Posts tagged ‘fly press’
Press Form Practice #6
I bought some more Britannia today and set to work on a few more pieces:
that are now just waiting for some final polishing …
Like this:
Press Form Practice #5 – Britannia Silver
I bought my first piece of Britannia silver yesterday:
Britannia Silver
- it’s a lot like Sterling silver but while the Sterling stuff is 925 parts per thousand pure silver (the rest being an alloy of copper etc) Britannia is 958 parts per thousand pure silver.
This means that Britannia is a little softer than Sterling and much more suggestable. It stretches where Sterling might have cracked and is more cooperative for things like ambitious silversmithing and spinning.
So Britannia seemed just the thing when I was struggling to move my pressforming from beautiful, stretchy copper into unyielding sterling silver …
In terms of cutting, annealing and polishing I really can’t tell the difference between the two alloys but for overall stretchiness Britannia wins hands down.
Here’s how I got on with it:
-
- Britannia Silver
-
- annealed
-
- pressed
-
- cut
-
- sanded
-
- soldered
-
- fittings made
-
- filed
-
- sanded
-
- pin fitted
-
- polished, washed
-
- and done!
It’s my first silver piece on the new press forms and I’m really pleased with how well it’s come out, now I just need to make some etching/finish decisions and I might have a range ready for the spring!
Like this:
Press Form Practice #2 …
Back in the studio bright and early today making up some pebble-esque press forms to sample etching on …
Like this:
Press form practice …
I got some time today to have a play with the fly press and work out some ideas for a new range that I want to take to the British Craft Trade Fair in April.
It’s nice to have development time but I’m also aware of my self imposed, end of March deadline to get all the work done! Here’s what I was thinking on today:
-
- a quick sketch
-
- cutting some templates
-
- press tool pieces
-
- marked out
-
- drilled
-
- and stretched
-
- two halves cut
-
- soldered
-
- into a little pebble sample
… more tomorrow, as well as an interesting Arts Trail meeting in Worcester …
Today in the workshop …
… has been a day of experimenting with some new ideas. It’s always an exciting time and, chances are these will evolve into something totally different, but here’s what I got through today:
a little drawing
some press form making
followed by press forming
cutting
and assembling
to be followed shortly but some etching, texturing, and maybe even a little drilling …
Fly Pressing … step one
Well, step 2 really – the first being ‘fix your press to a stable, unmovable surface‘ but this is where I’ve gotten to today.
I have a neat little stack of MDF off cuts (thank you to Mr W for sawing them up with the big electric saw) and I’m ready to make some press forms!
The New Fly Press
Bella, meet the world.
World, meet Bella.
She arrived in the studio back in the spring but its taken a long while to find someone to make some new pieces for her (I, sadly, do not have an engineer’s lathe):
and to get her bolted down to the worktop (a big thank you to Mr W for being braver than me and using the scary DIY drill)
*ta-da* She’s ready to go! Tomorrow I shall go on a hunt for some rubber samples, which I’ll need for making my own press tools in the next few weeks …
