Hi all,
This thing started off many years ago. I inserted round copper wire
into round 18kt. tubing that I had made in the traditional
goldsmithing sense, and then drew or rolled both metals down in a
drawplate to the dimensions that I needed. Normally this was in a
square drawplate. But sometimes other shapes were called for. For
the purpose of this missive, let us remain with the square shape.
This composite wire is easy to bend into intricate shapes. Because
the copper was inside the gold surround, it held the outside shape
true and loops, twirls and all manner of shapes were possible. After
I had bent the wire into the shape that I wanted, I would file the
top off. This left the copper exposed, with side and bottom "walls"
of gold.
This can be seen at http://www.meevis.com/new104b.htm
in a simple design where the copper was not etched out. After that
I would etch the copper out with nitric acid. It would take a couple
of hours and leave me with a basic “U” channel of gold if I was
using square tubing. There are advantages that are achieved with
this slightly labor intensive method. Namely: Wall thickness can be
determined before hand. Sharp curves can be bent without and
collapsing or deformation of what is essentially square tubing.
(or, for that matter, any shaped tubing). This allows exact
measurements of inlays, channel set stones, enamel and organic
materials and for them to be inserted more easily. This was the
prime reason for me developing this technique. Much more precision.
Okay, okay, so I am leading up to a point. So, it dawned on yours
truly, early one fine blue sky morning that the center wire which
was always copper, and need not necessarily be copper. It could be
any metal. And after I had realized that the center metal need not
be etch-able and it could be any metal of my choosing, including my
most favorite metal, titanium, I did just that… "Light Bulb"
time---- If you made different sizes of tubing in different types
of metals and inserted them in to each other, then drew them
through a draw plate collectively you would get a composite layered
wire type of thing. Then if you filed them in an appropriate
manner?
So, — with that idea in mind, go look at:
http://www.meevis.com/Tips5.htm
This is stuff that I am sure has been done many times down through
the ages. I hold no pretensions of the newness to it. But I would
love to see others take it further.
Hans Meevis
http://www.meevis.com