Doming an embossed item

[silver70]

Sorry for all the questions this week!

If I were to emboss an item by running a pierced pattern from a copper sheet, sandwiched onto silver sheet through a rolling mill would I be able to dome it using a wooden doming block and punch and annealing the metal thoroughly and maybe protecting it with material?

Or would I just lose the pattern anyway?

Thanks in advance as always!

[Dennis]

Forums thrive on questions, so don't apologise for that.

The secret of gentle doming is to use wooden doming punches with a leather or wooden mallet. Metal ones are much more destructive of textures.

Wooden doming blocks tend to be shallow, so if you need deeper domes you could get away with a brass block, provided you annealed by heating from behind and did not tap harder than necessary.

You must recognise that every time you heat a texture, particularly directly from in front, and then pickle it you loose a little of the definition.

[Goldsmith]

You can also use a leather covered sandbag and wooden doming mallets for doming some items, see; http://www.cooksongold.com/category_select.jsp?query=sandbag
I have various sized leather sandbags in my tool collection some are used for shaping and others just for holding and manipulating metals on while drawing and engraving designs pre piercing.

James

[silver70]

Thank you both for the advice! I look forward to the day I can answer newbies questions! It's the little touches of expert knowledge that make this forum so invaluable!