Jewelry Studio: Silver Wire Fusing (Liz Jones)

This book is a useful guide for anyone who has no or little prior knowledge of metal fusing but is familiar with soldering and other torch techniques. It is clearly written with easy to follow steps to enable the development of basic fusing skills.

My experience with metal jewelry-making stems primarily with sterling silver (SS), while the use of nearly 99% silver has been used with my glass and Precious Metal Clay (PMC - also approx. 99% silver) work. However, I have to admit that at times the steps taken when soldering SS and removing fire scale is time consuming. I decided to look into working with a purer form of silver and therefore purchased this book. Yes much is the same, but the ability to fuse silver without seeing the fire scale was pleasing (tested it yesterday - couldn't wait). Expense-wise it is often a set-back, but when you take into consideration time also equals money when in production of jewelry pieces, this may equal out. One of the most useful charts in the book was on page 67 where information of amount of wire needed to produce various sized rings. I also enjoyed playing with my little propane torch more than ever (have used it for other things). Yes this is a basic book, but one that is useful fo... Read more

I have recently started silversmithing. Before I finally tried it, I was kind of scared of the process. I bought this book because I thought it would be easier to just fuse the silver wire instead of going through all the processes of fluxing, soldering, and pickling silver, and I thought I would have to have an oxyacetyline torch to do it. In the fusing technique used in this book, the author uses a butane torch, which is quite strong enough to melt sterling and fine silver. I did suceed in completing some of the projects (while experiencing the expected learning curve of destroying quite a lot of silver). However, when I began doing the flux/solder/pickle type of silversmithing, I was quite surprised to find that not only can I solder jewellery findings with a butane torch, doing it this way nearly guarantees that I'm not going to ruin things accidentally. (Heavier projects DO require different gases, but small things like jewellery can be done with butane.) Solder, particu... Read more

I enjoyed this book a lot. Has good examples for your personal aspirations in wiring. Great photos,easy to follow instructions. Great for beginners as well as the seasoned jewelry maker.

First of all, the price was very good! Second, the information was great to get me going on fusing fine silver wire, it is so fun! The color pictures were clear and consise, it helped me gain the knowledge I needed to start fusing! I would recommend this book for any fusing beginner!