First effort soldering

[Sheen]

Hi all, this is my first go soldering. Would like a little advice. Firstly i struggled to keep my tiny bits of metal aligned and together as i was soldering (both bits were flat and unshaped) what's the best way to do this. I notice some people heat up the bigger piece of metal then place the earwire onto it at the last minute. Secondly i'd like to ripple the edges of the copper ribbon how would i do this?

[Dennis]

Keeping bits in contact is essential for soldering and as you know, they tend to move apart slightly when heated and the flux expands.
You have a soft soldering board , so a few strategically placed pins (stationery or dress making) with only light pressure, will do that.
You can make wavy edges with a cylinder burr, but frilly edges need round/half round pliers.

Your designs are super duper. Dennis.

[Sheen]

Aw thanks Dennis, your praise means a lot. Will try the pins with my next go; as the bits were thin, long and light they tended to move all over the place.
I was taking another look at your leafy ear cuff this morning. Looking at how your tiny little side leaf was joined to the main stem so neatly.

[Dennis]

These were done with pins as described. Varying degrees of success depending on how much solder was used. Dennis.

[JewelleryByMandy]

These were done with pins as described. Varying degrees of success depending on how much solder was used. Dennis.

🤭


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[JewelleryByMandy]

Love the design!


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[eekoh]

I love that curl on the fish earrings, and as another beginner it looks like you're getting it right to me.

I was actually just about to post a thread with the exact same title when I spotted this one so I hope you don't mind me adding my own project...
My first issue was that easy silver solder is MUCH harder than anticipated and I really struggled to cut it. Found a tip on the forum suggesting flattening it a bit with a hammer, which helped a little but I then lost the first couple of bits as they pinged off across the room never to be seen again. I didn't have any problem with the solder flowing, though I did have to poke the bits back into place once the flux got hot.
This is the neatest one of the batch and overall I'm fairly pleased with this join as a first effort as it seems pretty solid. It is visible due to the contrast in the metals but then I expected that.
It would be great to get some feedback - one question that occurred to me is whether maybe i've used more solder than needed?



(Unfortunately I haven't been able to get a really polished shine as the only hammer I had for texturing leaves fine scratch marks, but I'm going to see if I can get that polished up on the bench grinder before I use it again on another project.)

[enigma]

Its hard to tell from the photos whether the joint wasn't tight enough or there is just more solder to polish off, I would definitely clean up more though, especially the inside, you shouldn't really be able to see the seam at all if the join was tight enough once its polished up.
I place a block covering half of the bowl Im going to cut solder in then cut it with tin snips facing it down into the bowl under the block to prevent it flying around.
One other thing to note is that wide copper rings do tend to leave green marks on the fingers.

[eekoh]

Thanks, I did struggle a bit with getting the joins neat enough to start with but this one was pretty tight so I think it probably is excess solder here as I wasn't sure how much to file it down after.
I'll probably paint the inside of this with clear nail polish before I wear it, but its mostly a practice piece - I'm aiming to work in silver for that very reason once I've tried out some basic techniques.

[enigma]

Yes the inside definitely looks like its just excess, its suprising how much it takes to polish it right off but I would keep going.
Its a good idea to do practise pieces in copper first, I agree