Happy dance time!

I can re-size sterling silver rings! Doing a happy dance now! lol
These are my first three attempts:


The turquoise ring was purchased about 10 years ago at a flea market. It was a size 6 when I got it (my pinkie is a size 8) so I hammered the band out until I could wear it on my pinkie. I never wore it much because all that hammering made for one very thin ring band and plus the turquoise ring face, in my opinion, was too large for my pinkie.

The agate ring I found on eBay not long ago and it was a size 8. Again, it fit my pinkie but had a ring face too large for that finger.

The labordorite ring is my eldest sister's (Please don't tell her I was wearing it without asking. She gets a little cranky about things like that. lol) and was a size 6. Her hands are even larger than mine. She wears a size 10 pinkie.

Last night I worked on these rings. The first one I tackled was the turquoise. I snipped off the useless ring band and took the cabochon out of it's setting before soldering on a whole new band. In taking the cab out I found a surprise or two. 1) The cab was a dublet and 2) the original maker of the ring didn't bother to solder the bezel wire ends together. The ring is now a comfortable size 10.


Next I tackled the agate. This time I did not remove the cab from it's setting. I used Therm-a-Guard to protect the ring face. This was much harder to do with my mini torch, but I eventually got the band to heat up enough to take the solder. I sized it to a 11.5 that way I could, on a good day, wear it on my pointer finger and on normal days where my hands swell, I could wear it on my middle finger.


The labordorite ring I took the setting out before sizing it. I had a time matching the spliced piece to the original band because it was a full mm thicker and a smidgen wider. I just soldered it on then used the dremal tool to grind away the excess. It was sized to a 12 to fit her ring finger.



What would it have cost for me to get one of these rings re-sized locally? $30.00 - one week wait ($40.00 if it needed sized up more than just 2 sizes). Or I could send it to my sister in Illinois and (including shipping) pay $20.00 - one month wait (any size). What did it cost me to do it myself? $1.25 per ring and a couple of hours time. :)

Happy dance time indeed! lol