Silver Fuming Tutorial Please

[Anakin's Glass Eye]

Hi there. I'm looking for a little help or a good tutorial on silver fuming. How big a piece of silver do you need to use to keep it from melting? What kind of silver? How hot a flame to use? Oxidizing or reducing flame? Etc.?

Also, anybody doing gold fuming? Does it work the same? I have an unused wedding ring (14K gold) that I can use. :evil:

Any help is greatly appreciated.

;)

[Cosmo]

Here's how I do it...

*Obviously, do it with respiratory protection*

Silver:

I use silver powder that I get from work as a byproduct of developing film negatives. It's supposedly fine silver (according to my salesman) and it works well. A lot of people use fine silver bezel wire. A little goes a long ways.

Heat the piece to be fumed with a soft, fluffly flame. Heat the tip of a borosilicate rod and pick up the silver on the end. Change to a reducing flame, hold the silver in the flame about 1" from the tip of the torch. Let it start to melt. You should see the fumes start to develop. move the piece to be fumed into the flame towards the tip of the flame. The silver will start to deposit on the surface of the glass. You need to be careful not to burn your silver off. If you do, changing back to a reducing flame will usually bring it back.

Gold:

I use 24k gold bezel wire. I don't know if you can use 14k or not, as I've never tried it. Same process as fuming silver, but use an oxidizing flame for gold.

The trick is to fume both, which require different kinds of flames, and not ruin what you did before it. I wish I could tell you a trick to do that, but it's just one of those things you have to practice and see how much flame to use.

[kimberly]

I would add here that you should not use 14k gold!!!! It has alloyed with "something" and you don't know what that "something" is!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Most folks use 22k - 24k for gold fuming. I have heard that the 22k works better as it adheres to the glass more readily.


For the silver fuming, any fine silver will work. I have used: powder, foil, wire and bezel. The all work as long as they are fine silver.

[PyroChixRock]

22k does work the best. The wire is a ton more expensive then going to a coin shop and asking them for a silver coin, usually runs about $8 for a coin bigger then a silver dollar (ounce) and lasts a few years unless you drop it all the time. Same with gold, but a bit more spendy, go to the coin shop and ask what their prices are. Sometimes they have little gold pebbles if you don’t want to buy a whole coin. A coin about the size of a nickel is around $40.

With the silver coins, heat and hammer them to make cutting it off easier. Gold is so soft you don't need to flatten it if you don't want to, but you can cut smaller pieces that way. Don't heat gold to hammer it.

As for fuming, depends on what torch you use? Use a boro punty to stick it to or even quartz if you can find some. Chase the gold around, don’t let it fall off the punty! Silver won’t move around like the gold does on the rod, but it will sink in if you’re using the wrong flame.


There's an faq on fuming at the gldg, here

http://www.thegldg.com/forum/showthread.php?t=121

but I don't think you can view that section without being logged in.

[goldbaker88]

Thank you so much for this.