does any of this help or make sense? 😆
twindragonsmum 😆
tdm
twindragonsmum wrote:Jennifer wrote:Ah yes, but with PMC each piece is OOAK, essentially. I’d want to make several of each design in a run. Plus my favorite gemstones are not able to be set and fired with it.
Also we have no where around here that would allow me use of a kiln. 😉
Quote:You can make a run of as many of the design as you want. The mould would be similar to the plaster, two piece sort used in ceramics or if your piece will have a flat back to it, then the mould is a one piece ‘push mould’; you pack the clay into a one sided flat mold, wait till the clay dries a bit, pop it out onto your drying surface and fill the mold and repeat. Make as many identical pieces as you need! 😀 There’s also some neat stuff that will help size the mould down if you want the piece to be smaller. It’ll have all the same detail but the item won’t be as large. You don’t have to have a kiln to fire the pieces; it can be done with a torch; even the sort that you get at the grocery store for crisping the tops of creme brulee… they aren’t too spendy… Good luck! 😀
twindragonsmum 😀What is the stuff that sizes molds down? We have tried some things, but they seem to distort the sculpture a little.
I like “Reduc-It” from Rio Grande… I’ll quote the catalog since they say it better than I can explain 😆
“Reduc-It Mold Compound
This unique positive casting material uniformly reduces to 50% of its original size as it cures, creating scale replicas for most models. Make graduated sets, reduce original patterns, make earrin/pendant sets or ring emblems. Please Note: Dry flat pieces on hard paper towels to help keep the ends from curling.” page 477 of the 2008 Tools & Equipment catalog from Rio Grande.
Hope this helps!
twindragonsmum 😀
tdm
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