2.1 Rachel

Production techniques

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Sketch your design

Cut of a piece of wax as straight as possible to ensure that the ring is not going to be inaccurate.

Make the hole as big as the ringsize.

Use a set of calipers to mark measurements around the wax for the profile of the ring.

Use a cylinder bur to quickly trim away the excess wax.

Use a bur to remove a few millimeters on either side if you want to and/or make more details with this tool.

Use a bur to remove a few millimeters on either side if you want to and/or make more details with this tool.

The wax ring is attached to a rubber base to create a mold. A wax rod called a sprue connects the two. This will become the channel through which molten gold flows into the ring.

A metal flask is secured onto the rubber base. Then investment plaster is poured into the cylinder and over the wax model. We pour slow to avoid causing air bubbles in the plaster.

The flask is heated overnight in an electric kiln to bake the plaster until it’s fully cured. As the heat rises our wax melts away, leaving a ring-shaped cavity inside of the plaster.

Melt GOLD

The casting grain is weighed and placed into the crucible to melt. We need enough metal to fill our whole ring, plus some extra for the sprue and button. A healthy casting has a cute button on the bottom (you'll see!)

Our flask gets loaded next to our crucible in a spring loaded centrifugal caster. We light the torch and begin to melt down the casting grain.

When the gold has reached the right temperature, we remove the flame. Then we pull a lever that sends our crucible and flask spinning in circles. The molten metal is forced out of the crucible and into the flask using centrifugal force.

Now the mold is filled with gold. You can also see that cute little button at the bottom of our casting.

We submerge the flask in water to dissolve away the investment plaster. A solid gold ring is all that remains!

SOLID GOLD RING

The sprue and button left over from casting must be removed from the bottom of the ring. A jeweler’s saw makes quick work of this task.

Shape the bottom of the ring with a file. When we get the curve just right, we switch to sandpaper. We clean the whole ring using progressively finer grits of sandpaper to leave a perfectly smooth surface.

The inside of the ring is stamped with a hallmark and then sanded down using a sanding drum.

The polishing compound on this wheel is a light abrasive. It smooths down the metal and removes the finest of scratches. The surface of the gold begins to shine.

TADAAAA

- wax
- jewelry files
- set of calipers
- jewelry burs
- plaster
- tortch
- bucket of water
- jeweler saw

- rubber/metal mold
- gold
- kiln
- crucible
- centrifugal caster
- metal tool to hold the mold when hot
- polishing wheel

- Aerospace, automotive

- The oldest known example of the lost-wax technique comes from a 6,000-year-old (c. 4000 BC) copper, wheel-shaped amulet found at Mehrgarh, Pakistan.[2]

- analogue or digital

Excisting products

- Dont cut straight, fully cut it by hand and make it "imperfect"

- Dont make the hole round but another form

- Use unusual tools to remove wax, or my own tool to create other outcomes.

- Make more channels/sprues. Make a sprue that will become part fo the ring since the wax and/or the gold will not flow out or get in.

- Use another material other than plaster (silicone? or something more eco friendly? ), mayne a material that will influence the gold in some kind of way.

- See what happens if you dont let the plaster dry completely but let the soft plaster influence the gols later on, maybe you'll get organic forms.

- Mix the gold with another material that wont melt all the way so that you get a marble effect and/or get pieces in your ring.
- mirror mixture?

- Don't put enough gold in there to make the ring hollow when it spins.

- Colour or put a liquid inside of the plaster mold before pouring the gold in.

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Swaging