Nancy, nothing like setting yourself a challenge! “the stone is
freeform, you have no flat surface on the stone to work with, and
would like not to have a sheet silver back” Hopefully, it is not a
very small stone as well! I too am a rank amateur compared to most of
the great people who post on Orchid, I too love freeform. well, let’s
call them character stones, so I’ll chip in with my two cents worth.
Without seeing the stone, it’s hard to be really helpful - but I’ll
try.
Step one is to work out the diameter so you can make a bezel that
will fit tight. Stick the stone to a bit of plasticine to hold it
steady. Wrap a strip of paper round it and mark the overlap. This is
the length of bezel you need. Make it a tad - say.1 or.2mm small, it
will stretch if necessary. Thickness say.5 or.6mm (sorry, not sure
about American gauge measurements!)
Now the depth - the bezel needs to be tall enough to bend around
both edges and hold firm. Err on the too high side, you can remove a
little metal here and there to conform to the stone’s curves later
on. Now solder the bezel and clean up the inside of the solder seam.
Fit it around the stone, with the solder seam furthest from where
you will attach your bail. Mould it to the edges with, say, the
wooden handle of a burnisher. Check the height. If the stone is very
uneven, you may need to remove a bit of metal here and there - mark
these points very carefully with a fine tipped black marker pen.
Slide the bezel off very carefully, file off the excess material and
check. If you’re happy, solder on the jump ring to which you will
attach your bail (Remember the bezel solder seam is at the bottom).
Try not to bend it out of shape. If it’s all stretched and has become
loose, you have to saw through the solder seam, trim and solder
again.
Now, slide the bezel back onto the stone and begin the trickiest bit
of all - folding the bezel over without it slipping off or going
crooked in the wrong places! Somehow, you have to work out a way to
keep the whole contraption steady whilst you push the bezel over the
edges. first the top, (awkward, with the jump ring in place, but you
have no other option with the type of bezel setting you’ve chosen)
then the bottom, then at the equivalent of 3 and 9 o’clock, all on
the one side. Don’t attempt to close the bezel all the way around, at
this stage the objective is only to begin holding the stone in place.
Check the alignment and repeat on the other side. Use the convex side
of a curved burnisher or a bezel pusher if you have one - and be
fairly gentle so you don’t put nasty deep dents that will have to be
filed and sanded out later into the outside wall of the bezel.
Once you have the 8 ‘holding’ bits bent over, repeat the process -
either side of the top, then of the bottom, then the sides. If all is
looking good and the stone is holding firm, you can now begin rubbing
the bezel over completely. Hopefully, you will finish up with a
bezel, perhaps wider in some places than others, that follows the
freeform contours of the stone and still holds it in place firmly. At
worst. you have a mangled bit of fine silver with a sterling jump
ring attached that can go into your ever growing stash of stuff to be
melted down one day - and some valuable experience about things that
work and things that don’t!
I agree with others’ comments on the bezel of your turquoise in the
image you posted - the bezel looks a little high, obscuring more of
the stone than necessary and making it hard to fold the last bit of
bezel right over so there are no gaps. I was taught to drill a hole
in the back of my first bezels so I could push the stone out and file
the bezel lower it my original measurements weren’t quite right! I
was also shown that if you carefully cover the stone with masking
tape which you trim right to the edge of the bezel with a scalpel,
you can use a fine - #6 cut barrette (safe edge) file and then 600
grit sandpaper to neaten up the edges. The final touch is that lovely
trick of gently angling a point burnisher over the stone and running
it around the inside edge of the bezel.
Hope this has helped, I have followed this post with great interest
and learned a great deal.
By the way. it just occurred to me that one way around this problem
might be to cast a mould of the bezel? Any comments, anyone?
Jane Walker