This component is 15/16" wide and 1-1/16" tall pressed into a piece of 1” X 1-1/4" sterling silver, fine silver, or copper.
This is a pressing of an impression die that can be used for jewelry making or used in other art and craft applications.
To form these components, we use pieces of 20-gauge or 18-gauge copper, sterling silver, or fine silver that are pressed into impression dies using a hydraulic press. To use them, you can saw them out around the edges of the designs using a jeweler's saw. The impression dies that we use to make these pressings are not for sale.
Our die pressings are professionally pressed by us to ensure the best quality of details. Some of the impression dies that these are pressed from are replicas of dies that were carved by hand in the late 1800's and early 1900's.
Potter USA Die I173 Looping Dragon of Old
Dragon #80 Dragon of Old Sterling Silver Impression Die Pressing
Usage
The pressings are meant to be used as components for jewelry making but can also be used in many other art or craft applications. To use them for jewelry you can saw them out around the edges of the designs using a jeweler's saw with a 2/0 blade. After you saw around the circumference, use a file to clean up any edges that need attention. To achieve a perfectly flat bottom edge for soldering to a backplate, lay the cutout face up on a piece of 600 or 800 grit wet/dry sandpaper and move it with your fingers in a figure eight pattern until you can see that all edges make good contact with your backplate. This will ensure that your pressing will solder nicely to your backplate with no gaps. To avoid the possibility of pressure building up in the dead air space between your pressing and backplate when soldering, it's suggested that you drill a tiny hole somewhere on the backplate or in an inconspicuous place on the image to allow any built up pressure to escape so your pressing doesn't fly off the surface of your backplate while soldering.
You might notice that some pressings have a grainy or uneven texture around the edges of the image. Those uneven or grainy areas come directly from the impression die and are unavoidable because the texture was created by the die artist when carving the die. It can be easily removed when the image is cut out. Any areas on the pressings that look like they might not be completely clear are also a result of the die artist's work and cannot be avoided or improved upon by adding more pressure, annealing, or re-pressing. We often anneal once or twice during the pressing process to ensure the best possible result and we press each piece to the full extent of the details that can be transferred to the sheet metal.
Return and Refund Policy
Please check the sizes and gauges carefully when ordering, as we do not accept returns or exchanges.
Please note that we check the quality of each pressing carefully before we send them out.
Shipping Info
We offer shipping via USPS. Your shipping options will appear in your shopping cart. Shipping Insurance is included on all orders.
