[orchid] Soldering and Sea Glass

Hi Pam,

Maybe you might try measuring around the “waist” of the glass with
silver bezel, then soldering two rings – one ring in line laying
flat with the strip to each end of the strip. (This would look
like 00 ) Then take two other rings (soldered to each other
as if they were two rings on the same finger) and solder
perpendicular to the strip in the center of the strip. (This would
look sort of like 0—II—0 )

Now when you wrap the “belt” around the “waist”, you can conform the
bezel so that you have the thickness of two rings on each side –
one side is open so that you can slide the glass into and out of the
bezel – and the open side becomes your cold-connection.

If for some reason once you attach jump rings to it, it doesn’t want
to stay “closed” enough, you can attach a tiny ring very tightly
around the doubled ring to keep it closed (but if you do it to the
open side, you might want to add the same element to the soldered
side to balance the aesthetic). The tiny tight ring is not the same
ring as the attaching jump ring, which is not the same as the
soldered rings.

I’m sorry if this might be hard to follow; just think of those
"spotting" belts that they put on trapeze artists – leather belt,
with rings on either side of the waist (under where their arms would
hang straight down).

If this doesn’t sound like a good solution to you, you might want to
investigate more cold-connections anyway, rather than risk harming
the glass. (My guess is the glass has sentimental value.)

Good Luck in your solution!

–Terri