How to make a bezel set opal pendant.

The first thing I need is some bezel wire and as today I have run out I’ll need to make some more. This is a time consuming task. I often buy bezel wire but as I am not always happy in the quality I get from a goldsmith I tend to make it. Also, the gold merchant has only two sizes 3mm x 0.3mm and 5mm x 0.3mm. Sometimes I like thick bezels that I can cut down and file to shape.

Step one is to get some scrap metal left from castings that I have not used or ones that have failed and also bits of cut up scrap. I do not use any old rings or pieces which might have impurities in them.

Pleae note: If the images cannot be seen in this article go to my site www.opaljewelryexpress.com and look for this article in the jewelry information section.

I am going to melt this gold down in a crucible with a mixture of propane gas and oxygen using a large torch specially bought for this purpose.


Step Two
I put a pinch of borax powder on the metal so that it will flow. Once the gold has melted and is the correct temperature I pour it into a mould which will make it into an ingot that resembles a big nail. When I am pouring I keep the gold hot with the torch.


Once it has been poured I open the mould and take the gold out and quench it in water.


Step Three
I then anneal the metal. This means that I heat it to a cherry red colour with a bushy blue/yellow flame and then I quench it again. This will happen many, many times as the metal needs to be brought back to its original state.

When you hammer or squash metal it gets hard and brittle. This is called work hardening. It makes the metal unworkable so I need to anneal it and bring it back to its correct form.

Step Four.

I now pass the gold through a rolling mill. When the metal gets about half its thickness I need to anneal it again. Eventually what stated off as a piece of metal about 100mm long will be around a metre long and will be ideal to use as bezel wire.

Step Five.

Now I have some bezel wire and I wrap it around the opal. I get the rough shape and the size is nearly perfect. It has taken me a long time to be able to guess where I need to cut the wire to make it the right size.

I now put this on a steel mandrel and with a rawhide or bounceless hammer I hammer it to the correct shape and the opal fits snugly into the bezel.

The next step is to solder it to a piece of plate which I will show next time.

Tales From the Opal fields – The Day Fritz was Taken by Aliens.

There are a lot of people who live on the Australian opal fields who never do any opal mining. In fact, some of them have never even been down a mine and wouldn’t know a good piece of opal from a wombat.

Imagine driving 10 hours from Sydney where most people believe life is wonderful by any standard in the world and arriving in a place where the trees don’t like to grow much more than head height, grass ( except marihuana) is an extinct herb, and where you might as well say it never rains because if it ever does it generally just falls down holes in the ground and is never seen again.

Ah! But when it rains the native flowers bloom and throw themselves out of the ground like a virgin’s bosom and the grass sprouts in front of your eyes like a head of hair and everyone, and I mean everyone, even Wayne who just grunted the day he heard the news that his first son had been born, simply explode into smiles, leap into the air and come down grabbing and hugging the first person that they see. The barman traditionally puts on a free keg of beer and turns on the coloured party lights and runs them all night long!

No he doesn’t. There’s not even any electricity and I’ve already told you that the grass is extinct. What really happens is that the opal dirt, which is everywhere you walk, since it is taken out of the mines and spread around the planet where you have to walk gets wet and turns into a kind of gooey, marshmallow mud which is a cross between epoxy resin and crap. Then everyone is just pissed off!

Yes, imagine driving 10 hours from Sydney and finding this place and thinking: This is it! I am home. I have found my place in the sun…

Well, you certainly have and in 55 degrees Celsius that sun is going to burn your bald head up like a snag on a bar-b-que and even worse if you take your hat off.

Well, Fritz is one of those non mining people. He came from Germany as a baby booming German which was understandably hell on earth and traveling via Canada where he became a Canadian he eventually found this glorious place in the sun and thought: Ja, Ich bin nicht mehr ein Berliner!
To be continued

How to Buy Jewellery Safely On Line.

Many people, including myself, have natural, healthy fears of making a purchase for anything over the internet. For me it involves many aspects that I know are dangerous: giving my credit card to a stranger, no matter whether it is a real person or a computer form or shopping cart, trusting and dealing with someone in a foreign country

But I do make purchases every week. I buy jewellery, precious stones, gold and silver items, information, books, computer parts and much more. For me it is a way of life and business. Have I been cheated? Have I lost money? Have I been frustrated and angry? Yes to all questions!

Buying Jewellery on line is something that presents special problems all of its own. But I do it and I do it with very little chance of failure.

Firstly, let’s look at the problems I face:
1. I don’t know the people I am buying from.
2. I cannot touch and feel the item.
3. It costs me a lot of money to telephone people in foreign lands and be put on hold or go through a series of staff members before getting to someone who can help me.
4. There are language problems.
5. I am highly uncomfortable making a payment on line.


Now let’s look at the problems in more detail and the solutions:

1. As I don’t know the people I am buying from I have to find out about them. So I read their entire website. I read the “about us” part, the services provided etc. In fact, I read the entire website like a detective. I want to get a feel for these people. I want to know if I can trust them. If I cannot find a person’s name to contact then I will almost never buy from them.
2. If, on the other hand, I find that Mr Richard Smythe can be contacted by email, and telephone and that the business has a physical address then I am starting to feel good about this company. I’ll send him an email first and if I get no answer then that is the last time I think about that site. If he answers my email then I’ll most likely ring him.
3. As I cannot touch the piece of jewellery I expect a full identification of it. I want to know the carat of the metal, the type of metal, the weight of the metal, the type and size of the gemstones and their weight. I want to see the back of the piece of jewellery if possible.
4. To get over the costs of telephone calls I email first or I take advantage of the live chat facility. Then I find a person and a number and I tell them that I am going to ring them at a certain time.
5. There are language problems. Even minor things such as my Australian accent and the words that we use are not often used in countries such as the USA. So, being aware of that I speak loudly, clearly and without any of the words that the other person may not be familiar with. Simple things like using the term “claws” rather than the American term ”prongs” will cost me money in a telephone call when I am discussing jewellery.
6. I always want to see the close padlock on a shopping cart. I want to read about their secure encryption process.

Now, I have emailed and telephoned the staff, and I have read enough about the product and I am as comfortable about the ordering process as I can be I am ready to make a purchase. I buy a small cheap item and wait for it to show up. If that goes well then I will buy more.

I want to buy from a good website which has a person I can talk to on the telephone and I want a secure shopping cart and lastly I want to see a returns policy. No returns policy equals no sale.

Here is an example of how I do it. Three weeks ago I wanted to buy a good tanzanite stone for several thousand dollars. I found a website in Nairobi Kenya who had what I wanted. My plan was my usual way of doing business. I would first email and ask some questions about the product and get a contact. I would then telephone the person and ask many more questions. As I have a friend who lives in Nairobi I would get her to go and make sure that the business was real and a good one.

I sent an email to the contact specified on the website. I told them I was an Australian jeweller and asked questions about the products. The website said that they would answer emails within 24 hours. Well, I am still waiting and they have lost all credibility so I will cross them off my list.


The author Gary Hocking is an Australian jeweller who has his own website. http://www.jewelleryexpress.com.au You are free to copy and distribute this article as long as you keep the bio and the live link to his website intact.