Rolled Gold and Granulation- pt II

Back to the rolled gold wire- Mitch over at Hickoree's Hard Goods asked to make it into a pretzel pendant. 

(...gotta get me a Hill-side tie...)

Yes, the gold is a weird colour, but dont worry about it. ( its just that marble dust I was talking about)

A Pretzel Needs Salt.

So Im going to put some tiny gold granules on there.

Granulation is an ancient technique, mastered by the Etruscans. Seems to be a bit controversial as to how it actually works- but this is how it was taught to me by Dr Robert Baines:

Making the granules:

Place gold filings on layers of charcoal dust.

Heat this up, and the bits will melt into spheres; granules.

The dust helps to keep them separate. Then wash off the dust.

It'll be tricky to attach these things to the pretzel, they're really tiny. Smaller than this: "."

Ancient method: 

-malachite powder (see pic above)

-organic glue 

(Theophilus Presbyter prescribes quince pips, I think? or gum tragacanth is also good. I used a Uhu stick! Seemed to work- felt a little irreverent tho')

-flux

You paste the granules on with a little of this mix.

Heat it up gently with a bushy flame. The glue burns off ( creating a local reducing atmosphere)

Then there's this critical moment when you get a little flash of the metal just before you melt everything.

(stop before that)

The tiny amount of copper in the malachite powder melts with the gold just where the spheres meet the substrate. A very discrete join.( Is it diffusion bonding? Or is it just fusion?)

 A weird pic, yes, the pretzel is on the right with some of the granules bonded nicely. See how they are still spherical? ( bit fuzzy, sorry) Good Job!

Ironically, I decided that I was being too technical- the granules were too good, too spherical- not 'baked-in-salty' enough- so I decided to melt them in a bit, undoing my fancy-pants granulation.

The pretzel is ≈ 6mm long.
See, I told you the black stuff would come right off.

Stone Rolled Wire

Awhile back I posted about the history of wire-making.
Well, I think its interesting.
Before steel tools were developed, smiths would roll a strip of gold between stones to make a 'snake',
a bit like you do with pastry or clay- between your hands.
Its difficult to do this with other metals Ive found, but gold is very malleable and ductile- so, once again, it proves to be a friend, willing to go on any adventure...

I recently completed an interesting commission- with a request for stone-rolled wire.
Here's the process. Some interesting ancient techniques used...

Here, Ive cast a long cylindrical ingot, then rolled it with a marble block on a marble slab.
(fairly frequent annealling was required) I think it took about 30 mins to roll this down to a wire.

Marble is a pretty soft stone, true, but Ive found that if the stone is too hard or too smooth, it just skids over the metal, instead of gripping it and making a nice rolling motion.
A little bit of marble dust is created, and gets rolled into the surface of the gold. Not sure what the consequences of that are- marble dust would be calcium carbonate (yes?) - so what will happen when I heat that? Black stuff? Im supposing it will just fall out, leaving a pitted surface, so much the better!
A dip into lemon juice would soon get rid of it...
In any case, the high purity gold wont be affected greatly- its non-reactive.

Dusty fingers..
The resulting wire has an interesting surface and irregular, slightly ovoid profile- not so 'perfect', but more dynamic and therefore mysterious.
It is a bit of a funny colour- dont worry- it'll come good.

Next time: what I made with the wire...

Natron Flux

Metalworking can be pretty tricky.
How did people even discover how to do it?
Mostly by accident or serendip, we might say.
What impresses me is that we solved many problems without knowing the complex science behind it.
(In keeping with that, I will try to keep this discussion very simple)

For example, you can join two pieces of metal together by introducing another metal that has a lower melting temperature.
But when you heat certain metals in a flame, they get black on the outside.
(a reaction with oxygen in the air)
This black stuff prevents the joining of the metals.
So someone discovered a way of solving this problem- and today we call it Flux. (latin for flow)
Flux is a substance that you paint on to the metal, and as you heat it, it melts and becomes like a glassy coating that creates an oxygen-free world on the surface of the metals. No more black stuff- and everything flows.

Today, goldsmiths tend to use Fluoroborate flux. It works well, but folks, the vapours are bad for you to breathe in. Be sure to read the safety data if you use it.

