PRODUCING LIGHT WEIGHT THREE DIMENSIONAL JEWELRY ITEMS WITH VERTICAL WALLS OF A PREDETERMINED FORM AND HEIGHT ALL AROUND THEIR OUTSIDE CONTOUR

摘要

The present invention relates to the production of originaljewelry master model parts, in virtually any rigid material,assembling them in a mosaic style on a base and the productionof molds to produce duplicate copies of the form and detailsof the assembled parts in a thin thermoplastic sheeting that isthen cast in a selected metal using the well documented'lost wax process', in order to produce a very light weight copyof the master model parts.The 'lost wax process' uses a master model of a massive materialand specialized molds of it, in order to produce duplicate copiesof it in an expendable material that are invested in a mold filledwith a slurry of a ceramic based refractory material, the mold isplaced in a high temperature furnace that eliminates the expendablepattern and creates a cavity within the mold that is then filledwith molten metal, which, when solidified produces a massiveduplicate copy of the master model.The production of light weight jewelry items using to-day'sconventional jewelry production methods would entail producingeach model part separately, refinishing and assembling thedifferent parts using a selected soldering method, a step that isvirtually impossible to accomplish without leaving unattractiveseams that will tend to produce oxydation stains after a shortperiod; labour costs would be high.The expendable pattern material generally used in conventionalproduction methods is made up of a wax based product that has agranular surface, which is reproduced in the metal casting andmust be eliminated in the finishing steps of production whereasthe cast part of the invention uses a vacuum formed thermoplasticsheeting that reproduces a surface equal to that of a pane ofglass that results in an absolute minimum finishing requirementof the metal casting and produces a far more attractive finishedproduct at a much lower overall cost.