Skip to main content

Using My Scrap Sterling Silver and Bronze To Make Pod Earrings



It's very satisfying to use your scrap metal and make something you really like with it. I normally save my sterling silver scrap in a pot that I then send off when it's full for recycling in return for a nice amount of cash. But sometimes I like to get out my torch and just melt stuff and I've never done pods before......

Sterling silver and bronze will melt easily and form pebbles, sometimes lovely and round in shape and sometimes a bit more organic and freeform. Regardless of their shape you then have a piece of metal you can do things with. I watched a video by Janice Berkebile recently where she made some pod earrings which is what inspired me to play around with some of my scrap silver and bronze.



Here are some bronze pebbles that I've hammered to flatten them slightly before putting them through the rolling mill {that soldering block looks disgusting doesn't it?!}


A bronze pebble about to be squished. Bronze is a harder metal than silver and copper so needs to be annealed a couple of times times as you're flattening it with the rolling mill.


The flattened bronze pebbles. They are all slightly different, not perfectly round but lovely natural looking shapes. The next step was to anneal them again then dome them gently before pickling them to remove the oxides.


After normal pickling they then had to go into a super pickle mix to remove the copper plating that occurs when you heat bronze. I had been using a mix of hydrogen peroxide and white vinegar for the super pickle but I found adding some normal pickle to it gingers things up a bit and speeds up the cleaning process. It also produces more bubbles as you can see in this photo. They look like little underwater volcanoes! I set the plastic container of super pickle on top of my pickle pot so the heat helps to speed things up too.


The "pods" after a quick clean up. The edges are quite rough but can be filed and sanded to a smoother finish or left a bit more rustic if you're that way inclined. The silver triple stack and the bronze doubles towards the back of the photo are ready for soldering together once I've sorted out a silver ball for them all. I had quite a few fine silver balls ready made but have discovered I'm very skilled at dropping them on the floor when I'm trying to decide which size ball goes best with which size pod stack so I need to make some more! Then I'll use them to make earrings of some description - haven't got that far yet.
I have made a couple of pairs so far.....


Sterling silver pod studs



Copper stick earrings with sterling silver pods and lots of little balls :D I've also made myself a pod ring that I'm wearing as I type.....


I'm not sure "pod" is the right word to describe what these shapes are but as I'm not inspired to think of anything else at the moment it will have to do for now .....



Labels:

Comments

  1. Divya NThursday, February 19, 2015

    I love pods and think that they are adorable

    ReplyDelete
  2. deborah foordThursday, February 19, 2015

    Fab, I especially love the ring! x

    ReplyDelete
  3. UnknownFriday, February 20, 2015

    Hi, I follow you for a short time... but I'm very fascinated by the way you work! Is every time a pleasure :-)

    ReplyDelete
  4. littleRamstudioFriday, February 20, 2015

    Interesting blog as always. Fascinating to see your techniques and the lovely end results!
    Heather :)

    ReplyDelete
  5. MonicaSaturday, February 21, 2015

    Mi piacerebbe tantissimo vederti al lavoro, mentre produci queste meraviglie!

    ReplyDelete
  6. Miss Val's CreationsSaturday, February 21, 2015

    Great reuse of the scraps! The pieces are gorgeous. Pods is a perfect word for those little shapes. I love the pickling action shot!

    ReplyDelete
  7. K S Jewellery DesignsThursday, February 26, 2015

    These are fab and I love you have found a way to reuse scraps instead of how I use them (balls, balls and more balls!). I have tried hammering my balls (!) and texturing them but a rolling machine is still a dream I can dream... Love catching up with your blog.
    Kristin :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Cinnamon JewelleryThursday, February 26, 2015

      Thanks Kristin! Having a rolling mill does make life easier when it comes to flattening things. You can still do it with a hammer - it just takes more elbow grease!

      Delete
  8. KasiaTuesday, March 10, 2015

    These are absolutely gorgeous!

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Your comments and questions are very welcome!
If you would prefer to contact me directly please use the contact form on my "get in touch" page.

Popular posts from this blog

Combining Soldering And Enamel

The need to make cute, brightly coloured enamel studs propelled me into the world of combining soldering with enamel a couple of years ago. I knew from reading up on it that it was possible to enamel and solder on the same piece but wasn't too confident I was able to do it back then. It was a slightly embarrassing occurance that made me just get on with - I'd made some enamel studs with glued on stud posts. I'd used 2 part epoxy resin which was a job in itself as it set hard after 5 minutes so I had to keep mixing more up. The finished studs looked ok but that little voice in my head kept asking "are you sure you want to use glue?" I wasn't but didn't think I had any other way to do it so I used glue. I sold my first pair and merrily sent them on their way to Canada. A couple of week later the buyer got in touch to say the stud post had come off one of the earrings and the other was hanging off. I was mortified, apologized profusely and refunded her m...
32 comments
Read more

Torch Enamelling - What I've been Up To Recently!

I've admired enamelled jewellery for a while now and not too long ago did a blog post about Etsy seller tekaandzoe  and her wonderful kiln enamelled creations. I didn't think at the time that it was something I would ever be able to do as the cost of kilns plus lack of space would be a problem for me. That wasn't until I saw an advert for a torch enamelling tutorial from US jewellery supplies website Beaducation  by Steven James . It's a great tutorial showing the basics on how to torch enamel on copper. Of course I bought it! I then spent hours scouring the internet for more information on torch enamelling, where to buy the tools I'd need and of course the enamel powders. There are quite a few UK sites selling enamelling supplies and tools but as usual I found the US sites had more choice (why do we always lag behind?) I bought some enamel powders from a couple of UK sites to begin with - Cookson Gold have a good selection but bear in mind th...
37 comments
Read more

Etching Silver Using Nail Art Stamps

So my love/hate relationship with etching sterling silver continues. I've tried a few times now and always end up with different results most of them not that great to be honest. I've tried connecting the silver and a piece of copper to a 9v battery and also heating the ferric nitrate. Sometimes the results are good sometimes not so good. I currently have an etched piece of silver sheet waiting to be reticulated and rid it of the mess that is the etched "pattern".  I now know that using stamps and Stayz On ink just doesn't work with silver - the time needed to etch using ferric nitrate is much longer than etching copper and the ink starts to wear away after about an hour. This results in the pattern being patchy as the resist is eaten away and the silver ends up quite lumpy and course looking. I have yet to try using pnp paper. I don't know why but it all seems a bit of a faff to do. I don't have a laser printer so would need to find somewhere or...
34 comments
Read more