[Jewelry making - Article 00273] - Re: [Orchid] Tumbler and Ultrasonic...

[Eric McCafferty]

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Good Morning Annabel,

    I am going to try and answer several questions at once from your
    different postings. First ultrasonics. They are small tanks, filled
    with water and a cleaning solution used to clean jewelry. There
    usually is an option to have the tank heat the water, and when you
    turn the tank "on" is passes ultrasonic waves through the water which
    will help dislodge polish, dirt, investment etc. from what you have
    suspended in the tank. Key side note, objects must be suspended, not
    set on the bottom. Tumblers are machine that are usually used in
    material removal. There are countless different set ups so I will
    skip how they all do it, but the basic concept is you place your work
    piece in the tumbler with a "media", depending on the media used and
    the tumbling process, surface material is removed form your piece at
    different rates of aggression from heavy removal down to an almost
    polished appearance. 

    Casting, let's use a single ring as an example. You send to a
    casting house your wax ring to be cast. This is attached to a wax
    sprue, which is attached to a base. The metal flask is placed over
    this investment is poured in. The base is removed, the flask goes
    into the kiln, and the wax burns out while the investment hardens.
    This leaves you with a negative impression of your wax in the
    investment mold. As you pour the metal in it follows the sprue hole,
    fills up the negative impression of the ring, fills up the sprue
    hole, and then there is extra added for casting integrity that forms
    a "button" on the end of the sprue. Lessons in casting later, which
    would explain the purpose of the button. Different casting houses or
    different casters for that matter do things differently depending.
    All of them are going to clean off the casting to be able to cut the
    ring from the sprue. Some casters will do a better job of cleaning
    then others, but most if not all of the investment should be cleaned
    off. If there is any lest you could either put the piece in a sonic,
    or even use a stiff nail brush under running water. Another trick,
    put the piece in your pickle pot for a little while, and then use the
    nail brush or an ultrasonic. If I can answer anything else let me
    know. 

Thank you,
Eric McCafferty
Studio311.com
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