Phew

[shanmonster]

My attempts at granulation didn't work so well. I got some of them to stick, but my meticulously-applied comet design was all for naught. Instead, I'm left with a few abstract shapes which don't look at all interesting. Ah well. At least I tried. It's a shame I ended up losing so many of those itty bitty globes of silver, though. They took me a lot of preparation to make, and now they're sitting at the bottom of the acid bath. D'oh!

I finished all my other homework, though. I rendered a tube ring I've already made two of, and I matted a painted rendering of a cuttle cast ring with a set abalone shell. Now, I feel like doing something creative, but nothing too exhausting. Maybe I'll gather up yet another gallery of images to share with you.

First, however, I must eat. I haven't had anything substantial since breakfast time.

Comments

[cissa.livejournal.com]

Granulation can be a bitch. I'm sorry yours didn't work- it sounds really cool! You CAN add more stuff and re-fuse, if you're inclined that way.

I'm wondering why the granules are in an acid bath, though- were you fusing sterling? I hear that's possible, but it's not the best way to start in my opinion- fine silver is a lot more accomodating. It's probably worth recovering the granules when you dump the pickle- they ARE a lot of work.

I love granulation (and haven't done enough of it for my tastes), and have studied it with several people. I'd be happy to pass on anything I've learned, if you're interested and want to explain your process. I'm quite keen on spreading the insanity! :)

[shanmonster.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I'm using sterling. I don't have any fine silver. The technique my class was shown goes as follows.

Squeaky-clean sheet of thin silver (I used about 26 gauge) cleaned in pickle, with soap and water, steam, ammonia, and more steam. Silver thinly coated with yellow flux. Clean granules put in place with very fine brush moistened in yellow flux. Allow flux to fully dry. Heat with reduced flame (mushroom-shaped flame) until beads fuse to sheet. Air-cool, then throw it in the pickle. Heat and quench in pickle until fine silver comes to surface.

Apparently, this technique works only with silver. I think it also only works with sterling. If I remember correctly, it's the copper content which facilitates the bond.

Have you used this technique?

[cissa.livejournal.com]

Interesting! Thanks for explaining it- it does sound fascinating.

No, I haven't tried it. I have seen a demo of sterling fusing that worked pretty well, though it was done by an expert and she warned us that it takes practice and is still iffy. She did it as a variant of fine silver fusing, as follows:

Depletion gild the silver sheet. Make granules and depletion gild them. Then put the granules into a small bath of very dirty pickle and stir with a steel wool cylinder. This will plate the granules with a microscopic layer of pure copper. Rinse well and get everything clean. As the granules get hot, they'll naturally make a low-temp alloy with the fine silver surfaces, which helps them fuse before the rest of the sterling melts.

The rest is just like fusing fine silver or gold: Glue in place with the regular glue (1 drop hide glue, 1 drop yellow-green flux, 12 drops distilled water) and dry. (She also coated the back of the silver shet with water-soluble white-out; she said it evens out the heat. Make sure it's water-soluble; the solvent ones are really toxic when hot.) Put onto trinket kiln, cover (other people don't cover), and watch carefully. When it's glowing a good red, remove the cover and use a pretty big torch at least 6 inches away, wafting over the piece. Gradually get a little bit closer- though still really far away from usual torch work- until you see the flash.

This worked like a charm with fine silver- I don't think any of us had failures in that workshop, which was pretty impressive. Other techniques have had a higher failure rate! I've done more ambitious fusing than I ever thought possible using this technique, and plan to do more.

At some point I'd like to experiment with fusing sterling, since I like its strength; for now I solder the granulation to a heavier sterling back. I tend to have some fine silver around, though, since I also do enameling and fused loop in loop chainmaking.

Fusing fine is a lot easier than sterling, so I think it's a pretty good place to start if you can get some. I do adore fusing...