Wax wedding bands

Jewelry Discussion
21

Have been sitting in background for some time with this making a
band to fit next to an engagement ring. Long Long ago in the
land of learning this trade from some old timers, ( nitric acid
in a jar with thin rolled scrap cut small to refine the gold. All
done on the roof tops so it would not eat you and the venting
system up. It will give you three 9’s if pressed for time…)
back to the band, we used a two part mixture that dentist us for
making bridges, acrylic stuff, some is clear and some is pink,
also it is used at your friendly neighborhood beauticians to make
fake finger nails. I think the name is: Monomer L2000 and NP 400
Powder. So what you do is clean ring, spray mold release on
mandrel, slide ring up on mandrel tight, In some cases you may
have had to put some pink sprue wax in the bridge work, or air
lines of some styles to stop the acrylic from flowing into a
space that would not let the two separate. Then use a strip of
clay from a toy store, not play dough, just like when you were a
kid put some in your hand a roll it on the table into a thick
worm or snake use the clay and make a dam around the
mandrel,
about 1/8 to 1/4 inch wider than the band is going to be, so
looking at the mandrel you would have a clay dam wrapped
around
the mandrel, a space, which you are going to fill with acrylic,
then the engagement ring. OK ! So the next thing you do is Mix
the two part acrylic stuff, and you have to be fast because it
sets up quick, have a friend or use a mandrel holder so you can
turn the mandrel as you pour acrylic in the space between the
ring and the clay dam, fill it up keep turning and bingo it sets
up hard… Let set for about 30 min. or so. Pull clay off, Save
for next time, slip ring off and separate acrylic from ring. Then
you just start to finish it as you would a poorly cast ring with
flashing and mold marks, it works like soft metal, use a file and
you can use sand paper and if I remember rubber wheels and the
polishing machine. You can also put it in the boil out and use
the steam to clean it. When finished you may have to use some hot
wax for surface as it may have a pit or two but no big deal. It
sounds hard but it isn’t and it opens the door for some other
possibilities as you let you artistic minds roll. In fact it is
kind of fun to do. I like the smell of it, as I am just an old
hippy. This time of year it gets you up from the bench to get a
break and do some moving around… Learned this one, lets see
back in the 80’s from Bob and he got it from the late 40’s early
50’s…

Hope you can understand this as I have written it but if not let
know and we will try a new approach.

JB…

22

Peter, using your divider in such a manner this is a useful
trick. I learned it working with a cabinet maker, he used it to
fit cabinets to irregular surfaces (floors, walls, etc.). Its
funny how you can apply so many of your skills to other crafts
and interests.

Mark P.
WI

23

Hello group I for one would like to hear more about the nitric
acid trick. What concentration? What are the thin rolled strips
made of? What does the gold settle/stick to. I assume it has
toxic fumes? How long ? etc. Regards Joe

24

It’s hardly a rare trick. This is the simple process called
inquartation, and it’s a common method of basic refining where
high purity isn’t required. In essence, gold and the platinum
group metals won’t dissolve in nitric, while silver, copper,
nickel, zinc, and the various other metals normally alloyed with
the gold we use, do dissolve in nitric. So you melt your gold
down along with enough copper or silver to be sure the gold is
nor more than 25% or so of the total metal present (6K). then
roll the result out to either wire or sheet as thin as you
possibly can, to increase the surface area and therefor decrease
the time required to dissolve. this is then coiled up and put in
a beaker of nitric. Usually somewhere between 30 to 50% nitric
in water. Concentrated isn’t needed, and in fact, is a tad LESS
active than a 50:50 or more dilution with water. Be sure that
the beaker is big enough to allow a good deal of vigorous boiling
without boiling over. The reaction generates heat, and the
solution can boil up quite a bit sometimes. Also, it will
usually emit noxious brown nitrous oxide (? not quite sure i’ve
remember that right, but it’s the basic idea) fumes. These, you
do NOT want to breath, and they’ll rust anything around as well,
so this must be done outside or within a proper fume hood. The
latter, equipped with proper scrubbers, is the preferred method,
since there’s no real good reason to be donating those fumes to
the atmosphere either, even if you are not personally breathing
them. As the base metals dissolve, the crystals of gold are
released and fall to the bottom of the beaker, forming a coarse
sludge. When no more chuncks remain of the coil, the result is
carefully washed, and then washed again if a little fresh nitric,
just to be sure the reaction was complete. If you are certain no
platinum group metals or tin/lead types of solders were in the
scrap, the result can be used as pure gold, when all scrap was
from jewelry alloys. There are a few metals/impurities that can
cause problems for this method, but they are not common.

Inquartation is often used as a preliminary step before the
standard dissolution in aqua regia/precipitation with ferrous
sulphate or hydrogen sulfide technique of refining is used, since
it greatly reduces the amount of non gold to be dissolved in the
AR, and increases purity of the result, especially by removing
silver, which can cause problems in AR. The dissolution of gold
in aqua regia, by the way, can generate higher purity than can
inquartation, since once the gold is in solution, you can quite
selectively precipitate out only the gold, or only the platinum
group metals,

If your scrap had any significant amounts of silver, you can
easily recover this from the solution after removing the gold
sludge and filtering the solution to be completely free of
particulates, by simply adding table salt (better, a solution
thereof). The silver instantly precipitates out as silver
chloride, which you either sell to a refiner as is, or reduce
back to silver by any of several means which I won’t bother to go
into, 'cause I don’t usually consider it worth the trouble given
the low cost of silver. (I let the refiners deal with the silver
chloride I generate) Frankly, these day’s, I generally let the
refiners deal with the whole lot of scrap, as fooling with the
refining, while it may increase my yeild a tad over sending it
in, often doesn’t turn out to be a cost effective use of my time.
But back when I fooled with it, more as an educational excersize
as anything, it was interesting to do. If nothing else, doing a
little refining of your own is one good way to better understand
some of the chemical properties of the metals we use.

But if you DO play with these techniqes, keep in mind as well
that this is not a simple kitchen procedure without hazards. The
nitric is dangerous, and you face some risks in your wallet as
well. A boil over, or broken beaker, can send a whole lot of
cash onto the ground real fast. And like I said, you do NOT
want to be breathing the fumes generated.

Hope this helps.

Peter Rowe

25

That was very well explained, Great Job!..The only thing that
I would add is that when the chemical reaction of the nitric and
the rolled thin metal slows or even stops you can add a little
heat ( hot plate) to get more mileage out of your nitric.