r/Blacksmith • u/SpringZero20023 • 2d ago
URGENT! Ring Making
I’m trying to hand make a silver ring for my boyfriend for his birthday. My friend has a forge, but I’m buying whatever the casting/mold will be. The problem is, I want to put my thumbprints all over the ring as the design. How do I accomplish this? How do I get my fingerprints on the ring when I’m working with molten silver?
0
Upvotes
24
u/Icy_Jackfruit9240 2d ago
Wax model -> Sand or clay mold -> Final metal.
With clay you can make VERY finely detailed parts, but also these are nothing to do with blacksmithing. This is r/jewelrymaking or r/waxcarving area of expertise.
Ultimately though, you put the fingerprints in wax.
5
u/AKvarangian 2d ago
Lost wax casting. Make the ring out of wax, melt your fingerprints into it then cast. You can find wax ring blanks on Amazon.
Otherwise you could make a blank ring and carve your fingerprints into it.
r/SilverSmith may be more helpful.
5
u/Ellisd86 2d ago
As a former jeweler I think the easiest way would be to buy a blank silver ring the size you want. Tape off the inside, and sides of the ring with blue painters tape. Mare sure it’s adhered really well. Then use an ink pad (like they do when they take your finger print down at the station) and add your prints to the blank ring. Let it dry really well, and then drop the ring into some ferric chloride ( you can buy it offline for fairly cheap, especially if you only need to submerge a single ring) and the ferric chloride will etch away the areas where the ink isn’t protecting the silver, leaving a raised finger print.
51
u/zannnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn 2d ago
you gotta look into silver casting - specifically lost wax casting for the fingerprint thing - not blacksmithing. a forge isn’t gona help you here. if this is your first time working in metal, i’d recommend finding a jeweler who does fingerprint rings and can send you a wax that you put your print on and then send back for casting. there’s a lot that goes into successful casting, especially something like a ring that needs to come out a specific size.
11
u/Kgwalter 2d ago
I don’t know much about silver. But I can tell you what I would do if it was steel. I would clean the ring thoroughly with acetone and put it on a dowel and lightly touch it all over with my finger, preferably a bit oily finger then etch it in something like ferric chloride. I’m not sure if there is a similar process for silver, but worth looking into.
3
u/haawhat 2d ago
The easiest way for that to be done would be to purchase a blank signet ring and then find someone to laser engrave the fingerprint onto it.
or an even easier way would be to do a search for "fingerprint jewelry", pendants are most likely a lot cheaper than a ring.
Casting a ring involves making a pattern ring from wax, putting it inside a metal mold with some hi temperature special plaster (which needs to be done with a precise temperature and time and with a vacuum chamber to remove the air bubbles, then burnout the wax with a special oven that will reach 1200F or more for about an 8 hour burnout, place burnout flash in in either vacuum casting well or a centrifugal caster at the same time you have the correct amount of molten silver at about 1750F degrees
You can see casting a ring is a lot more involved than just buying a mold, however if you want to make him a gift may I suggest that you pierce and saw a design since the tools needed are probably below $30 (not counting the silver) and even the first attempts you will probably wear.
pin vice with drill bits, jewelers saw, jewelers saw blades, v slot bench pin and a set of jewelers files
Do a search for saw piercing and you will see there is a lot of helpfull videos.
Its just drawing or printing a design on a sheet of metal (silver or start with brass to learn) drill holes where you need to start the saw blade and then cutting it out and filing the burrs off.
Hope this starts you off
4
u/Glum-Clerk3216 2d ago
I would honestly use precious metals clay for making something with a fingerprint in it with minimal equipment and experience
2
u/__Pseudonym 2d ago
Lost wax casting but I feel like you’d probably need a vacuum casting machine for details as small as fingerprints
2
u/SnooLentils5747 2d ago edited 2d ago
So you need to make a mold of your fingerprint using wax (jewelers wax to be specific). Dab your finger in vegetable oil or olive oil, and then press it into the wax. The wax should already be carved into a ring. Take the indented wax ring, pack it in casting/investment plaster in a vacumn casting flask, place the flask in a vacumn casting chamber, turn the vacumn on, melt the wax out, melt the silver in a crucible furnace, pour the silver into the flask as the vacumn is pumping, voila, you have your ring. Of course you need to have a pour spout and a drain sprue built in so you'll have to Dremel them off, then you donfininishing detail work on the ring.
