Ring in Purple Heart & Silver... past weekend's work

[RoughboyModelworks]

Well, it's not a model but I spent the past weekend making this ring for my wife for our anniversary. A fun project though certainly challenging to produce, it's made from Purple Heart and Silver. Since purple is her favourite colour, Purple Heart was the obvious choice in addition to it being very hard and dense, actually difficult to machine. A few setbacks along the way generated some trenchant and colourful commentary at the bench. Ring is wrapped in 26 gauge Argentium silver wire which also performs a structural function, reinforcing the wood band. The 24 pins, representing the 24 hours in the day are 21 gauge silver.



Paul

[finescalerr]

So on top of everything else you have the skills of a jeweler? -- Russ

[Chuck Doan]

Priceless!

[chester]

Beautiful Paul. I've had the opportunity to work with purpleheart several times and found it always was a challenge. It does not take to wood glues very well and the grain is so tight that your tools must be super sharp. It takes a real talent to get the results shown, bravo.

[Ray Dunakin]

Beautiful, and very cool!

Congrats on your anniversary. How many years is it?

[MinerFortyNiner]

Outstanding workmanship, Paul.

BAD news, the wife saw it, now she's wondering when I am going to make a ring for her...thanks a lot, man!   

[Philip Smith]

Happy Anniversary to you all. She's one lucky gal!

Philip

[RoughboyModelworks]

Thanks guys... she loves it and that is the main thing of course. We've been together for eleven years and married for two. I believe I'm the lucky one Philip as she's my best friend too and fully supportive of all my eccentricities, obsessions and general curmudgeonly behavior, much to the amusement of my father who believes she deserves an award...

You're welcome Verne...

Chester, yes it is a difficult wood to work with and your cutting tools have to be perfectly sharp to get a quality result. Grain structure is part of the problem. It has a tendency to be conflicting, so you can be cutting with the grain one minute and against the next on the same surface... challenging to say the least. It can also be brittle so takes great care in working, especially with a small cross section. One of the problems I had with this was boring the finger hole as it dulled my boring bar almost immediately then broke it. I ended up finishing the boring by hand with gravers... very delicate work.

Paul

[marc_reusser]

Beautiful work.

Happy anniversary.


Marc

[Mobilgas]

Very nice Paul        Happy Anniversary          Craig