The Extra Mile.

[Dennis]

This is a bracelet I made five years ago and when I had a message to say it had broken, I felt sure that it would be a failed solder joint. So I sent off a new one, which you have seen in a previous post. But when the old one was returned to me the fracture was in a thin section of metal.
I was all for soldering it up for a spare, but my teacher challenged me to go the extra mile by inserting a hinge at the fracture line to relieve the stress of constantly flexing it. So I soldered the fracture, filed a curved seat and soldered in a 3.0mm tube. Then I filed away the outer part of the tubing, cut through the remaining half tube and the bracelet, creating two cradles (for more details see Tim McCreight ‘The Complete metal Smith’). It was simple to locate the 2.0 mm dia. knuckles and solder them in. The only innovation was that in the case of the two outer knuckles I left them temporarily connected with a bridge of tubing for better accuracy of spacing and alignment.
The 2.0mm joint tubing was specially made by drawing it down from 4.0mm to gain thicker walls. The riveted hinge pin was made from 1.1mm gold wire for strength. Dennis.

[Mia]

So impressed Dennis.
I wish I had your teacher.
Mia

[medusa]

heck, i can't even see the hinge in the first picture! how does the catch work?

[Kathryn Harrison]

Wow that is really amazing, I'm terrified of trying hinges maybe in a few years!