So yesterday one of my mates had a baby, they are always good to me and i never have anything for them and it ain't through a lack of trying but today i decided to make a silver bracelet from a coin that is from 100 years ago.
This is something i had never tried before but i had an idea so i forged ahead, i started by placing the coin in a die so i could punch a hole in the centre using my press.
I got the coin out of the die and placed it on my heat proof matt and started annealing it so it becomes soft and workable.
I placed the coin into a coned die and pressed down to start turning coin inside out.
As you can see the coin has now started to look more like a ring than a coin, i keep annealing my work often through the project.
I used my ring stretcher to stretch it out to a maximum size, this must be done gradually making sure annealing is done when the silver becomes hard to work.
The ring is now stretched out and the next step is to cut it at the back.
I straightened out the bracelet so i could stamp a name on the back but i am not showing this step.
I used a small file to profile the edge so it was smooth and used some sandpaper.
I used a leather mallet and formed it around a mandrel but i don't have 3 hands for this photo.
As you can see it is almost done and the last few steps is to pickle and polish it, the pickling removes firescale from the silver and a high speed wheel is used with polishing compound for a nice shine.