A robin redbreast in a cage, puts all heaven in a rage. So wrote William Blake, but he might as well have included this piece of tumbled haematite, because my attempts at turning it into a pendent met with endless difficulties.
Traditionally tumbled stones are wire wrapped, or put into cages, but test pieces with copper wire didn’t go at all well. Finally I decided to make a claw setting, using triangular wire for effect. When this was nearly completed, it became obvious that the reverse of my pendant was far more interesting than the front. Needless to say the jump ring then needed moving and the claws when un-set were too short to push home with any certainty for a second time. So, there was nothing for it but to start all over again.
Foolishly I also tried to polish out a few marks left on the stone by the previous wires, using a blue radial disk, only to find that this removed all the high gloss. Nothing I had to hand would restore it – not finer disks, not metal polish, nor diamond paste and not all the grades of MicroMesh, nor MircroMesh liquid on a cloth.
Just as I was bracing myself to order another random batch of stones, I thought of Vonax which is the final polisher for acrylic. Sure enough, this on a soft bristle brush and then a cotton mop, did the trick.
Below is my abandoned frame and my completed effort. I have posted it here so that I could share my solutions and hope that you will join in with your own experiences and suggestions.
Dennis.
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