Trouble With Gold-Filled

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Trouble With Gold-Filled

by Samantha Ryder
(Cranebrook, NSW, Australia)

I recently had a request for some gold-filled jump rings. These are the coils I made from the wire I received, although they were made from two separate lengths of wire. They were made at the same time, and tumbled together.

The large coil is as expected - beautifully shiny. The small coils are dull and pitted on the surface. My supplier insists that both lengths of wire are gold-filled, so the question becomes one of mandrel size. Has anyone ever experienced gold-filled dulling down with smaller mandrel sizes? Or do you have any other explanation for the difference?

I'd really appreciate any advice, as I am hoping to expand into making gold-filled jump rings, but I am simply not happy with the quality of the smaller coils.

The wire is 16 gauge (1.3mm), the larger coil is a 10mm mandrel, the smaller coils are 3.5mm and 4.5mm.

Thanks!

Sam Ryder
NexusMaille
NexusMaille blog

Comments for
Trouble With Gold-Filled

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Gold-filled jump rings dulling and pitting
by: Rena

That's really weird, Sam - I've never heard of anything like that! I can't imagine why one would pit and become dull, and the other not - unless, as you thought, one of them is something other than gold-fill.

I hope one of our friends with more insight will stop by and post some info or suggestions!

Tighter coils?
by: Luann Udell

My GUESS would be that somehow the gold coating is affected by wrapping tighter coils. That could put more stress on the metal, stretching the gold layer more than on the bigger diameter coils.

A good person to ask about this is Russ Nobbs, owner of Rings & Things in Spokane WA. Since we aren't allowed to give links, just google the business and search for the jewelry forum on their website. Russ started out years and years ago making "name" jewelry by twisting 10K gold-filled square wire, and he has a wealth of information from many many years of jewelry-making and component-selling.

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