Copper bezel wire

I am starting to make jewelry again, and doing some experimenting
with copper. I would like to make bezels from copper-or buy them. I
have had no luck finding anyone selling copper bezel wire, or copper
bezel cups or even on how to make a bezel out of copper
sheet.

Can anyone help me with this???

thanks!
barbe

I would like to make bezels from copper-or buy them.

For a piece that was a play on a peacekeeper service medal I earned
as an rifleman in Croatia ('93) I went with brass and tube set three
small stones (2-3mm). It all went quite dismal, the thing being that
copper and brass get terribly soft when annealed. I had to solder the
tubes onto a sheet, hence it was annealed, once I started setting the
stones the tubing started to loose it shape, wouldn’t close since the
metal couldn’t support the force being delivered (needed for
compressing metal over a stone. If you think that age hardening the
copper in a convection will get around this, and want to give it a
try then you simply do it as you would with silver then hardened the
piece, then set the stone. Another option, especiallygood for costume
pieces would be faux (false) settings are stones pretty much just
glued doen to a surface that looks like a bezel setting, but really
is only a seat. Depends on you audience I suppose.

Kindest,
K. David Woolley
david.woolley@unb.ca

If you have access to a rolling mill, roll some wire down to the
proper size. If not, planishing might work.

marilyn

Hi Barbe,

Consider cutting some 28 or 30 ga copper sheet into 1/8" or wider
strips on a guillotine shear. 6 inches of copper sheet can go around
a stone just under 2" diam. Sheets start out at 6x36", we cut at 6"
by whatever, and can produce the strips at preferred bezel width by
up to 12" long on our 12" shears.

Have a rolling mill? “Squish” some copper wire down into a strip.
Start with a very straight piece (you may need to roll the wire
between two pieces of clean soft wood).

Zigzagged “teeth” can be put on the bezel’s upper edge with a
checkering file. Good luck, Rockabilly Gal!

You may have been trying to set too big of aa stone into a thin
walled bezel that was too high. The whole piece could also have been
tumbled with steel shot before setting the stones.

marilyn

It all went quite dismal, the thing being that copper and brass get
terribly soft when annealed. 

If I need to work harden a peice during fabrication I will put it
into my vibratory tumbler with steel shot for an hour.

Mark