How to Make a Semiprecious Stone Ring

Jewelry is a great way to express your style and personality. Making your own jewelry may seem like a daunting task, but with the right tools and a little practice, it can be tons of fun and rewarding to be able to display your end products.

Things You'll Need

• Silver or gold
• Metal smithing hammers and irons
• Solder
• Torch
• Rotary tool (Dremel) with polishing heads
• Metal cutting saw
• Metal files
• Flux
• Clamps, tweezers and pinpoint metal tool
• Pickling solution in crock pot
• Sandpaper for metal
• Stone of choice
• Pushing stone mounting tool
• Burnisher

Instructions

1. Draw out the design of the ring you would like to make. Pick out the stone you want in your ring. Some stones look better with gold than silver and vice versa. For instance: citrine is a gold-colored stone and so looks better with yellow gold versus silver or white gold, while smoky quartz is a brown stone and while can go with yellow gold, it stands out more when done with silver or white gold.

2. Take a piece of paper and place a small strip around your finger and make a mark where it ends. Lay this paper out flat onto the half round metal you are going to use for your band of your ring. Use the hand saw to cut the metal off for the size of your band.

3. 

   Take the half round metal to the steel iron (anvil) and use a metal hammer to band the metal into a circle shape. The steel iron should have a horn-looking end that the metal can be bent around to make the circular shape. Once happy with the band being bent into the perfect circle, take it to your fireproof area with your torch.

4. Place flux onto the ring and cut some small pieces of hard solder. Heat up the ring with your torch until it glows a slight orange. Place the solder with a pinpoint tool to the place where the metal joins. Keep heating the area with the torch until the solder melts and connects the two pieces.

5. Take the ring to the pickling solution so it can clean off the residue. Check the ring to see if any extra solder got anywhere and if it did, use the metal file to remove it.

6. Using metal wire (silver or gold), wrap it around the stone that is going to be used. This is to create the basket to hold it. It should be slightly smaller than the stone's face. Bend two pieces of wire in half and form them to a "V" shape. Make sure they extend far enough to attach to the ring and the basket and still have enough to be used for prongs.

7. Take all the pieces to the torch area. Use the hard solder again for the first attachment of the prong setting. Place the two "V's" together to look like a tent. These are small, so be very careful when heating them to not melt them. Once heated, place the small piece of solder at the tip where the two "V's" meet and connect them together with the solder.

8. Take the circle or oval piece for the basket and place flux on it and use the hard solder to close the circle completely. Take these pieces over to the pickling solution and clean them off. Remove any excess solder with the file.

9. Place the circle of the basket piece into the center of the "V's" that were joined. Using the clamp, have them held together. Use the medium solder and heat up the pieces and place the solder where the circle and "V" pieces meet to join them together. Place them in the pickling solution to clean them off.

10. Use the soft solder to connect the newly made basket with prongs onto the ring band. Use the clamp to keep the basket in place. Heat each piece, make sure to not heat the basket too much until the ring is fully heated. Place the solder at the joining place of the end of the "V's" to the band of the ring. Once connected, place in the pickling solution and clean it off.

11. Clean up the metal by first filing all any residue or extra solder. Then use the sandpaper to smooth the surface. An initial polishing can also be done. Use the Dremel with the polishing attachments and press firmly onto the ring. The ring can be held with a ring clamp or by hand. Be sure it does not get too hot or loose or it may fly out of your hand and across the room.

12. Place the stone into the basket prong setting. Fit it securely. Tweezers can be used to fit the metal basket around the stone.

13. Clip the prongs off with metal cutting scissors so they are just long enough to go up over the stone's top surface. File the edges of the cut wire and then sand them with the sandpaper.

14. Use the prong pusher tool to set the metal of the prongs over on top of the stone's surface. Start at one corner and then move to the one diagonally across from it. Then continue to the other two. Use the burnisher to press the prongs further and smoothly against the stone's surface.

15. Take the completed ring back to the Dremel and do a final polishing until the surface is as bright and smooth as wanted. Display and enjoy your new ring.

Tips & Warnings

• Wear safety glasses when using any equipment. Once you have successfully mounted one stone, you can go to making multiple baskets for several stones to be set on one ring.