I am considering to buy a rolling mill. One of my reasons is that I have a huge stash of sterling silver forks and spoons. I’d like to flatten the useful parts into sheets. Is that possible?
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Are you talking about sterling silver silverware or other kinds of metal silverware?
You don’t want to roll stainless steel silverware through a rolling mill. It will destroy your mill.
Personally, I wouldn’t run silver plated silverware through a rolling mill. It might be okay and not hurt the mill, but it also might destroy the mill if the base metal is a hard alloy.
Sterling silver silverware won’t hurt the mill.
Hope that helps!
Jeff
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Sorry! I read your post too fast. You say that you want to flatten sterling silver forks and spoons. That won’t hurt your rolling mill, just make sure that they are actually sterling silver, not silver plate or anything else.
Jeff
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Why don’t you buy a torch, crucible and ingot mold so that you can cast the sterling silver into ingots first. Then they can be rolled into much larger, more useful, sheets. Jeff is right, make sure that it is sterling and not stainless or plated on to a metal harder than the rolls…Rob
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If I wanted to do that, I would first lay the utensil on steel block and whack it as flat as I could with a rawhide mallet. My feeling is that the flatter it is before rolling the less work for you and the machine
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The shape and size of the piece when you are done rolling is limited by the size of the original piece before you roll. By being able to start with an ingot, you have a lot more control over the results. You also need to make sure that the original piece is clean and that there are no sharp edges to bury in the piece after you roll it…Rob
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Yes. My rolling mill was the first significant piece of equipment I bought, because I had inherited a lot of sterling flatware. Flattening as much as you can first does help, also frequent annealing.
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Before you destroy your sterling flatware… What company made it, and do you know the pattern? Replacements.com buys old sterling, refurbishes it and re sells it. Especially discontinued and rare patterns. There are plenty of people out there that would love to fill out their collections.
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I actually wound up with two sets, both Birks. The first was mostly sacrificed to work, though I sold some of the fancier pieces like a fabulous cake knife - at the time (6-7 years ago) things were a bit grim, I was using the food bank, among other things. I couldn’t afford to buy supplies and had to work with what I had. The second set came to me more recently, from my great grandmother, I have kept it and it’s my everyday flatware now.
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Just be careful some don’t even pay scrap value!
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You are correct. Flattening the silverware with a rawhide mallet and anvil or steel block surface before rolling it through a rolling mill will make it easier to roll. Good thinking!
Also Jo’s suggestion that the silverware is potentially more valuable as vintage silverware is something to research.
Good suggestions!!
Jeff
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I always ask someone who wants to scrap their sterling flatware if they have researched its value with a replacement shop first or just advertised it in some way. Others may be looking for the same pattern, especially if it isn’t engraved…Rob
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Most flatware is 800 Silver (if its got any amount of silver in it, it’ll be marked). I have worked with a fair share of coin (800) silver which I first turned into ingots and then rolled through my mill and eventually turned into reticulation sheet. I can see what you’re aiming for. If it’s 800 silver then go for it, I think the patterns will look cool. However, 800 silver is a lot harder to roll than sterling (due to higher copper content) so be prepared to get an arm work out unless you have gear reduction and even then small bites and anneal a lot to make it easier on you and the mill. Don’t forget to pickle between annealing and rolling and brass brush the surface before reannealing, otherwise you end up with reticulation silver.
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I believe most, if not all, American-made flatware is .925. European/British might be lower, not sure.
Good point! I’m Euro descent so more familar with the 800 silver. Worth checking the hallmarks.
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Pounding and flattening and annealing would work, but make sure that you aren’t destroying something that could have far greater value than the metal itself… solid sterling silver ware, especially antique is something that collectors prize. If you need the money, you might be better off selling the silverware and buying scrap cuttings from a precious metal dealer. Where I live, there are many native American artisans that do fabrication… I bought all of my sterling at a discount as they were cuttings and scrap… investing in an ingot mold was one of the best things that I did… it allowed me to cast scrap silver and make sheet and wire at a third off of the cost of buying premade sheet and wire at retail from a jewelry manufacturer that sold findings, wire and sheet…If you are going to make a lot of jewelry, an ingot mold and rolling mill are indispensable. Working in gold presents the same issues. Most coin gold is 90% gold and copper… it’s very close to 22 karat…91.66% gold versus 90% gold for coin…coin gold can be dropped to 18 or 14 karat by weighing it by atomic weight percent and adding silver for green and copper for yellow gold…the cheapest way to buy gold is to buy 1/5 ounce Austrian Philharmonic or Krugerands that don’t have much coin value. By adding other metals by atomic weight percent and melting and pouring into ingots, you’ll have all the gold that you would ever need.
sorry, the post was intended for Barbelschroeter…
please see my post at the end of the thread… I sent it to the wrong person…
Becareful of destroying antique sterling…the price of old solid sterling silverware could be a lot more than the metal content… in 1979 to 1980, the oil billionaires, the Hunt brothers, tried to corner the silver market… the price of silver shot up form $6.80 to over $38 an ounce and momentarily hit $50/oz… investors were also convinced that silver prices would continue to increase and there was a silver frenzy… the general public dumped thier heirloom silverware for melt down…no one really knows how much was melted down but some estimates are as high as 50 to 75% of all antique silver in the US… That also includes old silver coins… I would be cautious and check the collector’s value of what you have since the supply of old silverware has been depleted…
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