Duration: 11:51

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In this video I take the exciting challenge of crafting my very own gold wedding bands. The decision to make these myself was a meaningful choice. It's not just about the potential savings from recycling old and broken family gold but about the joy of wearing something I made.
While working with gold is something new for me, my previous experience with lost wax casting came in handy. And I have to admit, gold is truly a beautiful material to work with.

My setup is simple, utilizing tools I've made for other tasks. Moreover I think wedding bands are often crafted differently, involving the soldering of metal strips rather than employing the lost wax casting technique. Anyway, after a first failed attempt due to insufficient metal and an overly thick sprue tree, I tried again and the subsequent attempt was successful, resulting in perfectly-sized right out of the plaster.

The resulting rings weigh in at 5g and 7.2g respectively. After remelting the filings and sprues, a total of 10.85g of gold remains. This accounts for a slight weight loss (1 gram) compared to the chains I melted, possibly due to other metals dissipating like solder. All the old chains and materials I repurposed were made of 18-carat gold (750 or 75% gold), the ideal alloy for wearable adornments.

At the end, I'm thrilled with the outcome. However, there's a joy that surpasses all of this. I'm over the moon to be marrying my wonderful girlfriend on the very day this video is published!❤️

Thanks a lot for watching, I hope you liked the video! Suggestions and comments are welcome. Leave a like and share with anyone who might be interested!

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0:00 Forming Wax Rings
1:48 Lost Wax Mold Preparation
2:55 Investment Plaster
3:56 Wax Burnout
4:18 Melting Scrap Gold
5:48 First Cast
6:38 Second Attempt
7:19 Ring Cleanup
8:25 Saving Every Bit of Gold
9:01 Final Polish and Buff
10:05 Result and Story Time