can any of you "BURNISHERS" out there tell me how to burnish real fired gold and why it is done at all. i fire gold onto pieces but have never burnished. i believe that the gold is different fom my regular gold too.thanks in advance for any info and tips.
Steve Bath
In article , paula writes
"burnishing" as a process is not just limited to clay work. other fields use the burnish process to gain a higher quality surface finish. it's an extension of "sanding", buffing, or polishing. generally it's done to improve the surface quality thru surface hardening. so it's usually a hard material pressed onto the workpiece material. the process also "work hardens" the surface which means the surface "skin" is distinctly harder then the primary "parent" material. the grains of the material are more dense. in the metal working field you can increase the life of a part (get MILLIONS of cycles from a part before it fails) thru work hardening and thru achieving a very smooth surface.
in woodworking, lathe turning, after a piece is well sanded you can use a scrap piece of wood to press upon the workpiece while spinning to get a shine from the new work piece. (stay too long and you can burn wood too...). the fiber grains of the wood are all pressed down tight with the new workpiece. (staining burnished wood parts is harder to accomplish since the grains are all closed off on the skin of the workpiece - the stain can't penetrate the wood).
in metal working burnishing can be done to achieve extremely fine tolerances and get an extremely hard surface on the part. for instance, if you want a hole say .250 +/- .00003 inches in diameter, you can drill a hole smaller then the final size and SMASH a ball bearing thru the hole. the ball bearing being very hard & smooth will force the hole to the ball bearing's size.
for your gold pieces, you can do the same but you should use a piece of gold to burnish with so you do not contaminate the gold with some other material. for soft materials you'll also want to consider using a gold burnishing tool that is similar in hardness such as 18 carat upon 18 carat. i don't know what the hardness is of fired gold but i suspect it's very soft. using an old ring or such would likely scratch the new fired gold.
for me - with a gold piece - i'd try buffing for a few hours 1st... unless you're polishing a brick of gold.
see ya
steve
steve graber
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