silver plating

[mandy h]

Hi I'm new here and would am just after a bit of advice, please.
I make reasonably priced etched brass brooches, and now and again someone asks if I make them in silver. My answer is of course , but you need to pay the extra for the silver. However most people don't want to spend that much, as it would normaly double the price.
So I was wondering about silver plating. I have seen some pen plating kits , that dont use lots of toxic chemicals, I was wondering if anyone had any experience of them.
I realise silver plating will wear in time, I've considered sealing afterwards with lacquer or even a thin layer of cold enamel.
I dont make enough of these to make it worth while sending them off to be plated professionaly, though I live in hope!
Any suggestions welcome, thanks.

[Dennis]

Dear Mandy,
I think a plating pen will be tedious and expensive for this, but many companies sell silver plate renovating solutions, which you can apply with a cloth. I got some from Walshes, thinking I could try it on silver, but it only works if there is a base metal underneath. I don’t know whether you would find this good enough as the layer is quite thin, but so is the effect with a plating pen. I must say that in your place I would investigate the cost of professional plating, as at least you could put your name to this with some confidence. Dennis

[Joe]

Hmm, I wonder if you've really investigated the cost of silver?

It's very worth-while costing on the Cooksons website, measuring your brooch carefully and bearing in mind that they will supply a rectangle of sheet of almost exactly you requested size.

The etching process is a bit different...

I don't know what your pieces look like or how much you charge, but if you're charging more than £15, the cost of the silver and etching might comfortably be built into a modest £5 surcharge but give you a huge increase in perceived value!

Counter this against hundreds for a plating system... you could buy almost half a kilo of silver for the price of a pen plater; that's an awful lot of brooches!

[mandy h]

My pieces are quite large, I am talking about items about 5 x 5 cms and sometimes bigger. I do buy silver sheet fro cooksons as I also make things in silver
the basic brooch is 12.50 in brass so then the extra for silver plus silver catch (as it seems a shame to put a base metal catch on sterling) then makes the piece about double.
Sometimes I am tempted to put the basic price of a brass brooch up to compensate, but I am unsure of selling them then.
My other thought of course is that if I could plate one it would save my having to make another one!

[lynnm]

I have used the plating solutions on an epergne I have where the plating is wearing off. It works well but needs redoing regularly (it polishes off quickly) so I am not sure it would work well on a piece of jewellery

[Dennis]

Dear Mandy,
By coincidence, today my class had a tutorial on plating and one of the things a plater will ask is how many microns you need, as this affects the price. Heavy wear items like rings need about 15 microns of plate, while those subject to little wear, such as earrings need only 3 microns. We were told that anything below that would be porous enough to allow the underlying base metal to tarnish and this discolouration would eventually show through.
From what other students said, the price of silver plating might only be £4 per item, but postage to and from the plater would add quite a bit.
We were given a good handout, including a list of platers, so depending on which part of the country there might be one near you, or if you put an address in my private messages, I could post you a copy. Regards, Dennis.

[nickr]

Hi, there are disadvantages to plating that havent been mentioned such as the difficulty in reproducing the surface finish you already have. Depending upon the plating salts and method used you item may very well end up with a dull white surface or a slightly yellowish silver colour. This is because of how the silver crystal structure forms on the surface. Very thin plating tend to rrequire little in the way of polishing, the thicker ones or platings on larger objects will usually require quite a good buffing to make them bright silver which may not work with an etched piece. I would suggest you look at your costs, in terms of materials AND labour for the existing ones and then factor in the new materials and any extra labours costs. You will probably then find that the silver ones arent that expensive but your base metal ones are far too cheap considering the effort applied to their manufacture.