Mokume-Gane Motion Ring
Introduction: Mokume-Gane Motion Ring
This Instructables is all about making a motion ring which was totally inspired by famous jeweler <PERSON>. He is an amazing artist and the level of craftsmanship is speechless. I don't want to make the ring in a simple material that's why I decided to make a mokume-gane which is a Japanese technique of fusing two or more nonferrous metals together. In my case, I use two different metals brass and copper. Mokume has a pretty high rate of failure if you are using brass because of their different melting points and that thing makes it a bit more difficult to make. But one more advantage is that it's not that expensive so you can take that risk. I made this material two times in the past and every time it's difficult to make something out of this material in one go. Since this is a layered pattern material that's why I decided to add two different patterns in this ring and that definitely gives it a much more vibrant pattern when you open up that ring that vibrant pattern can be seen all around the ring. Definitely, if you have some Jewellery tools like a rolling machine then it saves a lot of your time and is able to make perfect jewelry. One thing which I didn't show in the video is the annealing process of the material during the making process of the jewelry. This is an important process while making jewelry. Now, most of the nonferrous act differently and to soften them you need to dip them in water after getting red hot. The rest of the process you see during the journey. If you have some more tips and tricks to ease the process then surely post them in the comment section down below.
Supplies
Material and tools used.
For the jewelry builds it's better to have all the jewelry equipment you can possibly grab. I don't make jewelry very often so I didn't have too many tools regarding this particular field but there are a few basic tools which I used are listed down below.
1. Angle grinder
2. Sheet metal cutting scissors
3. Hammer
4. Plastic mallet
5. Ring mandrel
6. Rotary tool
7. Drill machine
8. 972
Polishing paste
9. Heating torch
10. Jewellery saw Material used
Material used
For the material, I used brass and copper sheet. The brass I have is 22 gauge in thickness while
the copper sheet is 20 gauge in thickness. I recommend doing one thing is to choose the material of the same thickness so that heating action remains consistent throughout the whole billet.
1. Copper sheet 20 gauge
2. Brass sheet 22 gauge
3. 1.6 mm brass rod
Step 1: ​Cleaning and Marking the Sheet
The first and foremost important process in making a mokume is the cleaning process. These materials get oxidized quite quickly and you can clearly see that on the surface also. So with the help of a Scotch Brite pad, I clean the oxidized layer of the sheet and make it nice and shiny. This process has to be done on both sides. Once the sheets are nice and shiny I started the layout process. The stack I am going to make is 50mmX 100mm. Since in the future I wanted to make a few more things out of this billet that's why I made a thick billet. I first made the marking on the sheet and then draw the cutting lines onto both sheets.
Step 2: ​Cutting the Sheet
Now, this isn't a small sheet and you can't cut it with a jeweler saw. So to do that I use metal cutting scissors and this will surely ease the process. Now one disadvantage of this process is that the edges are not going to come up straight but when you are going to press this then it's not going to create any problem.
Now if you are not using the pressure plate then this is going to be a rather difficult process for you need to make sure that the pieces you cut out need to be absolutely straight without curles. So I first cut the sheet from the shortest side and then cut them further down to the required size.
Step 3: ​Making a Pressure Plate
A pressure plate is a rather easy and most crucial thing while making mokume-gane. The main purpose of this is to apply constant pressure onto the billet while it's heated up. and this action is going to fuse the metals when it's going to reach the exact temperature. The advantage of this is that it has a high success rate and since you are not hammering the billet it's going to fuse a lot better. For the pressure plate, I am using a 15 mm thick plate and I made a layout of holes in this, center punch them, and then drilled a 12.5 mm hole because I am using 12 mm bolts. 972