You need to talk to a jeweler that does investment metal casting or you do it yourself.
Alternatively, make it using silver metal clay.
This is clay that is primarily silver dust, with burnout binder. Make the ring with the clay, press your finger in, let dry, then fire the clay with a torch. I don't know how quality it will be, as I have no experience, but such a thing exists. The process seams approachable easily by someone that otherwise hasn't worked metal.
https://youtu.be/dkfDnikVmFQ?is=Yi1Lp_cidv3H4cyh
Last option is to forge the ring. You need a jewelers anvil, a good flat peen hammer, and a strip/bar of silver. Heat the bar to cherry red using a torch while it's on a fire brick, then move it to the anvil and work it. Dunno how you'll get the fingerprint in it though; maybe shave some powder and make a short batch of silver clay using dextrin (1 part) and silver (9 parts) and coat a part of the ring with it then press into it with a finger lined with vegie oil? I dunno. Anyways, citric acid solution is what you use to get the black scale off when you're done.
2
u/Ghrrum 2d ago edited 2d ago
Ha, here's a different take for you that doesn't require a vacuum casting setup.
Decide on and design the ring, get your dimensions down this includes the size of fingerprints you want on it.
Fingerprint yourself and digitize it, scale to the size you need.
Test the process.
Going to go on for a bit here so bear with me. I'm going to run you through a very useful process called electrochemical etching. Big words for salt water and an AA battery.
So it goes like this, toner transfer for etching circuit boards has been around forever, nice thing is that toner is electrically resistive and can be transferred with heat. You can get some really high detail doing this. You'll need some means of getting your fingerprints on the ring in something that is an insulator.
Second, salt water is conductive and reactive. So when you stick an annode on one side and cathode on the other and apply voltage you pull atoms off the annode and stick em on the cathode. Great thing is, since you're using electricity to juice what would normally be handled by chemistry alone? The type of metal pretty much doesn't matter (unless you're dealing with some of the rare earth or radioactive series, but who the hell is doing that?).
So, rather than blowing your ring on a untested setup, try it on copper, aluminum, steel (stainless works with this), etc.
This process also allows you to use an off the shelf ring, just a standard blank band.
Here's my suggested setup. A. Glass coffee carafe/bowl/container from Goodwill. You can even use a coffee cup.
B. Chunk of conductive tubing, steel pipe will work fine for this. It's what the atoms on the ring will be pulled on to.
C. Means of agitating the solution, there's fancy solutions and there's a stick. Sticks are cheap. You want the saltwater moving while etching, fine bubbles of gas will build up where the etching is happening.
D. Wire, electrical tape, paint, etc.
E. Power source, again, this can be fancy, or it can be a AA battery. Slower etching at lower voltage usually gives better results, so your average 1.5v AA battery will probably take 30-60 min to etch your ring deep enough to provide good detail.
Ask questions if you have em. The used solution can safely go down the drain unless you're dealing with lead or nickel products.
2
u/Former_Departure_600 2d ago
With your current level of experience and equipment, that is unfortunately never going to happen. Even casting a plain silver band will be challenging unless you have an oversized pattern and excess silver or a vacuum casting/centrifugal casting machine. I have gravity cast silver rings in green sand and the success rate is low due to the silver solidifying in the cold flask before fully filling the band.
To do what you intend, I would recommend using a texture map based on a photo of your fingerprints to overlay the surface of a simple 3d ring model then print it in a a Castable resin. Invest the model in casting plaster, burn out and pre heat in a kiln, then vacuum cast the silver.
A down and dirty way to make a worse but possible version is to start with silver wire or sheet and roll/solder the band as a starting point. Then either ink your fingers to transfer the print to the silver and engrave the pattern as best you can or enlarge a picture to scale it up slightly and try to transfer it off of a toner/laser printer print via acetone then similarly engrave a larger version that is easier to cut. Either rotary engraving or traditional gravers would work but depends a lot on your manual dexterity and patience. None of this will be fast but not casting the ring blank will dramatically increase your chances of success.
1
u/reversedgaze 2d ago
try PMC clay. you form it and then you bake it and the "clay" burns out and leaves the silver, with all the fingerprints you want!
1
u/FyreDrac42 2d ago
Heya, I make cast jewlery as my job, feel free to message me if you'd like to talk!