The Ring - Part 3

Wednesday we had our church employee picnic in Central Park. During the weeks leading up to the picnic, I was asked incessantly to play softball with all my comrades, but it brought up too many ill feelings reminiscent of high school. I opted to sit in the bleachers and work on my ring. Had it been wiffle ball, it might have been a different story. I wasn't alone as pretty much all the cool people were in top of the bleachers, just like in high school. That was a million years ago.

I filed for probably two hours straight with some spoon tapping here and there. I did have to answer the question, "What on earth are you doing?". As with all the things I do in my free time, either people think I'm crazy or rather intrigued. They never seem to relate however, which is why this is going on my own finger.

The Ring as of 6/25/09

The Ring - part 2

I'm trucking through this thing much faster than I anticipated. I'm even holding off on shaping it anymore because it is going onto my right hand index finger. My index finger is pretty stubby, so I realized that if I shape it too much, it will shrink beyond what will fit on my finger.

I went to Zales and found that my finger is about size 10, which comes out to about 20 mm across. I'm going to do more measurements to be more precise on how much I can bang away before its too late. I don't mind it being a skinny ring anyway.

I did drill the center out, which was rather difficult since I don't have a vice. I had to hold the thing or put it on the floor. I actually made sure to bite down in case I went into a finger. It will be a breeze to dremel out the rest of the ring when the time comes.

The Ring as of 6/21/09

I can't understand for the life of me why the other guy took a year to form his ring. I've been going at this for five days and have accomplished a considerable amount. I think it is because he is holding his quarter while he taps. When he holds the ring and taps, the quarter naturally moves when struck lessening the blow. My method is such that I place the ring on my computer desk running parallel with the wire frame. The desk has a beveled edge like a spoon, so I'm essentially bashing two sides with every hit. The rounded corners allow for a nice centered strike on the bottom. Bear in mind, I usually put a sock doubled over in between as the banging can be very loud.

One Nerd To Rule Them All

So thanks to my friend Elise's much more informative blog, Dum Spiro Spero, I have decided to make a ring out of a silver quarter. While scouring a flea market during a blind date, I chose this 1960 quarter because it was in very good shape and looked almost new. There is no real significance to this year for me aside from the fact that Psycho was released in 1960 and that movie rules the world. I figured this first go around would be a test run anyway so I wasn't looking for anything too special.

For those not familiar with the process, I'll briefly explain. Any quarter from 1964 and before is all silver and is not made up of various metals as in today's quarters. This is common knowledge and why you rarely find older quarters in circulation. To make the ring, you get a spoon and tap the sides of the ring until it forms into a ring shape. Lastly, you drill out the middle and dremel it smooth.

I must have thought these were more malleable that they are. Somehow when reading the blog, I glazed over the part where it took the guy a year to form the ring. Now I understand why. Last night I tapped steadily while watching all of This Island Earth from 1954. A stellar movie with really advance special effects for the time. Running time for This Island Earth 88 minutes. At approximately five taps per second for nearly an hour and a half, this is how far I have come.

The Ring as of 6/16/09

You can clearly see that I pounded my way through the ridges that surround the ring. The outer lip is now forming. I don't believe this will take a year, but it won't go fast.