Before that (and still), most would use Borax flux (sodium borate) which is a naturally-occuring mineral.

It is sold as a sculptural cone-shape, which you can grind up and mix with water to make a paste.

It doesn't work as well as, and is harder to remove than Fluoroborate flux but its slightly less harmful, I gather. Still, read the safety data if you use it.

Seeking an alternative, I had read that the ancient Egyptians used something called "Natron" as a flux, so I thought Id look it up, wondering about its toxicity. Might it be a viable alternative? Not that I think ancient Egyptians did things better- I mean, they worshipped flies and reportedly, would treat wounds with faeces. But still, I'd like to know more about Natron.

Historical Natron (sodium carbonate decahydrate and sodium bicarbonate) is a naturally occurring mineral that can be gathered from dry lake beds. In fact, there is a lake in Tanzania, called Lake Natron. (There is a Lake Borax too...)

Apparently this pink lake is an important Flamingo breeding ground - lots of pink!
Natron was a very useful substance in the ancient world; used in soap, mummification preservatives and glass making and so on.
Turns out Sodium's elemental designation; Na, is related to the egyptian word natron.

Where can I get some? Lake Eyre perhaps?
Does it work as a flux? Are the vapours toxic?

Scrimshaw

Remembered this scrimshaw badge I made, back in 2003...
At the time, Alice was wearing this at some Brunswick St. café and the waiter said "hey, you should make these and like, sell them..."
Yes...yeah...yep...

Johnny

So... I got a press!

5 tons of pressure.

200 kgs of cast iron.

And 200kgs of thanks goes to my Dad, who helped me transport it, man I wished I had photographed that, it was crazy and Dad was wearing this red zizzou beanie- you know, for capers such as this one. 

(+ thanks also to kindly neighbour Adrian for extra muscle.)

Quite a biffer, I think I will paint it almost-black.

Potential names:

"Johnny" ( because its a John Heine, and I think this is my favourite so far)

"Stampy"

"Squishy"

"Biff"

"Trogdor"

"Menhir"

OR

"Brain Surgeon"

"The Butterfly"

"Spiderweb"

"Snowflake"

okay, yeah its turning into a dad-joke...

Im starting to get used to its hulking presence already, like the proverbial elephant in the room.

Now I've got to knuckle down and get some dies made. 

Further Adventures With Wholemeal Gold

More wedding rings being made from native gold nuggets, in the Goodness style. Here, the ring is unjoined. It starts off pretty rugged.

When you have a specified width, height, profile and circumference to meet, and you are achieving this just by hammering, you have to pay attention. Gold is very malleable, but its not like clay- once you've stretched it, you can't really shrink it back. It may come across as if Im just feeling my way through the whole task, but in fact, Im constantly checking and measuring with a vernier calliper. 

You will notice the spots... these are naturally occurring inclusions of other minerals, present in the unrefined nuggets. I recently described this to a groom-to-be as "like real vanilla seeds in an awesome ice-cream". Basically, you won't find this in a shop. Folks are really responding to this material and process- thanks for giving me the privilege of making them for you. I genuinely feel moved when I make these, its not an ordinary task for me. 

Ulno in The Storm

A pair of Ulno bangles for Ebony.

Gold and Iron.

There was a terrific/terrible storm here, so I went outside under the eave and photographed these in the strange light. Then the hail drummed out a fearful tattoo on the tin.

Westwoods

At last- westwood rims for my 1930's bike- these are an old style rim that are hard to get around here. They still make them in India and China, where the popular bikes are based on pre-war english roadsters. But if I go to a local bike shop and say- "got any westwood rims?" they say "west-what?!"
...or my favorite customer service phrase ever; "it costs money just talkin' about it".
Anyway- finally got some + dusty tires.
I think these rims should be black though, yeah... all the steel should be blackened... hmm...
And check out the fillet-brazed head stem.

DN at New Mociun Store

MOCIUN store is open!
Really like those vitrines and tables.
Caitlin has a great eye and makes tasty wearables, so I was really happy when she asked me to send jewelry for her new store...
Note: If you loved my Sunrise Ring, definitely head over to Mociun and grab one before they all get snaffled... there aren't many and I cant keep up!

