0:01

Welcome to Jewelry Making Tips with Metals mith

0:04

Society the ultimate podcast for anyone

0:06

passionate about the art of jewelry making

0:08

. I'm your host , Corkie Bolton . Metals

0:10

mith Society is a community on Instagram

0:12

that has over 240,000

0:15

individuals , from professional jewelers

0:17

to small business artisans , hobbyists

0:19

, students and even those curious looky-loos

0:22

eager to learn about jewelry making . Together

0:25

we share tips , kindness and support

0:27

. In this podcast , I will

0:29

discuss tips from the Instagram page

0:31

, provide deeper insights , address

0:33

questions and share bonus tips that

0:35

often surface in the comments section . So

0:38

, whether you've been making jewelry for a while

0:40

or you're just starting your jewelry making journey

0:42

, this podcast is your go-to

0:44

resource for all the jewelry making

0:47

tips . So grab your tools , dust

0:49

off your workbench and join me In

0:54

today's episode . I'm excited to talk

0:56

about gold . Now , if

0:58

you're someone that's been working in silver and

1:00

you're interested in working in gold , but perhaps

1:03

you're a little nervous due to the high cost

1:05

, hopefully this episode will

1:07

help you feel a little bit more comfortable

1:09

with getting started . Before

1:12

we jump into today's episode , I want to tell you about

1:14

my favorite work pants . They're

1:16

made by Dovetail Workwear . These

1:19

pants are not only cute and comfortable , but

1:21

they're super durable , perfect for working in the

1:23

jewelry studio , and Dovetail

1:25

is offering our community $10 off

1:27

your order with code METALSMITHSOCIETY

1:30

. So head over to dovetailworkwear . com/

1:33

METALSMITHSOCIETY and you can save 10%

1:35

off your first pair of work pants

1:37

. I want to begin today's episode

1:40

by letting you know I'm not a master

1:42

goldsmith and I'm totally cool

1:44

admitting that . When I went

1:46

to college for jewelry making

1:48

back in the early 2000s , I

1:50

was on a budget , so

1:53

my experience working in gold

1:55

was fairly limited . And then over the

1:57

years , as I developed my own

1:59

jewelry line , corky bolt and jewelry , due

2:01

to the expenses of the materials

2:04

I was working primarily in silver

2:06

for many years , but I would dabble

2:08

in some 14K and some

2:10

customs . And over the

2:12

years , as I've been studying engraving

2:15

and diamond setting , I've

2:17

become way more comfortable working

2:20

in gold . I was also fortunate

2:22

enough to be able to attend Metalsmiths's

2:25

in Florence this past October Shoutouts

2:28

to Monica . This trip to Italy

2:30

involved me working with a master

2:32

Florentine goldsmith for a week , and

2:35

that was truly amazing

2:37

. Recently I

2:39

made a pretty big decision for my business . I

2:41

decided that I was going to work exclusively

2:44

in gold . If you want to check out my

2:46

work , I will put a link to my website

2:48

in the show notes corkie bolton jewelry . com

2:51

and to touch upon

2:53

that briefly , there is

2:55

more profit in gold

2:57

jewelry and , as someone who

2:59

dedicates most of their time to Metalsmith

3:02

society , this podcast

3:04

and helping others learn about jewelry

3:06

making , my time at the bench is limited , and

3:09

so , if I'm only going to make a few

3:11

pieces of jewelry a month , it makes sense

3:13

for me to work in gold , and so I

3:15

wanted to pass on

3:17

some of the things that I've learned , hopefully

3:20

help some of you take the next steps

3:22

to working in gold , if that's what you're interested

3:24

in . So let's get started

3:26

. I'm going to be talking today

3:28

about 18 carat yellow gold

3:31

and 14 carat yellow gold , and

3:33

that's because these are the metals that I

3:35

use . Golds come in a

3:37

rainbow of alloys and

3:40

red golds and yellow golds

3:42

and a bunch of other alloys that

3:44

you can imagine , but pretty

3:46

common to work in 18

3:48

carat or 14 carat yellow . So

3:50

, to define them , 18 carat

3:52

gold contains 75%

3:54

gold , while 14 carat

3:56

gold contains 58.3%

3:59

gold . Now , because that 14

4:01

carat contains a higher percentage of alloyed

4:03

metals like copper , it provides

4:05

