Andrew110
Pendant 3D printed in platinum at Cooksongold.
For the last issue of TCT Magazine, I decided to tempt fate on a scale never tempted before. The magazine went to press around St. Valentine's Day and for the second year in a row, I was not at home but I had something up my sleeve that would hopefully make up for it.
The risk came with putting this story into print with the potential of it being seen a good week before my grand gesture thus potentially ruining it full stop. But there was a relevance, and regular readers will know the great lengths I go to for a dash of editorial colour.
See, for the jewellery feature I visited the UK's largest jewellery district to see how the students of the BA (Hons) Jewellery and Silversmithing Design for Industry (DFI) course at Birmingham School of Jewellery (SoJ) in the UK are reshaping the manufacture of jewellery.
The course is in its tenth year and as a celebration, the team, including Claire Price, Keith Adcock, and Andy Howard along with Frank Cooper, invited me down to see some of the output the current crop of students are producing.
One of those works that immediately draws attention, due to the fact it seems almost out of place is a set of honey dippers, the decorative handles of which are printed in nylon on a selective laser sintering machine at UK service bureau, Digits2Widgets (D2W).
"As part of their first week of inductions into the technology to try and understand it we get them to produce these honey dipper toppers," explains Senior Lecturer / Programme Leader, Claire Price. "They get a visit to D2W and some space on the machine. It is a one day task playing with T-Splines, having seen the machine and what it can produce, understanding the tolerances and materials. It is about getting them used to the speed too, rather than saying 'oh we have six weeks to come up with a design for a honey dipper,' the reality is that they wouldn't have that."
Decorative honey dipper handles printed in nylon SLS.
The course is grounded in that very reality of hard industry; it is geared up to give the students a skill set that will get them work in a fast-changing world. Amongst learning CAD skills, laser cutting, laser welding and 3D printing, the students have to spend some time using a traditional jewellers workbench.
"One of the first things we get them to do is to work on commissions," says Keith Adcock, Senior Technologist at the Jewellery Industry Innovation Centre (JIIC). "It's all well and good designing your own piece from scratch, but in the real world, they'll more than likely be doing commissions restoring rings from grandparents.
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Exhibit at the UK's definitive and most influential 3D printing and additive manufacturing event, TCT 3Sixty.
"Most companies want people now who can do a little bit of CAD, but they also have those bench skills. There was a thought that 3D printing and CAD would replace modelmaking. What has happened is, an awful lot of people who are now CAD designers in the trade are just modelmakers, but they've swapped the tools. I do the same job now as I've always done except I don't smell of oil so much; I used to do die-sinking and toolmaking, and I still do that, but now I use a computer."
Reinventing Relics
Hand-dyed bracelet finished with metal detail.
Alongside the students' work is that of the current Artist in Residence (AiR), Timon Tio. In exchange for a little student support, AiRs have the opportunity to develop new work and technical skills. Timon's current collection is an example of what can be achieved using 3D printing from head to toe.
"I had to understand how the technology works, understand the value of the material, had to understand the final target, understand the people who will be willing to buy this," says Timon. "First of all, I thought about this project as something that not all of the people could buy and not just be a conceptual piece of jewellery."
The first product in what Timon hopes will become a line is the Relic Bracelet, printed in Nylon as one piece with a working clasp using SLS, it was then hand-dyed, and a 3D printed and then cast metal detail added as a final flourish. It has a good weight, close up the surface finish is impeccable, and importantly it is selling as a product. But what stands Timon in great stead is that he came at this from not just a creative point-of-view but that of a Product Designer.
"The bracelet comes inside a 3D printed packaging that was printed as one," explains Timon. "I had to adjust the proportions so I could maximise my space inside a D2W container and lower the price for the end user. The 3D printed box not only protects the bracelet but also becomes an object of art. I was very inspired by the relics, (ed. hence the name) the relic is the remains of a physical scent or the goods of a person and is usually kept within a memorial, and this is the relationship between the bracelet and the packaging."
