 |
| My students and I grabbing the closest tool and hamming it up for the camera. |
Rings class at The Workspace was very successful!
The goal of the rings class is to learn how to do three things and learn to do them well enough that a student feels confident to continue learning and creating on their own. Sawing, filing and soldering. See my earlier post regarding sawing. This post will discuss filing.Filing is very important and it can be a crucial step that helps to create a beautiful piece of art. It is important to understand files, what they are made of and how using them properly will help in achieving a professional finish with your pieces.
Files, specifically jewelers files (also called needle files), are made of steel and like sandpaper, have a range of textures from coarse to fine. It is nice to have some coarse (00 or "rough") and some fine (all the way up to 8 or "super smooth") files. Files quickly clean up burs and rough edges and straighten a crooked cut. They also come in different shapes so you can file in small tight spaces and round spaces and square spaces... So think about your end goal and choose the appropriate file for the job. I like files that have a smooth side so while filing in a tight space you have less chance of scratching an area with the back side of the file. Because sometimes you only need to file a certain area and the surrounding area may already have a nice finish.
It is usually taught that you must use a file in only one direction. Some files only cut in one direction. Also, cutting in one direction will help your file to last longer. To file your piece, stroke the file along the edge that needs smoothing, firmly; then pick up the file and return to the start and cut again. Do not rub the file back and forth on your piece.
 |
| Files: A rough, round file. A flat cross-cut file (teeth going two directions). A flat file that has teeth all the way around and is a bit thicker. A file showing a smooth back side to protect the rest of your work. A flat file that only has teeth on the edges. A fine cut file that is also a cross-cut file. |
Above is a photo of just a few of the files I have. I have not spent a lot of money on the rougher files, but as I slowly increase the size of my jewelers bench I will add higher quality fine cut files. The file on the far right is only a #2 but still is a fairly smooth file. With a nice smooth file I can quickly file the end of an ear wire about as fast as I can run a cup bur over it with my Foredom drill. Note: all of my ear wires get tumbled with stainless steel shot to burnish the ends for an extra smooth finish that is comfortable to put in your ear and it also work hardens the wire and makes them stronger.
 |
| Not a great picture but this person is filing a piece of silver with a needle file and resting on the bench is a large flat file. Flat files are usually sold without a handle and you can have a wooden or plastic handle that you can use with your flat file. I am not sure why they are sold this way. But I do not have a handle on my flat files. I leave them on my bench, flat, and rub my metal on the file as it lays there because I am usually using the flat file to smooth the edge of my metal that I had just completed sawing and I am attempting to get a straight, smooth, sometimes 90 degree edge. |
Filing is not the end of the process when finishing jewelry. Jewelry needs to be comfortable and you don't want it to get caught in hair or snag clothing. After filing, you move to sandpaper. Just like in filing you start with rougher sandpaper and move to finer grit sandpaper. THEN after that you can begin polishing with polishing compound and a buffer wheel or special polishing wheels made specifically for the Foredom or Dremel drills. Tumbling is also a great option for polishing/burnishing metal.
 |
| Filing a copper ring. Note the pack of jewelers files resting on the bench. You can usually get a set of files fairly inexpensively. They will come in a few different shapes. Note the injury to the hand in the photo did not occur during class :) |
So much fun stuff to learn, so many fun tools.
Sign up for my metals classes so you can learn more!!
http://www.sac.iastate.edu/index.cfm?nodeID=20175&audienceID=1&action=detail&eventid=27308
More pics from Rings Class
 |
| Hammering texture to copper |
 |
| Cutting out a circle to add to a ring as a decorative element. |
No comments:
Post a Comment