Tumbling lessons
Posted on August 13, 2008
Filed Under Arts and Crafts |
Yesterday my tumbler and stainless steel shot arrived from DelphiGlass.com, which was just in time for me to tumble the sterling silver necklace I oxidized with hard boiled eggs. Tumbling your jewelry is a fine way of polishing it and work-hardening it to make it stronger. To tumble jewelry, you should use stainless steel jeweler’s shot, which is made of three or four different shapes of steel including spheres and pins. The different shapes ensure that every nook and cranny of the jewelry gets pelted with these tiny bits of metal, resulting in a very smooth, shiny, clean, almost mirrorlike surface. For those of you interested in this process, here’s a howto that explains how to do this, very well. I only have one caveat to add based on my very limited experience, which I’ll share below.
The necklace came out beautifully. The silver is kind of bluish grey, like gunmetal. While this is not one of my favorite designs (it’s too big for my taste and there’s just something about it, not sure, because it’s pretty), I especially love the way the polished clasp looks. It couldn’t be any more lustrous.
After I was done with the neckace, I started tumbling a bunch of my copper pieces: rings, earrings, necklaces. I noticed that the copper was coming out of the tumbler darker than when it went in, and this was not what I had expected. It was pretty, with various shades of colors, but not necessarily what I would want on every copper piece. After quite a bit of experimenting, I finally discovered that it was the Palmolive “aromatherapy” dish detergent I was using as a burnishing aid. And it seemed to be permanently discoloring the copper. I switched to Pantene shampoo with much better results.
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Hi. I’ve heard about oxidizing with eggs before—I’m not sure patina is my favorite finish, but at times it’s wonderful. BUT I’m surprised that it would “stay” on if you tumble it afterwards. I would have thought the shot would “shine” it off. What I do like about the idea of using eggs, is first: it’s quick, second: it’s easy, third: no special “stuff” like LOS that STINKS, or paint on patinas that you still have to store, find (lol), and paint on.
Thanks for the great idea!
Teri
It’s definitely convenient to use eggs. A tad bit messy if you’re not careful, but easy enough to clean up.
Teri, I think the soap I chose to use at first made the color on the metal. After I switched to shampoo, the pieces I tumbled didn’t fully retain their patina.
Thanks for stopping by!
Tina
great wire work!
I love tumblers. The shine you get is so amazing isn’t it? The first time I tried it I couldn’t get over how amazing it is.
I just wanted to give a heads up on the steel shot- don’t use the kind with pins if you want to have your patina stay in the nooks and crannies (and of course you do, or else why bother?)
Cheers,
Christine
very very very pretty. so you were lucky that is wasn’t perfect colours. that made it unique