Does anyone know offhand what the approximate sterling content of
Bali silver is? I know it’s not .925. I once had some sent to a
refiner as a little “test” run and it came back at about 78%. I’m
just curious. I think the public sometimes gets confused and assumes
Bali is .925 or sterling. I sometimes have customers that don’t
understand why sterling silver is actually more expensive than Bali.
Any info would be much appreciated.
Thanks!
Catherine,
Sterling is an alloy of 925 parts of silver and 75 parts, usually of
copper. The silver you find in Bali may be an alloy with a lower
percentage of silver, but that doesn’t account for the price
difference. The main difference in the price of goods produced in
Bali and the price of goods produced in the US is the cost of labor.
Steven Brixner
I don’t know the silver content of silver from Bali but “Sterling”,
by definition, is 925, 92.5% pure silver and 7.5% copper.
Joel Schwalb
@Joel_Schwalb
www.schwalbstudio.com
about 6 years ago the studio I worked for were buying Bali chain
direct from there, and found out that the content of silver was at
about 400 to 600 parts silver, customers kept complaining that the
material was going pink and brown in a very short time ,we were even
getting it pink out of the pickle or the ultrasonic some times,
that’s why we checked in the first place. And had to make
adjustments to have them alloy the 925 exact for us. if you pay
attention to the fact that 90% of that material is not stamped the
quality stamp / tagged when importing.
Atelier Babikian
P.O.box 54147
Philadelphia , PA.19105
215.465.9351
www.Hratchbabikian.com