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Ranasp In reply to Astalo [2008-06-15 01:42:27 +0000 UTC]

Thank you, it worked better than I expected it would.

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Ranasp In reply to Mikau-010 [2007-11-25 05:32:02 +0000 UTC]

You mean the wire wrapping? That was actually quite easy! Just anneal the copper wire, and wrap it steadily around the base metal. Sometimes it needed to be shoved into place, but with softened metal it works. It would have been really hard to do if it weren't annealed though.

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Mikau-010 In reply to Ranasp [2007-11-25 23:31:05 +0000 UTC]

no no no

the colored bands on the metal itself
where you fused copper and brass together and marbalized it

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Ranasp In reply to Mikau-010 [2007-11-27 02:39:24 +0000 UTC]

Ahhh the mokume gane, yes that's a tedious and difficult process. Looks wonderful when complete though.

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Ranasp In reply to FearaJinx [2006-01-31 01:14:06 +0000 UTC]

Thanks again, I'm glad it came together as well as it did.

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Ranasp In reply to Hrafenka [2006-01-23 00:41:15 +0000 UTC]

Again, thanks. I wish I could do more metal work, but an apartment isn't the best place to try doing that kind of stuff.

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Ranasp In reply to ChinaTeaCup [2004-03-27 20:07:48 +0000 UTC]

Yes and yes. There's a lot of sawing with a jewler's saw involved, so your arm hurts like an s.o.b. for a while, plus you're almost definitely going to get cuts, and burns if you aren't careful. You need a delicate hand too, because when soldering metal together you need to place that teeeny bit of silver solder in just the right place, and apply the heat just right so it doesn't go flying off (or melt where you don't want it to go). Then there's hammering, and if you're not used to that it makes your entire arm and shoulder ache. So yeah, its challenging, but eventually you get used to it and then you can have fun with it. Thanks for the compliment.

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Ranasp In reply to KittyPhoenix [2004-03-12 05:56:31 +0000 UTC]

Thanks. This brooch took a long freaking time to make, even if you take away the time it took to make the mokume stuff.

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Ranasp In reply to mllebienvenu [2004-03-11 06:03:16 +0000 UTC]

Heh pretty close. I may as well do some 's'planin'. First you take different metals (I did copper/brass/copper/brass), solder the sheets together really well, then put it through a roller over and over again (a roller is two cylendars that spin with a thin gap between them, you can adjust the gap so you slowly squash metal into thinner gauges). When its about twice the length it used to be, saw it in half, then solder the two layers together so now instead of four layers, you have eight. Keep on doing it until you either get your fingers nearly caught in the rollers or you burn yourself. (just kidding, even if you do that you have to keep going. ) When you're happy with how many layers you have, nail it down onto a piece of soft wood (pine does well), and using a metal stamping tool (looks like a round ball on a metal stick, they come in various sizes so you can make spheres) pound the living shit out of it, the more of a pounding you give, the better the patterns. When your arm is ready to fall off, remove the metal from the wood, flip it over, and start sanding like you've never sanded before. When you're done, it will be smooth but with swirly spiffy patterns all over.

I'll post a pic of the leftover mokume I have sometime.

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mllebienvenu In reply to Ranasp [2004-03-11 07:40:56 +0000 UTC]

yeah...that's what I was talking about....hehe.... I learned about the technique with sculpey....

and a very entertaining description too....LOL

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Ranasp In reply to mllebienvenu [2004-03-11 14:16:37 +0000 UTC]

Ohhhh sculpy would be so much easier to do it with! But it'd still look neat. Awww thanks! Can you see why I try not to teach?

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Ranasp In reply to vampirewombat [2004-03-11 04:21:59 +0000 UTC]

I haven't been here long enough to see what there's a lot of, but I figured there couldn't be much metalworking it they didn't even have a jewlery category.

The short of the word is that its a Japanese technique that used to be used for a samuri's sword.

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vampirewombat In reply to Ranasp [2004-03-11 04:40:12 +0000 UTC]

Psst, you replied to my comment and the person above me's in the same post. And the same technique that used to be used for katanas, eh? Nice.

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Ranasp In reply to vampirewombat [2004-03-11 04:43:34 +0000 UTC]

Yes, I tend to do that, I just seperate different responses into different paragraphs. I hate double posting, it looks like I'm just trying to raise my post count...Although I don't have a post count here, really...

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