G’day; I have recently completed a 40 cm necklace chain in
0.9mm sterling silver round wire, which was admired to the extent
that I have been asked to repeat the chain exactly in 0.9mm round
14carat gold wire for a Golden Wedding present for my wife’s
sister. The sterling chain weighs exactly 11.5 grams, and the
problem is, what weight of 14carat gold 9mm round wire should I
order to be able to make the new chain? I never could do sums,
and don’t have a whole lot of money to over-order gold - I don’t
work in gold very often for that very good reason. Help and
suggestions please? Cheers.
P.S I have produced a VERY simple but (I think) adequate
recognition badge for members to download and print on whatever
medium they wish. I sent it to Dr Aspler for his comments last
night. I used a picture of an orchid from a web site with
permission of the owner. I also asked Dr Aspler to suggest a
place where it could be displayed. More cheers, –
Dear John, The weight of a comparable chain made in 14K yellow
gold would be: 15.08 grams
But you would have to buy a little more since there may be some
links to discard. However the calculation is simple enough, and I
think you would be able to do such calculations if a similar
situation should arise. So here is the formula to use.
weight of silver chain x specific gravity of14KYgold Weight of
Gold Chain =
specific gravity of sterling silver
11.5grams x13.65 (SP Grav of 14KY Au) Wht of 14kY gold chain =
Hi John. I believe the way to solve this problem is 11.5g. X
1.257 ( 14.k yellow gold is 1.257 times heavier than silver -
Oppi Untracht - Jewelry ) = 14.45 g. + allowance for saw kerf is
( the number of chain links times the width of the sawblade used
to cut them e.g. - 400 links times 0.0135 for a # 2 blade = 5.4"
of 0.9 mm round wire plus say 3 " of extra wire to hold on to
the ends of while forming. Now this all works out to 14.45 g. of
0.9 mm wire = 22.5 dwts. + ( 1.67 Dwts/ ft X app 0.75 % of 1
ft. = 1.3 Dwts for a grand total of ( 22.5 + 1.3 = 23.8 Dwts .
That is if you used 400 links of chain and you cut with a # 2
sawblade. Now to be back in the real world , I think you need
app. 25 Dwts of 14 K. gold wire app # 19 gauge ( 0.09mm) I don’t
know if this is exactly correct , but I am impressed by my logic
. Tex-eclectic - Robert L.Powell
P.S. I do hope that this is correct and of help because like
You I am limited in the money I can spend on material, and I do very much
enjoy your comments.
Enter the diameter and weight of your silver. Highlight Sterling
and Round Wire and then click on the Calculate length based on
weight button. I got a length of 1738.159 mm.
Change the metal selection to 14K and click on the Calculate
weight based on length button. I got 14.209 grams. Of course
this doesn’t include any waste, but you already knew that.
When this nice tool first showed up, I made a couple of checks
against other tables and it seemed to correspond pretty well to
other tables. I’m not sure why the numbers differ a little from
the other responses.
Hi John. I believe the way to solve this problem is 11.5g. X
1.257 ( 14.k yellow gold is 1.257 times heavier than silver -
Oppi Untracht - Jewelry ) = 14.45 g. + allowance for saw kerf
is ( the number of chain links times the width of the sawblade
used to cut them e.g. - 400 links times 0.0135 for a # 2 blade =
5.4" of 0.9 mm round wire plus say 3 " of extra wire to hold
on to the ends of while forming. Now this all works out to 14.45
g. of 0.9 mm wire = 22.5 dwts. + ( 1.67 Dwts/ ft X app 0.75 %
of 1 ft. = 1.3 Dwts for a grand total of ( 22.5 + 1.3 = 23.8
Dwts .
I don’t think that 14.5 gm of wire is 22 dwt. Twenty-two dwt.
is more than 33gm. Fourteen and a half gms. is almost 9.4+
dwts.
Skip Meister @Skip_Meister
N.R.A. Endowment &
Certified Instructor
in all disciplines
Certified Illinois D.N.R.
Hunter Ed, Instructor
weight of gold chain is equal to the weight of the silver chain
times the specific gravity of 14KY gold divided by the specific
gravity of sterling silver.
Every jewelry text book and many supply catalogs have a list of
specific gravity values for the metals we use.
SpGr 14KY =13.65
SpGr S.S. = 10.41
Hope this helps and is clearer than the first post I made which
did not print correctly
G’day; Thank you for your note. Actually I finally used the
MetalCalc on the Orchid Webpage which someone told me about. It
is really simple and efficient to use. However, I have a feeling
that my wife’s sister won’t be getting a chain from us made in 14
carat gold wiRe: I checked the cost of the wire required using
MetalCalc and discovered we simply couldn’t afford it, though 9
carat gold is a possibility. But my wife isn’t too keen on
sending low carat gold as a Golden Wedding present. She says
she’ll have to think about it, and may ask her two other sisters
to come in with her. That has been done befoRe: they all
clubbed together and bought us a British Proof Sovereign when we
had our golden Wedding a few years ago. That worked out at well
over $200 NZ! She jokingly had suggested that they send her “one
of your gold coins”, meaning their one pound coin in a golden
coloured alloy. Oh Well! in 1945, when I left the Royal Navy to
become a civilian, I was getting a wage of 5 British pounds a
week, and remember, a Sovereign was once a british pound. When
our NZ currency became metric, one pound British was equal to 2
dollars NZ! Anyway, thanks again for your input, and cheers, –