I decided to get some solid silver wire for stringing my best beads (up till now I've been practicing with the silver plated wire from Michael's). After researching a little about silver wire, it looks like Argentium Silver is the way to go. This is pure silver that's been doped with Germanium, which creates an anti-tarnish layer on the surface, also this silver alloy is nickel-free, meaning some people who are allergic to silver can wear this kind.
Another reason I wanted pure silver is to fuse the ends of the wire into balls to act as head pins for beads (otherwise I need a little loop or something at the end of the wire to keep the bead from falling off). When you heat up metal it tends to discolor and one way to remove this discoloration is the "pickle" the metal in an acidic solution (yes, Google is an awesome tool).
Experiment #1
It turns out you can do this with simple household ingredients like a vinegar (weak ascetic acid) and salt solution. I first tried this at room temperature and boy is it sloooooow, I left the piece in overnight and it was finally shiny by the morning, yes ... success, sort of.
But you all know I'm just not a terribly patient person, so "There must be a FASTER way" I cried as I headed to the local Second Hand store for a crock pot, and VOILA,
I present to you the "PICKLE POT"
Experiment #2
As one of the goals was to melt a ball on the end of the wire to hold a bead with a 1/16" hole in it, I wanted to try in a couple of gauge wires to see how big each gauge allowed.
I started with, from top to bottom, 16 gauge silver, 20 gauge silver and 20 gauge bronze (way cheaper than silver and so I just had to try it too).
hmm, lost a bit of the 20 gauge silver when I kept trying to make the ball bigger and then the whole damn thing would just drop right off the end of the wire onto the counter : (
close up of the discoloration, referred to as firescale
the bronze end fell off, not sure if this is normal or just my inexperience? Anyway, here is the silver after only 2 hours in the hot vinegar/salt solution.
