Easter project (more flush setting)

Hi all,

With five whole days off for easter i decided to learn flush setting. Having never done it before I devised a project that would involve a lot of flush setting to give myself practice, and (in case the first attempts were irretrievable) did two practice settings first in some scrap sheet before starting on these:

Attachment 10139

The large stones are green quartz checkerboard cabs (8mm), and each "halo" is comprised twelve 1.5mm zircons.

I have two main criticisms of my own, firstly I thought i could do the halo stone placement by eye - turns out not so much. The kindest thing you could say is it looks a bit rustic - and rustic wasn't what i was shooting for, i should have employed maths or a template or something?

Secondly i'm not that happy with the finish. The backs were fine before i soldered the wires, at which point the back face developed some tiny pits (from the heat I guess), and with the wires on, i no longer had a flat surface to emery, so did the best i could with radial disks. The fronts were fine until i slipped on a couple of the flush settings. I got the scratches out with tiny everflex flame tips, but overall neither side has the perfect flat mirror finish i was after, and i'm not sure what to do at this stage - surely compound would not be safe over the stones...

All in all though i'm fairly pleased with them for a project, and will wear them, they remind me of those little metal cotton reels for sewing machines!

Any feedback or tips for improvement would be gratefully received :)

Faith

They're pretty good Faith. No one but a jeweller would see anything wrong with them.

To space them evenly print a circle divider template, easily found on line. However, they don't always go up to twelve, but a clock face would guide you.

To set them all on the same circle, scribe feint marks with dividers, using the outer edge of the disk as a guide.

https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=ci...LeXv8AfZzpvwAg

Thanks Dennis :),

I even had a printed Visio drawing of the design, so I have no excuse! The circle divider templates look great tho, exactly what I needed, thanks :)

Faith

You done well...getting a perfect layout & finish flush setting a flat surface isn't the easiest thing to do.

I think you did a great job Faith, layout is certainly not easy to get perfect!

Ta ever so much Chris and Sarah,

I was a bit disappointed with the layout to be honest so I'm consoled that it's a challenge for everyone, although I'll know to be a lot more diligent about it next time. In fairness this was probably the most complex piece I've tried to make tho, so practice will surely help too :)

Thanks again :)
Faith

Actually I have one other question about these if I may... (I forgot to ask!)

In my original design I had the flush set stones closer to the bezel wall, and the whole silver "halo" section narrower, but it ocurred to me that if I did that I'd never get the burnisher into the 'back' of the flush settings - cos the bezel wall would be in the way. Is that a genuine constraint of a design like this or could I have gotten around it somehow without widening the halo as I did?

Many thanks in advance :)

Faith