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Rudolph,
Once you have the fine silver skin, you can only use a glass brush and lightly brush the surface of the white skin off. The fine silver that comes up on the Sterling Silver is thin and delicate - You cannot polish it to a high shine, you must treat it very carefully. You will have enough shine through the transparents enamels.
Thank you Trish
Is better to use flux first or direct the colour?
The white skin is actually the fine silver on the surface - using a glass brush gently burnishes it to shine. You don't have to use flux on fine silver but you do on Sterling Silver.
Coming in late, but this may help!
I enamel on sterling castings which are done professionally (cast under inert gas - avoids any porosity in the casting and reduces firescale). I do not need to raise any fine silver surface - I just brush the casting with a fine brass brush and carry on from there. I have changed from a glass brush to a brass brush as the fine glass elements break off, and hurt if they get stuck in your skin. You MUST use some soap (washing up liquid) or your silver gets a brass plated surface.
And with respect, Trish, I don't use flux first, I just go straight to colours. I use leaded transparents of several makes.
Why not casting direct in fine-silver. Many people think, fine-silver is too soft. But if you counter-enamel the piece, there is no stability-difference between fine- and sterling-silver. Since many, many years all my jewelery up to 4x4 cm is onto 0,7 mm fine-silver sheet produced. I had never a reclamation, that the enamel flake off, or that a jewelery piece break.
Edmund
Thank you Edmund and Tamizan
I will try the brass brush.Looks like good idea.Edmund I use also 0,7mm fine silver sheet for most of my work(lunica,kolovrat earrings) all is counter enameled and everything is OK.But sometimes I want the silver on the back of the piece and not counter enamel.I found one professional casting company and now i will try to cooperate and make some new designs:)
R.
If you have prepared the Sterling-silver by annealing and pickling several times, the surface look matt white. You can polish this surface with a polishing-steel, a polishing-agate or a polishing-blood-stone. You get a very shiny surface. And this methode has an other advantage. By polishing the fine-silver-surface, the surface become compacted.
The picture shows left the unpolished, right the polished silver-surface.
Edmund
Thank you Edmund,this looks very good.
Wow! That looks great! Does that shine hold up when you heat it? Does it stay that bright under the enamel? I need a polishing blood-stone, I just like the idea.
Lillian
Polished silver pieces lose mostly a bit of his gloss if you anneal it. Under enamel the gloss remains sufficient. Nearly always at first I fire a thin layer of a very clear silver flux onto a polished surface. . After firing this layer, I roughen up the layer cautiously with a diamond milling tool. Then I glue on the wires, sieving on a very very thin shift silver-flux and firing again. The wires are fixed very well. Not till then I fill the cells with colored enamels.
Edmund
Hi Edmund,
Do you use the polishing agate/stone/steel dry, or lubricated with soapy water? or?
thanks!
Cynthia Eid
Hy Cinthia,
It is always better, if you a polishing tool lubricate. Many goldsmiths use spittle.
But you can also a bit water or soap-water use. If you a grease-containing lubricant use, you must after polishing degrease the work-piece.
Edmund
Rudolf, I use yet another method if I want to enamel sterling silver: I start with once heating and pickling the piece, then I apply a layer of Art Clay 650 slip and fire either with a torch (small/ single pieces) or in the kiln (larger and more pieces). Afterwards you can polish the piece with a brush (glass or brass) or tumble the piece. You can control the thickness of the slip layer very well. You can even structure the surface a bit. It is important to heat the piece once and pickle it, otherwise the slip will not bond. I used this for keum boo for some time and I find it for both enameling and keum boo less time consuming than rising a sufficient layer of fine silver.
Gisela
Hallo Gisela,
that is a really new and I think very interesting idea. It is a pity, that I, because of my age, cannot enamelling longer. Otherwise I would try this method immediately.
If I look to your pictures you show here in the forum it seems, that you are a creative and experiment joyful artist. Experimenting and trying out of "impossible" techniques was that what I loved in enamelling. I wish you furthermore a lot of new ideas.
Edmund
Many thanks Edmund for your very generous comment. I feel really honored to get such a nice comment especially from you as I admire your work already for some time. Gisela
I have few questions:
I want to make thin piece using casting from 925 silver,I know that before enameling I need prepare the metal to make 999 silver on the surface.
But i want to polish the piece for excelent shining effect and then use transparent enamel.
How to prepare the 925 silver and how to polish it not to remove the fine silver surface?
Thank you
R.