still kicking

[MarsFire]

View attachment 53159

Superb

 

[Sinterklaas]

You dont have to drill with large drills. I use 0,6mm drill for 1mm stones. And If the I prefer not to drill through the metal in case of jewelry. So it will stay stronger. What you can do to clean up the back is. With a slightly larger ball burr that the drill lightly make a facet on the hole. Dont go in to the metal. Just enough to remove the metal burrs on the back. You can even do it by hand. Just push and twist. Then the back will look clean.

Dont drill to large then you will have hardly any metal for the stone's seat.

For (micro)pave work I dont even use setting burrs. I only use ball burrs to make the seats. Drill small hole then use gradually larger ball burrs to get to the stone size.
To remove the metal between the holes you can use a cylinder burr or a tapered burr in a small diameter.
You could also use a small graver.

As for the burrs making a weird pattern in the hole. Try to push harder and see if that fixes it. Also check if all the facets on the burr are intact.

 

[Dani Girl]

yes pushing with more pressure and going slower seem to help, but swapping to busch burs fixes that mostly. I'm really struggling with the setting part. I'm not sure if I've cut/divided up the prongs in the right fashion. I see some superglue happening to this one too. lots of my holes are too deep. I think it will take a while to get a feel for perfect depth.

the section inside the handle I just decided to make as many prongs as possible and see if they can hold.

I'm pretty sure I'm doing this all wrong.

 

[Dani Girl]

I got one side to stick apart from one broken stone. having a lot of trouble getting them to sit upright and also I've a feeling i shouldn't have split the beads like I did?

 

[Dani Girl]

 

[Dani Girl]

stone setting and work holding? grs black pitch cup? is it petrol or diesel to dissolve that? I imagine there would be lots of stones that wouldn't like being soaked in fuel. what about the red pitch jewellers use? how does one get that off? I don't fancy the idea of trying to pick thermoloc out of every nook and cranny and I recall a post from a decade or so ago of a jeweller who did and then tried everything to dissolve it out but nothing could.

 

[rweigel]

“having a lot of trouble getting them to sit upright” - I use the same type of tool holders as for beading tools and fix a piece of hard 2.5mm brass rod inside. I file it to a blunt point and use it to press down the stones into their holes. By pressing down at one side or another, I can change the orientation of the stone and align it. I use ball burs for the stone seat and drill them such that the stone fits tightly. The spherical shape of the seats gives the freedom to align the stones slightly. If one does not budge, I pull it put with the beeswax/charcoal cone and try to align it better next time. Works for Zirconia and Diamond, could be fatal for brittle stones.

I push the beads against the stones in several goes, as pushing to much one bead without the other three holding the stone already slightly will result in unwanted displacement.

Cheers

Ralf

 

[Dani Girl]

I got it done, I'm planning to plate it two tone, I think rose border and background

 

[Dani Girl]

I broke 3 stones trying to move them or not realising the beading tool was in contact. broke 3 drills and a blade off a ball bur. I decided it's nicer to oneself to clean out deformed metal formed when cutting the relieving cuts around the prongs out with a setting bur. thanks for that tip, I also put brass rod in my palm control and whacked the heck out of them asking them to move, I think maybe the off centre drill holes might have played a part. next time I'll start with the burs and maybe drill later. lots of these stones are way way too deep. it's not overly easy.


pitch cup for workholding?

 

[Dani Girl]

how would you hold this to set the stones? still having trouble getting stones seating nicely.