more durability and resistance to wear

4:07

and tear , but it's also a little

4:10

less yellow in its color . I

4:13

buy my gold primarily from

4:15

Stuller and Rio Grande , and

4:17

when it comes to buying it , it's a very

4:20

similar experience to silver , except for the

4:22

cost , of course , but you can buy

4:24

it in sheet form , tube , wire

4:27

, decorative wire . So

4:29

really anything that you can

4:31

purchase for silver you can typically

4:33

also find in gold . The

4:35

other thing you need to purchase when

4:38

you start to work in gold is

4:40

gold solder . Now , gold solder

4:42

comes in two forms there's plum

4:45

solder and there's repair solder . Plum

4:47

solder is what you're gonna wanna purchase when

4:50

you're fabricating . It's

4:52

equivalent to the carat value of

4:54

the gold you're working in . So , for example , the 14

4:56

carat plum has that 58.3%

4:59

pure gold in its formulation

5:01

. The repair solder is

5:03

really only gonna be for if

5:05

you're reattaching a prong or you're sizing

5:07

a ring , and I , quite

5:10

frankly , don't use it . It's gonna

5:12

look more white and

5:15

have a decreased carat value . So

5:17

you're definitely gonna wanna purchase the plum . Now

5:20

, when it comes to the

5:22

actual , which solder do I

5:24

purchase ? You use the same

5:26

step down soldering procedure as you

5:29

would in silver , Meaning your first

5:31

seam you should start with a hard solder

5:33

and then subsequent seams you could

5:35

go to medium . I personally

5:38

don't tend to use the easy yellow

5:40

gold solder because I noticed that it

5:42

does have a slightly more

5:44

white color and appearance , which

5:47

will stand out in my solder seam . Next

5:50

we can talk about oxidation and the difference

5:52

between gold and silver . Most

5:54

gold alloys don't oxidize

5:56

as much as silver when they're soldered

5:59

or annealed properly , so that actually

6:01

makes soldering gold kind of easier . The

6:04

oxides that do form on the surface will generally

6:06

come off in your pickle and

6:08

you can lightly buff them off as well . Let's

6:11

talk about fluxes . To

6:14

protect your gold alloys . You wanna

6:16

use a barrier flux ? Barrier

6:18

flux can be made by mixing

6:20

50-50 boric acid

6:22

with methyl alcohol , or you

6:24

can buy a commercial one like fire

6:26

scoff or supernil . Now

6:29

that's any time you're heating the metal . So

6:31

even when you're annealing , it doesn't hurt to

6:33

coat it with a barrier

6:35

flux . You

6:38

will also need to use a flow flux

6:40

when you're soldering . That could

6:42

be handy flux or

6:44

mighty flux . Before we talk

6:46

a little bit more about soldering gold , I

6:48

want to touch back on annealing . Annealing

6:51

is essentially the same as when you're annealing your

6:53

silver , but with yellow gold you're going

6:55

to bring the metal to more of a visible

6:58

cherry red and you want to make sure that

7:00

you anneal nice and evenly

7:02

. When it comes to the equipment

7:04

that you're going to use to solder gold . It's going

7:06

to be the same as your silver . However

7:09

, a lot of goldsmiths recommend working

7:11

with a dual gas torch because

7:13

the dual gas torch systems

7:16

have smaller , hotter flames

7:18

. When it comes to your soldering surface

7:21

, you just want to make sure , if you work both in silver

7:23

and gold , that your surfaces are clean

7:25

. You don't want a rogue chip of silver

7:27

solder to end up splattering onto

7:29

your gold piece as an example . That's

7:31

very annoying to remove . The

7:33

same rules apply when soldering

7:36

gold as to soldering silver

7:38

. You want your seam to be nice

7:40

and tight . One little difference

7:43

is , after you do your barrier flux

7:45

, you dip it in your boric

7:47

acid , methyl alcohol mix or one

7:50

of those commercial ones . You are

7:52

going to apply that paste flux

7:54

or mighty flux more

7:56

on the actual seam itself . You

7:58

are going to concentrate your flame

8:01

directly onto the seam that you're soldering

8:03

. When working in gold , just keep your

8:05

torch flame there , paying attention

8:08

, watching the metal for

8:10

any colors that it's changing . Then , when you

8:12

