Methods of covering silver with gold

[Hello from Austria]

Hello,

I am wondering what are some methods to cover silver sheet with gold? I cant afford to work in gold, so covering silver with gold will be the option. I know of keum boo, but what if I wanted to "gold plate" a piece of jewellery which is too intricate to burnish? I've seen some instructions to gold plate using a gold plating machine and swabbing your piece with electrically charged wand, but I am sceptical..! Can you suggest what you use out there?

Thanks

Julia

[ps_bond]

Electroplating has been in use for just over 200 years... Why the scepticism?

Of course, the traditional electroplating baths used moderate amounts of cyanide, which wasn't ideal. Cooksons can sell you a plating unit (or a pen plating unit for smaller areas) that AFAIR doesn't use cyanides.
Then there is fire gilding/amalgam gilding where you dissolve gold in mercury, paint it onto the item and heat it to drive off the mercury. Also not a great process to indulge in.

[Dennis]

At its most basic you can sweat solder thin gold sheet, say 0.3mm to thicker silver sheet for instance 1.0mm, and then roll down to suit or hammer to thin and texture it.

Here is a brooch I made in this way when I first started. Dennis.

[silken]

I use a pen plating system from spa plating and it's great! I generally use it for selective plating of small silver pieces and it, well, does what it says on the tin. I use the battery version as it was the cheapest option available as you don't need to use it with a rectifier and extra leads. It's probably the easiest way to apply gold to silver as far as I'm concerned. I've used the keum boo method before but found it fiddly, especially on intricate pieces. You can also buy accent gold which is a paint of sorts:

http://cooksongold.co.uk/

It consists of fine powdered gold suspended in a binder. You apply it as you would a paint then fire the piece. A lot of people use it with PMC & fine silver. The downside is, it is very expensive. Investing in a plating system would be more cost effective over time. Just be careful to buy the plating chemicals from a reputable supplier as some less reputable ones water down the solutions, hence reducing the amount of gold content.

[Sandra]

I've got a new project idea in mind but of course it involves techniques I've never tried before! Actually I'm not sure what to use for one area, I want to etch some small areas on the silver background and somehow make the recessed etched area gold. I have read about Keum Boo however I'm not sure spending so much money on gold foil is something I want to do until I get a little better at all this. Do you suppose gold leaf or even gold enamel might work?

[CJ57]

This was one of my keum boo pieces for the OS, it's slightly challenging if you are looking for perfection but I really enjoyed using it for the first time and the effects on the various pieces I produced are very different.

[mizgeorge]

Gold solder flooded into small areas works well for this as well Sandra.

[Sandra]

Oh thanks guys! I like the idea of gold solder and the price looks great too. I want to try Keum Boo too but will save that for a little later. I'm curious about the melting point of easy gold solder vs. easy silver solder?

[Dennis]

Taken from the new Cookson printed catalogue, the brazing temperatures, i.e. the temperatures for soldering are:

Silver easy 755°C,
9ct yellow gold easy 750°C
18ct yellow easy 750°C. So very similar. Dennis.

[camalidesign]

I have also thought about starting to use gold overlaid on silver, so far I only use it as accents e.g. gold granules or thin sheet etc.

So, my question would be, what plating system to get from Spa? I want to use it for plating small recesses such as e.g. a small shape cut out in sheet, soldered onto backplate, as well as other projects such as just plating sort of random areas on e.g. textured pieces. Any advice from those who have bought the various options they have available, would be much appreciated!

Also, how is plating in recesses best done, by soldering together first and then plating, or does this not give very neat/accurate results around a recessed area? How thin is the tip of the plating pen? Alternatives? Plating the backplate first and then soldering on the front with the cutout??

Also, having not given keum-boo a go yet, what is the difference in thickness between that and electroplating? Probably a stupid question, depends on what thickness gold foil you use etc, but if you don't ask you don't find out!

Lots of questions!

Carin