inlay bubbling

[Brian Hochstrat]

I need some advice, I am inlaying a wolf, roughly 1 inch square not counting its legs. I am trying to use argentium silver to get the silver color, but by the time I get all my edges set, my center won't stay down. I have tried several different approaches all unsuccessful. Such as, deeper inlay, bigger teeth, heavier under cut, set one side, work to the other, remove silver from center to set the center but by the time I fill it popps up again and annealling countless times, I could use 999 silver and not have near the hassle, but Ray Cover inlayed a pretty big piece of copper in his knife, which work hardens way faster, so I can't give up just because my material is fighting me. Suggestion please. Thanks, Brian

 

[Ray Cover]

Brian,

Is the surface you are trying to inlay into flat or is there an arch to it?

Can you post a pic of it so I can see what the situation is?

Ray

 

[pilkguns]

yep, pictures please, how big is the face of the punch in relation to the overall size of the peice you are trying to inlay?

 

[jimzim75]

Just a thought.
Could you re alloy the metal. It's probable .925 silver and .075 argentium. Your going for something that wears better?
So, if you add a little pure silver to make it .950 or .975 silver. You might get better results. I would think you would get less
work hardening and thus less bridging.

 

[FANCYGUN]

OK..now maybe this is a dumb question at 6:15 in the morning but.........are you using any kind of a clamp to hold the inlay in place as you work around the edge setting the inlay? Metal is moving all over the place as you expand it into the undercuts. I also as a force of habit, also tooth the inlay recess itself to help prevent the movement and assure the inlay will stay in place.

 

[metalartz]

Have you word with argentium silver. If not you should know that it anneals at a must lower temp then sterling (1050°F/565°C ) and it must be air cooled till all red is gone or it may crack, best not to quench and just air cool.
-david

 

[Mike Cirelli]

I've not inlaid Argentium, I would relieve my frustrations and use fine silver. Argentium will still tarnish, if not heat treated a certain way to get the maxium benifit. Are you inlaying this into steel teeth or soft metal teeth. Cause if your trying to inlay it into fine gold I don't think it will happen with just small teeth.
Mike

 

[Ray Cover]

Just the other day I inlaid an argentium scroll into a 14k Gold field on a Wall Street themed knife I am currently working on. I used the "dead soft" argentium sheet from Rio Grande. No anealing no anythign just straight out of hte package. Everything worked fine.

Scott mentioned something about punch size that made me think.

You punch may be too big across the face. When doing this type of work I don't let the face of my punch get any bigger than about 1/16" MAX across the face. The face is also textured heavily on a ******* file. None of this tapping it on sandpaper for me. I want the darn thing to BITE.

Ray

 

[Ray Cover]

Don't you just love censoring software

That was a B

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S T

A R


D File

 

[Brian Hochstrat]

Here are some pics of the channel. legs are of coarse no problem to set it is the vast open area in the center that is giving me fits. As you can see it is a curved surface and I have used a variety of punch sizes and materials, a brass with a .050 face, a steel punch the same size and a .030 steel. Hopefully the pics are helpful. Thanks, Brian

 

[Ray Cover]

I see the problem.

Best I can tell from the picture you have taken a square or similar graver and raised individual teeth to hold the middle down. I don't know where you learned to raise the teeth for inlay but that method is not going to work well for any inlay (in my oppinion)

If you have a copy of James Meeks the Art of Engraving he does a good job of explaining how to prep a background field for an inlay footing.

Here are some clay mock-ups I made for my intermediate class. As you can see the teeth resemble the surface of a crosscut file except the "teeth" have been cast over to form a curl or hook. As I said earlier I have inlayed platinum into gold and argentium into gold using this method and it holds fast and secure.

Ray

 

[Brian Hochstrat]

Ray, I have had several people show me the individual tooth method, but I know the crosshatched teeth method also and I will give it a try. Thanks for the help. Brian

 

[Ray Cover]

I really don't put a lot of stock in the individual teeth. For several reasons

1. It is hard to get enough of them.
2. They do not have a large surface of underlocking structure at their base like the crosshatched "teeth" do.
3.The teeth themselves don't present enough surface area on the curled part of the hook to hold securely.
4. If the crosshatched teeth are done right you have to tear up the inlay material to get it out, not so with the individual teeth.

These are the reasons one side of your inlay is popping up when you hammer down the other.

Ray

 

[Mike Cirelli]

Ray wouldn't you say that the underlaying metal would have to be somewhat harder than the inlay. I can't imagine inlaying Argentium into fine gold. Or the teeth made in fine gold withstanding the inlay process. I guess my experiance with argentium is I want it as hard as I can get it, and it can get pretty hard.
Mike

 

[Ray Cover]

That is correct Mike.

But the 14K gold I used worked just fine.

Ray

 

[John B.]

Hi Brian.
Bubbling up........I hate when that happens!!!!
For me, you don't have enough teeth in the field.
I see large areas without any.
Then bend down the outside edges of your inlay to more than conform to the shape of the floor plate, reanneal it, clamp down the middle with a machinist's clamp and seat around the edges. Seat the legs first.
The floorplate should be firmly fixed to a thick piece of metal or wood before you do any seating.
My guess is that you are getting some springing out of it.
I always also fill the bottom milled out cavity too, as the metal is pretty thin in this area.
When seating like this I use a hammer and 1/4 inch brass punch and give it a sharp whack.
Too much gentle tapping just workhardens it before it seats and bites the burs.
Just my thoughts, hope it helps.
Best regards, John.

 

[Brian Hochstrat]

Thanks everyone for the good advice. I clamped the center, used crosshatched teeth, and a smaller more heavily roughened tip on my brass punch, it went in quite easily. I am not that happy with my end result, my channel got to deep, surfaced into the udercuts on the edge, ect. ect. basicly to much trying and retrying and experimentation, I had to just stop before I turned it into complete garbage. But I have a good system now, and the next one should go in easy and be pretty flawless. Thanks again everybody, Brian

 

[Martin Strolz]

Hello Brian,
take a high speed steel square graver and grind you a new undercutting tool. I has to be very,very sharp, angel not too wide. Regrind often! In a mild steel plate this tool actually should stick, when driven in with two blows of an engraving hammer! Use a coarse wheel and leave the tool rough. Take care because it will break easily, so dont change the angle during working. Remove all broken debris from your undercut because that will ruin your next tool when you rework this area!
A good undercut looks quite dark because it lower part is so narrow and sharp. It is essential to make sure that your workpiece is held solidly. Glue it onto a solid block of aluminum for example using epoxy glue.
Have someone else to push and hold while you hit the silver during inlaying.

Hope you can post that you succeded within the next days!
Martin