MOCIUN

224 Wythe Ave

Brooklyn NY

Open Wed-Sun 12-8pm

Closed Mon Tues

Finito

Finished native gold rings, in the Proven Goodness style.
Quite simple- but its all about the texture, folks.
I make hammers with specially textured faces, then tap all over the surface, about one million times. 

Surfaced

My work was featured in Surface Magazine. Hey, there's me! Boy, that is a goofy picture of me.
(Thanks to Kate Nicholson for the article)

Pin

This funny iphone pic is the only record of this vaguely botanical gold pin I made for a friend's Mum.
Slivers and granules, fused together.

Native Gold

Working with native gold today... great fun.

Native gold is just as it comes out of the ground... wholemeal, so-to-speak, not refined.

It has slight impurities, and is about 22-23k. (remember?)

Over the last few weeks I've been working mainly with brass- which, as a material is bristling with good points.... but gold, native gold- is truly delicious to work with; malleable, resplendent, weighty...

It is as if it just wants to turn into a wedding ring, doing this by itself...

Above, the ring is as yet unjoined, and still bespeckled- soon to be whole and glowing.

———•———

Bangle Calligraphy

Custom version of Ulno bangle; iron and 22k gold

I was having a productive morning... when I received a letter in the "mail". How delightful!

But when I opened it, it turned out to be a bill from "The Bank" for $11,100,006!

So I quickly minted the first installment. "The Bank" was rather chuffed.

*Actually I did study at RMIT- as did Stuart Devlin who designed the real Australian coins (+ those of 36 other countries)- Above is the old 1 cent piece. Can you just see the tiny "S.D"? Perhaps I'd better lift my numismatic game.

** To that end; I'm seriously on the hunt for a FLY PRESS- does any one have one for sale / know of one?

Please Please do let me know. Australia only. It looks like this:

Or even this:

Love and Paper

A recent commission for his and hers 22k gold wedding bands. Congratulations R and J- Best wishes to a beautiful couple!

The brief was kind of challenging; crinkled paper texture on the surface, but thicker than actual paper and both rings to be cut from the same block (but different finger sizes...). I began by making a textured strip, parted that into two widths, then bent up the rings from those.

And then the join....! Now, how would you make an invisible join with an irregular texture? What I did was make a scarf joint, cut on a steep angle, which meant that the join had an irregular line on the face of the ring, that gets hidden in the crinkley texture. The solder used was ≈20k gold, with a slightly higher copper-to-silver ratio for a near-invisible colour match. ( I was not game to try fusion here- the texture would get melted...) The soldering had to be super-careful and the amount precisely judged, because I would not be able to clean up any excess from the face of the ring without damaging the texture...
Can you picture that?
No, its near-invisible.

this time, gold

Ulno Bangle, now available on my webshop.

I dared myself—to make a gold bangle- as simply as possible.
For some reason, sometimes it takes courage just to do something simply- I worry that it may not be 'enough'.
But here, I think it is. Something beautiful and robust that you could wear everyday.
Let me know if you'd like one.

And for some reason, when I try to make something simply, it often takes much longer than I think!
In this case I tapered the wire very slightly, 1mm at the terminals, 1.5mm at the nadir- just for a bit of subtle dynamics. I did this by rolling the wire between massive slabs of iron, at a slight angle. This tapering could be achieved with a hammer, I suppose, but would result in a more planished look (planes of hammer-marks)- and besides I wanted to try the massive slabs. 

iron—gold

Leafy Gold Ring

This is the beginning of a gold ring that I make.
I melted the end very slightly, to round it off any sharpness.
That's when the rainbow appeared.

The other side (which will become the inside of the ring) is burnished. I'm getting into burnishing. You don't remove any material, just rub it smooth with a piece of haematite.

I cleaned off the pesky (tho' pretty) rainbow.

Lastly, I bend it round.
And now its a ring.

Update on the Old Bike

Getting there with the Healing...
+ Soma bars (too shiny, I agree)
+ Brooks saddle
+ French pedals
=Stealthy!

Click on the bicycle picture in my links bar that says VELO- for some amazing old bikes by CollectVelo