Questions about lettering on the inside of a ring

[Arnaud Van Tilburgh]

I could not find answers and tips on engraving on the inside of a ring.

I have tried to do this for a long time, I had the best result using a "flat" engraver. I didn't have the Graversmith then, but gold and silver ain't that hard to cut.

I have seen a lot of hand engravings on the inside of wedding rings, I studied them to find out how they where done.

Yesterday I tried it again with a 120° engraver, but it was not so good as I would like it to be.
I suppose there is a "trick" tot do this kind of engraving, can someone help me on that?

How I do it till now is cutting from the top of the letter to the bottom. I turn the engraver a bit to the outside of the roundness of the line. My example shows the direction I do it.
I also know that it is more easy to draw the letters at 45°.

So a little help on this would be welcome.

arnaud

 

[Daniel Houwer]

Hi Arnoud,

You might want to check this thread out.
http://igraver.com/forum/showthread.php?t=3600&highlight=alphabet+for+inside+rings

I spoke to the engravers of the Edelburijn in Holland last weekend. They do the inside engraving just with a carré graver. Just like another engraver over here.

Good luck with it.

Daniel

 

[Arnaud Van Tilburgh]

Tanks Daniel,this makes it already a bit more clear to me.

arnaud

 

[Sam]

Inside ring engraving can be quite a challenge because of the small space and limitations of graver movement. On wide rings I use a flat graver for the bright cuts and a square for the hairlines. I don't use a 120 inside rings as they can easily cut too wide.

I tell my students that on a scale of 1 to 10, if you rate your lettering as an 8, it will be about a 4 when engraving inside rings.

 

[mdengraver]

Aphabet for Inside Ring Hand Engraving

Search for this thread (Aphabet for Inside Ring Hand Engraving) . It provides you a good script alphabet for inside ring engraving. There are also many threads at the Engravers cafe on inside ring engraving, including how
to prepare your gravers.

 

[Arnaud Van Tilburgh]

You encourage me al lot Sam. but sure it is probably hard to do.
However it seems to me that 30 years ago, all wedding rings have hand engraving letterings. And although they looked impressive, looking at them on a magnification X10, you see the illusion of the handwriting. Just parts of the letters that were cut.

I don't know if I made myself clear. The inside ring engravings I'm talking about don't have outlines, it looks like cut in several parts when you look at it on a magnification X10, but only tapered lines.

I don' t have an example of it to make a photo, but I think these people that did these engravings had a trick to make it look like handwritings.

It is a pitty I can't show you on of these old wedding ring engravings, but as soon I got one I will show you. I'm from the old continent, perhaps they engraves wedding rings in a different way in the US.

arnaud

 

[James Roettger]

Arnaud, I like to use a 100 degree face with a 20 degree heal angle and the Lindsay relieving facet added. Before I had a sharpening machine I used a 90 degree face with a rounded heal at about 20 degrees lift which worked less well than my precision ground tips but still adequate. I find it very helpful to make the engraver very narrow for about 3/4 inch toward the end. This narrow tapered end allows greater turning angles when finishing things like the tops of rounded letters. I've seen a lot of the antique style letters you describe. Basically these guys skipped rounding the tops and bottoms of the lettering but nearly joined them. This is is result of the blocked access to inside rings. I also use homemade bent tools to acheive horizontal lines. Attached are some pictures of the gravers I use.

 

[Jim Sackett]

Arnud The way they taught me back in 1960 was to take Cork from champagne bottle or what ever. Lock it in the vise, hold the ring in fingers of left hand. Pushing it down into the cork a bit this will keep the ring in place while cutting with your right hand.

If the angle is right you don't have cut the whole line. With the correct angle the illusion of connection is created.

Jim Sackett

 

[Ron Smith]

You can engrave inside of rings in different styles, but this takes a lot of knowledge and someone to show you how to shape your gravers. The pictures that James shows don't give you enough information. You have to understand the need of the tool, particularly for horizontal lines. Old time engravers could do this work extremely well. They got down into the bottom of bowls and spoons etc. These were common engraver's tasks, but often an engraver would have to make a graver for just one job, and over a period of years would have an array of strange looking gravers that would boggle your mind. Not many left who know how to do this stuff.

This is something that needs to be shown as an apprentice situation as it is almost impossible to explain.

The curves needed in the tools and angles are a bit different from the standard gravers, but it can be done.

I must have done a thousand, and never did like doing them (difficult work), but it was work I couldn't afford to turn down. Machines couldn't do it then. I think they can now. You can get swamped with that kind of work once you get a reputation for it and do good lettering. Not many who do it nowdays, except jewelry engravers that is. If you could get with one of them and let them show you, that is probably what you should do to get it right. I wasted a few graver blanks learning the right shapes etc. You have to be able to work the steel. Anneal, bend, heat treat and then draw the tool to the proper hardness and if you get it wrong, you have to start all over. Anneal, bend, heat treat and draw the temper. The tool needs to be carbon steel too, which they all used to be when those technques were used, and every engraver knew how to do it.

