[Jewelry making - Article 00034] - Re: [Orchid] Fine Silver tubing

[Peter W. Rowe]

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>       how do you compensate for the tubing spreading open as the
>     metal expands while you are trying to solder the seam ? 

    This can be a real problem.  As well, some metals (white golds,
    for example) can spring open during drawing, so you never get a
    drawn seam that's quite close enough.  the answer is to draw a
    tube to slightly larger than your desired size, and then solder
    the seam.  While heating to above annealing temp, the seam can be
    gently coaxed closed again with tweezers, soldering the seam in
    small sections.  Then, after soldering and some clean up of the
    seam, the final drawing gets everything round again and
    eliminates the evidence of the soldering operation.  With softer
    metals, though, like higher carat golds or fine silver, it's
    usually not a problem in the first place.  Anneal the tube one
    draw before you intend to solder it, so it's being soldered after
    being drawn only one step through the plate.  If your gentle, it
    will usually just stay closed.  You can also prepare such tubes
    (with seams that start out looking good but which you fear will
    spread open) prior to soldering with binding wire to hold it
    shut, but this is a bit of a pain, since you must do it so the
    wire bridges the seam without touching it, or the solder will
    adhere the binding wire to the tube when it runs down the seam. 
    Avoiding that is certainly possible, but takes more time than
    simply adjusting while soldering if needed, with a pair of
    tweezer to squeeze things shut again.  Sound's less neat and
    slick and professional and all, but it gets the job done with the
    least effort and bother. 

>        how do you keep the tubing from opening up again during
>     another soldering operation - especially if it's a soldering
>     operation that's going to go into an enamelled piece and you
>     are therefore using IT for that as well? 

    You've drawn the tube at least once after soldering, and
    annealed it as well. If you did both carefully, and then pay
    attention to where the seam is placed in assembly, the tube won't
    open.  You soldered the seam with hard or IT solder, so by the
    time that solder might flow again, the tube is well past
    annealing temps, and has no spring in it to open it up again. 
    Also, if you used only a minimum amount of solder in the first
    place, it will remelt again at a slightly higher temp than it
    originally flowed at, so if you're careful, you can put entire
    pieces together with just IT solder, without things flowing
    unduly.  Part of the key here is clean tight seams without excess
    solder.  And by being careful where the seam is, if any solder
    does flow again, see to it that it's at the place where the tube
    is being joined to other parts, so a little solder flow makes no
    difference.    And finally, don't forget yellow ocher or similar
    stuff when needed.  A coating of the stuff, while messy, does
    slightly insulate what's underneath, in addition to preventing
    solder from flowing farther than it already did.  So you can
    often keep the solder on previous joins from getting quite hot
    enough to flow at all. 

Hope this helps.

Peter Rowe 
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