see that solder start to flow , just

8:14

gently pull that flame back . Your

8:17

experience soldering your gold

8:19

is going to be very similar to your silver

8:21

. I think you've got this

8:23

. You're going to pickle as you normally

8:25

would . Now we can move

8:27

on to talking about other aspects of working

8:30

in gold . When

8:32

you're , let's say , sawing and filing

8:34

gold , one hot tip is

8:37

you want to make sure that you collect every

8:40

single piece of dust , because

8:42

the gold is substantially more valuable

8:45

than the silver . I mean , we should all be collecting

8:47

all of our dust anyhow , but when it comes

8:49

to working in gold , one tip that I picked

8:51

up when I was at Metalsmith's in Florence

8:54

is putting a piece of tissue

8:56

paper in your bench drawer and that

8:58

allows every single piece of dust

9:00

to get collected so that you can later recycle

9:03

it within your own studio or send it to

9:05

a refiner . The designing

9:08

aspect of working in gold you

9:10

want to design with your budget in mind

9:12

. In silver , pieces

9:15

can be a little bit thicker . You're

9:17

not going to feel that as much in your wallet

9:20

. But when it comes to the gold , you can

9:22

save money just by determining the

9:24

thinnest gauge you can get away with . That will

9:26

still give you durability . Of course

9:28

, fabrication and forming with

9:30

gold is the same as working in silver . You

9:32

just want to pay attention to when your gold needs

9:35

annealing . You know , go back and

9:37

anneal it . Get it to that nice cherry

9:39

red , make sure it's nice and even and

9:42

polishing . Now a

9:44

tip I would recommend is keeping separate

9:46

bits and polishing buffs for your

9:48

gold work , because little flecks of metal

9:50

get embedded in there . So if a

9:53

buff , for example , had a lot of silver embedded

9:55

on it and then you used it on your gold pieces

9:57

, there could be some cross contamination . So

9:59

once you've decided this is going to be a gold

10:01

buff , take a Sharpie and write gold on

10:04

it , and that way you can keep that

10:06

separate . If you want

10:08

to get started working in gold but don't

10:10

have a ton of money to invest , I

10:12

have two different suggestions . One

10:14

is you can start to add little gold

10:16

components to your silver pieces . This

10:19

can provide some beautiful contrast

10:21

and provide greater

10:23

value to your work without totally

10:25

breaking the bank . Another

10:27

way you can do that is you can have gold

10:30

bezels around your stone but

10:32

have the back plate be silver . This

10:35

wouldn't be jewelry making tips with Corkie Bolton

10:37

if I didn't share about a tip that was shared

10:39

by our community and talk about it a

10:41

little bit more in depth . Back

10:43

in 2019 , Susan Fawman shared

10:45

a tip about soldering a gold

10:47

bezel to a silver back plate and

10:50

one of the main things that is

10:52

shown in this tip is a

10:54

setup which allows you to heat

10:57

the piece from the bottom , focusing

10:59

your heat on the silver back plate so

11:02

as not to melt the gold bezel . I

11:04

have to say that one of the top comments

11:06

is super helpful . It talks

11:08

about using potentially

11:11

18K or 22K

11:13

for the bezel because they are

11:15

much easier to set

11:17

than 14K , and I can

11:19

attest to this personally . And it's

11:21

also mentioned that you might want to end

11:24

up using silver medium

11:26

solder to solder the back

11:28

plate to the bezel . You'll want to be

11:30

mindful to not use an excess of solder

11:33

in general , because you don't want the

11:35

silver solder to go up onto the gold bezel

11:37

, but I think if you're heating it from the back

11:39

plate and you're pulling that

11:41

solder down around

11:43

the bezel , you shouldn't have a problem , and

11:45

I think this is great advice . I

11:47

hope today's episode about gold was helpful

11:50

to you and if you have more information

11:52

on working in gold and want to submit a tip , I

11:54

would love if you emailed it to me over at

11:56

tips at metalsmithsocietycom

11:58

. I'll add all this info in today's

12:01

show notes . I so appreciate you joining

12:03

me and I'll see you next time .