Ron S

 

[Scratchmo]

You're right on Ron. The guy I apprenticed for (George Bickley) did so much stuff on spoons and bowl bottoms that his standard script graver had a heel that was cut to such an extreme angle he practically held it perpendicular to the work. He was so used to using that set up he used it on everything and tried to teach me to use the same set up on everything. I never could get used to it except on bowl bottoms.
They used to make a bent ring graver commercially, but I found them to be too flexible to work well. Maybe a heavier steel would work better, but I think my problem was trying to dig too deep. Anyway, if you want to try to make your own bent graver, it's not too difficult. You can start with a regular graver and heat it up to a dull red and allow it to slow cool. At this point, it's soft enough to bend to the desired shape.

Hardening and tempering gravers are really easy on high carbon steel. After you've bent the steel, just heat it up to orange hot, and quickly quench it in water to harden, plunging it in straight down vertically, and stir it quickly until cool. Gravers are so small they cool very quickly. Then, take it down to white metal with scotch bright or steel wool, or polishing wheel so you can see the temper colors in the next step.

To temper, SLOWLY heat it up until the business end turns a slight golden color and quench again. In tempering, I usually concentrate most of the heat on the handle end, allowing that end to temper down to a purple or blue while the tip is slowly heating up to the desired straw color. I have found that every so often, newly purchased high carbon steel gravers are not properly hardened and had to harden and temper them fresh out of the box, however, I've never run into a defective graver in high-speed steel.

 

[Arnaud Van Tilburgh]

Thank you all for you reply things are more clear now.
But as I said, I've seen and studied so many lettering in wedding rings with my diamond loupe (X10), and there are only a few horizontal lines, the b, t, v, w and z.

And of course there are engraving machines these days that can do the job, but I don't like it. I also think there are more people who want to pay a bit more for a hand engraved lettering in there wedding rings.

Ron and Scratchmo, sure I know how to work on steel, and how to temper it. And of course if I can find an old engraver who can show this kind of engraving I will aske him to show it to me. Bet as you said, there are only a few left who can do this. That is because machines took it over, and that is why I try to offer this to mu clients.

arnaud

 

[Mario Sarto]

Arnaud, all wedding-rings we sell today are rounded inside. Some more, some less. I believe this makes it harder to engrave them by hand. But i am with you, engraving by hand looks ten times better than a laser or a machine can do...
Mario

 

[Arnaud Van Tilburgh]

Mario, I agree about the round inside of wedding rings, bus as I'm doing ting different, I make al ring myself. And here people want wide wedding rings. And it is not obvious to make them round.
Because of the higher gold prices, I sell a lot of Titanium handmade wedding rings, and I think I' almost the only on in the world. I have a well visited webside and although my shop window is not that well visited, I have a lot of customers via Google. And they find their way to my shop, sometimes they take 2 1/2 ours on train to see me.

I appreciate that a lot and that is my solution on the economic crisis. The advantage of this crisis could be that only the best survives.

I also know here in east of Europe, people have enough of the cheap Chinese crap, so an handengraving in a wedding ring could be hard to do, but I don't mind spending some time on it, even the way I do it, my customers prefer this instead of machine engraving.

arnaud

 

[Jim Sackett]

Hi Arnaud

I think the outlines shown on the pictures I posted are only examples on paper to show the direction of the cuts. I use a 90 degree square graver. And roll it away from me to get the heavy body stroke cuts. And back to normal position for hairlines.

Jim Sackett

 

[Arnaud Van Tilburgh]

Thanks for the tip Jim, I will study the directions on the paper.

arnaud

 

[Ron Smith]

Scratchmo,

I woud have described the process more thoroughly but many don't have a clue to the colors requred to get the tool the right temper. Light straw to one is dark straw to another, if you know what I mean, and you can get the tool too soft, so until you see it, it is just speculation and it is better if you can get someone to show you. I think I described it in my some of my writings somewhere, but there aren't that many interested until you get into the jewelry end of engraving.

Good description however, almost verbatum to what I would have said.

Thanks for the info.

Arnaud,
If you know how to work and temper steel, you are half way there. Getting the right curves for the item you are working on is the trick. One way I made a ring graver is to take a bent graver and turn it up side down and put a couple bends in it to clear the sides of the ring. Then sharpen the very end to make a belly out of it.

Wish I could figure out how to get a drawing into an attachment, but maybe you can imagine what I am saying.

Ron S

 

[tldcowboygear]

Hey Ron,

Do a drawing, take a picture of it and post as a jpeg.

 

[Arnaud Van Tilburgh]

Ron I think I can imagine what you are saying, but of course a drawing is worth 1000 words.

arnaud

 

[Ron Smith]

inside ring graver

Okay, here is your thousand words.

Wow! pretty sloppy picture, but maybe you get the idea. If not, I will try again.

You will have to play with the angles anyway, to suit your own hands and dynamics.

Hope this helps.

Ron S

 

[Arnaud Van Tilburgh]

Ron, thanks for posting, I will make one, try it, change it till it does what I want it to do.
Once it works I show it. And as I understand is that you have to understand how a engraver works and then invent a model that can do the movements with a face and heel in the right direction.

arnaud