Relic bracelet and packaging printed as one.
I asked Jonathan Rowley, Design Manager at D2W how many people print with the packaging in mind...
"Not enough!" He exclaimed. " If you imagine that bracelet laid out in CAD costs what it costs, the added expense of adding a little bit around it is negligible, and the value of producing the packaging simultaneously is immense."
The judges at the 2018 Goldsmiths’ Craft & Design Council Awards appear to agree and Timon's project took home a Gold Award for Production Jewellery at the ceremony earlier this week.
Jewel in the Crown
There are many technology routes the students can follow for their final submission; they aren't required to use 3D printing, though most do at some stage in the process. There's plenty of equipment on hand, be it traditional or new, in SoJ's phenomenal facility. But the Technology Hub ran by Frank and Keith's team is of most interest to us with its array of 3D printing systems including a 3D Systems ProJet, an EnvisionTEC Perfactory, a Solidscape machine (they call it that "the workhorse") and a Cooksongold / EOS Precious M 080.
Using the latter laser sintering technology, student Andrew Cowley has created an incredible pendant using 3D printing and other laser technologies to a whole new level. Due to a desire to make the pendant in platinum Andrew had to turn to Cooksongold themselves as the Technology Hub's version of the M 080 is currently exploring the constraints and opportunities of printing in silver.
"Initially, I wasn't planning on sintering it at all," says Andrew. "The plan was to make it in two halves and laser weld it together, but because of the shape - as it got more organic - I realised it'd be a nightmare to match up, and I didn't want an ugly seam around the outside. I also knew that the silver laser sintered material wouldn't be up to the standard I wanted and I hadn't seen anything laser sintered in platinum, so I took a bit of a risk."
The platinum pendant on the Precious M 080 build plate.
The pendant consists of four parts; there's the stone; the body, printed in platinum; and the two oval-shaped inserts were printed and cast using the Solidscape machine. The platinum printing was uncharted territory, and the price represented a challenge Andrew had to create a workaround for:
"I had to change the weight a few times, the first time I did it, it was coming out weighing 20 grams, and I couldn't afford to get that done, I had enough budget for around 10 grams, so there was a lot of trial and error. I made some of the holes bigger and kept cutting and cutting so I had a shape I was happy with that was affordable." Lecturer Claire says that although many students like the idea of printing in precious metals the cost proves too prohibitive and Andrew "worked his socks off" part-time to be able to afford the piece.
Once the part was finished (three-and-a-half days ahead of schedule too) there was the matter of finishing. Andrew did something that Frank Cooper reliably informs me he'd only seen one person try on a piece this small before, "The technical term is laser ablation," Frank shouted across the room.
"Cooksongold had removed the supports for me but I tried everything to get tools into the holes to finish the inside, and I couldn't get that surface quality I wanted," says Andrew. "Someone at my work suggested zapping it with a laser welder and see what happens. I wasn't sure how dense it was going to be so there was a chance I was going to hit it with a laser, and the whole thing was going to disintegrate, which was my biggest concern. If I had done it with silver, it would have blown a hole in it."
Luckily it worked, by turning the laser welder down 20% and upping the beam diameter from 0.2 - 0.4 mm to 1 mm Andrew was able to polish the insides leaving little sign of the fact it was 3D printed. The piece is a work of art, and you can tell how proud the entire team is with Andrew's work.
After the meeting, I had some time to kill before my train home. I started to look around and began to get a feel for the decades of craft that lingers in the Jewellery Quarter air. It hit me there, after my tour, why jewellery, due to the painstaking craft involved, has become such a valuable commodity over thousands of years.
With that, I decided to go through with something I've been thinking about for a while and buy an engagement ring. Thanks to the Design for Industry course I ended up spending way more time thinking about the craft of making the thing than I would have previously.
For those of you wondering if my grand plan paid off. She said yes.
