Mixing Palladium with Silver

Jewelry Discussion
1

Greetings fellow Orchidians,

I’ve been reading the posts about Argentium and the S88 Alloy and I
see that there is a lot of interest in finding a silver alloy that is
tarnish free. It is obvious after all isn’t it? Who wouldn’t want a
solution to a problem that has plagued us
artisans/craftspeople/jewelsmiths (to avoid getting into “the
definition of a jeweller” - I like the term jewelsmith myself) for
centuries.

I recently had to fabricate a piece in white gold for a client.
Until that moment my experience with the white gold alloys was
dreadfull. Because of the nickel content in the alloys, the gold
became so damned hard and brittle it always cracked when I passed it
through the rolling mill. Furthermore the “white” gold wasn’t
actually white in colour but had a distinct yellowish tinge,
requiring me to rhodium plate it.

“So why not find another alloy” I said to myself and got my hands on
a few grams of palladium. I mixed it in with the gold and lo and
behold everything worked out great! The metal was white (I mean
REALLY white) it had the normal hardness of 18k yellow gold - maybe a
tad harder but still very easy to work with (no cracks through the
rolling mill). No rhodium plating required and it’s tarnish free.
Even when soldering, the metal produced almost no oxidation though
the temperature required to solder and melt the alloy was much
higher. “A gift from Mother Nature” I said to myself.

So my question is this. Has anyone tried mixing palladium with
silver?

I read in the archives that Hans Meevis (BTW - great site Hans and
very beautifull work) had mixed palladium with silver (10-90% ratio)
and said that it worked like sterling and was very tarnish resistant.
The article was posted about a year ago. Anything new since then?

-Has anyone else tried mixing palladium with silver?
-What was the ratio?
-How are the working qualities?
-Is the metal tarnish-free?
-Are you satisfied with the results?

The only downside I see for this combination is the high cost of
palladium when compared with all the other silver alloys. If you used
this palladium-silver alloy, would you use it for handmade pieces,
production run pieces, both???

Anyway take care all of you and keep on creating…

Lee Lyssimachou
Lee Feenix Art Workshop

2

hello Lee

I had looked for such an alloy as you made,and about 10 years a
Friend of mine showed me a piece 6x6 and some wire /rod of this
material silver and palladium that she had picked up from Germany.I
did some searching and I found a German company that makes this
material for the dental industry and they also have a jewelry
department, they are pretty big and the Name starts with H but can’t
the rest of the info,they have a web site. I think the only
prohibitive aspect other then the cost of the material was the
shipping costs to different parts of the world other then
Germany,but that might have gotten better now. sorry can;t find the
company name but a little search will find them in cyber space.I
know that my friend use to swear by the silver/pall metal,stayed
springy and very malleable at the same time.no oxidation. I think
here (USA)the platinum silver alloys (ABS) are fairly similar to what
you were looking for.but cost probably is somewhere in the
stratosphere at this point,with price of platinum going where it
has.

ciao
Hratch Babikian
www.Hratchbabikian.com

3

Dear Lee,

ABI Precious Metals in Carson CA. are producing both platinum and
palladium sterling silvers.

I wrote an article on the Platinum/Sterling for our September issue
and the stuff was wonderful to work with.

I haven’t worked with the palladium/sterling yet. They are more
expensive than traditional sterling but far less expensive than gold.

Nanz Aalund
Associate Editor / Art Jewelry magazine
21027 Crossroads Circle / Waukesha WI 53187-1612
262.796.8776 ext.228

4 
I had looked for such an alloy as you made,and about 10 years a
Friend of mine showed me a piece 6x6 and some wire /rod of this
material silver and palladium that she had picked up from Germany

Maybe C. Hafner?
http://www.c-hafner.de

Cheers
Matthias