Hi Jen,
I’m NO expert by any means and I’m still going through my own steep
“polishing” learning curve - but I can offer up what I’ve found in
my own work.
I do ALL my “polishing” with my flexshaft and am starting to be much
happier with the results I’m getting. I’ve been making for about
eighteen months and also wearing my creations for that length of
time. This has shown up the fact that my finishing techniques were
sadly lacking. Pieces have become very dull, scratched in appearance
and tarnished in a very short period of time. I have put this down
to three reasons:
-
not work hardening the piece enough so that the piece quickly
shows scratches and appears dull
-
not preparing the surface properly prior to “polishing”
-
not “polishing” the piece sufficiently
In working on these three things, other problems have shown
themselves and have had to be worked on. For instance, I bought a
tumbler and after preparing pieces with a rubber wheel, I put them
through the tumbler. When they came out, it showed that my technique
with the rubber wheel in the flexshaft was not good. There were
hills and valleys in surfaces I had thought were sufficiently flat. I
HAD been going over the surface much as a child might colour in a
picture - back and forth. To eliminate this, I NOW use the rubber
wheel in circular motions and no longer suffer the hills and valleys
surface.
So to address point number one, I use my tumbler to work harden my
pieces so that any shine I then apply to them will hopefully remain
for a much longer period of time. I’m now very careful to prepare
pieces in such a way that they will come out with an even surface
rather than hills, valleys or orange peel.
Addressing point number two, I thought that I was filing and sanding
sufficiently - until I noticed that in performing the later
finishing stages, insufficient preparation was being exposed in the
form of unfiled scratches! This of course meant that I was then
having to go back several steps to eliminate those scratches, filing
with successively finer grades of file and then sandpaper, until the
scratches (which I had thought were gone) were indeed finally gone.
To save myself the wasted time, I now loupe surfaces constantly
before moving on to the next stage.
In addressing a completely different concern - that of firestain - a
dear friend (and Orchid member) suggested to me that I was not
polishing sufficiently for firestain to even show itself. I was
adamant that I was not getting this dreaded thing called firestain
and didn’t even know what it looked like. He deliberately created
some and photographed it then emailed it to me. “Oh no” says I, “I’m
definitely NOT getting any of that”. He warned me that when I
developed my polishing methods to a high enough standard, the
firestain would show itself. Guess what? Yep, you guessed it - he was
completely right. As my polishing became better, the dreaded patches
started to appear! This prompted me to start using Pripps, on the
advice of a number of people on Orchid. But that’s another story. The
whole point to this paragraph is that it showed that my “polishing”
had NOT been up to scratch (excuse the pun) and needed more work.
In addressing the third point, that of polishing, my latest
enlightenment happened whilst polishing a piece I made prior to
using Pripps flux. I thought that I had got rid of any remaining
patches of firestain. I had done the filing, sanding, rubber wheeling
(grey/ green and then pink) with flexshaft, tumbling to work harden,
Dialux yellow with bristle brush and flexshaft and finally Fabulustre
with bristle brush and flexshaft. However, those pesky bristle
brushes always seem to leave minute scratches of their own, which you
can always see in one direction when the light hits them, and this
was annoying me to the max! So I decided that I needed a further
step. I mounted a cotton mop in my flexshaft and broke out my block
of rouge. Fantastic!!! Finally, those bristle brush scratches were
disappearing, leaving a beautiful mirror shine! But guess what else
appeared? Yep, patches of firestain!!! Grrr! It took some serious
buffing to get rid of them once and for all but I did it in the end.
But it just went to prove my friend right - until the work was
polished properly, the firestain wouldn’t necessarily reveal itself.
It’s no longer a problem anyway, thanks to Pripps, but I now work a
lot harder getting a better polish than I ever used to.
So in summary, I file (progressively finer), sand (progressively
finer), rubber wheel in flexshaft (coarse then fine) using CIRCULAR
movements to help maintain flat areas, tumble with stainless steel
shot and burnishing compound, Dialux yellow/bristle brush in
flexshaft, Fabulustre/bristle brush in flexshaft, then finally
rouge/ cotton mop in flexshaft. If setting stones, I do that after
the tumbling stage, before final polishing with Dialux, Fabulustre
and Rouge. I also do the polishing steps using circular movements to
maintain an even surface.
Loupe, loup, loupe in between each stage to make sure it’s done
properly before moving onto the next stage. Something else I now do
is plan what finishing stages needed to be completed before
soldering certain elements together - to avoid having tricky areas
which are difficult to polish later. I will prepare and pre-finish
elements and tumble them before soldering them together, if they are
going to prove difficult later. Then when polishing, the lightest
flick with the bristles of the polishing brushes in the flexshaft
restores their shine. One pesky problem which irritates me with the
flexshaft, is that you’ll be getting to the stage of a beautifully
polished piece and you can slip, scratching the piece with the
shank/mandrel/shaft of whatever bit you’re using, or even the
handpiece itself. I frequently end up putting dinges into my work
this way, and then have to go back and repeat certain steps to remove
those scratches - very irritating indeed - but with care it happens
less often.
Sorry for such a long reply. Hope it helps.
Helen
UK
http://www.hillsgems.co.uk
http://helensgems.ganoksin.com/blogs/
