2013-05-24

Raising pots - a finished specimen?

I have raised perhaps five or so bowls so far, and managed to solder wires onto two of them. The one illustrated on the left was raised from 0.9mm gilding metal (a low-zinc brass) to which I also soldered a foot. This latter was made of a 1.6mm thick silicon bronze disc, domed, with a 20mm hole sawn in the centre, after a suggestion made by my tutor Steve Wager. It is by no means a good piece of raising; there are hammer marks aplenty, the solder on the wires is quite meagre, and my draughtsmanship generally is fairly loose. But I was quite pleased with it. I filed out the hammer marks on the body of the pot above the wires (made of hand-drawn bronze), and below the fairly straight section of the body, to give something of a contrast. I subsequently wished I had made the foot from 1.2mm gilding metal to rationalize the colour scheme, but my stock of the latter is brand new and I didn't have the patience to quickly take off a small section so used a piece of 1.6mm silicon bronze that was handy. All metals were supplied by Columbia Metals Ltd.
Raised bowl with foot Raised bowl with foot
The second picture is of my tightest raised pot so far, with two round bronze wires soldered on. The picture shows the jig I concocted to allow me to solder an 11mm brass tube stem; my first attempt failed, too many gaps for the solder.

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