[Jewelry making - Article 00121] - Re: [Orchid] Working with Argentium

[Zen Sojourner]

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>         The wire does stiffen up pretty well, but I'm still a little
>     worried that it might still be too soft to be sturdy enough to sell
>     to people.  Now I'm also wondering if it will tarnish because I did
>     not anneal the wire first. So I guess I'm wondering - should I be
>     annealing the wire first, even though it is already quite soft so
>     as to ensure the tarnish resistance and then heat harden it and
>     then construct the necklace?  Will the wire then be too hard to do
>     nice wire-wrapping? 

    Nan, I've been using 22g Argentium round wire with pearls and have
    found that it work-hardens sufficiently while working with it for my
    purposes, at least.  I have used it to string pearls to make braids
    on heavier guage wire and as earring dangles.  I did not anneal or
    heat harden which I now regret due to the reports of tarnishing
    out-of-the-bag, and my experience with the Argentium bracelet I've
    been wearing for a bit over a week now. 

    However, it would appear that my wire is actually half hard rather
    than dead soft, so if you do choose to anneal, you might need to
    work it back up to half hard.  You can do this by twisting the wire
    (round wire will just twist and twist without any visible change,
    square wire will get a spiral twist in it).  Or you might try to
    precipitation harden it, though I couldn't begin to guess how long
    you would want to heat it to get it to only half-hard, since there is
    the potential to precipitation harden to twice the hardness of
    standard sterling. 

    Which brings up another question - how hard is half-hard for
    Argentium compared to half-hard for Sterling, if the maximum hardness
    of the Argentium is actually twice that of Sterling? 

    Whew, makes your head spin!  Or at least mine. 

Sojourner

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