How to Post Process Silver 3D Prints - Shapeways Blog

How to Post Process Silver 3D Prints

October 10, 2011

So you have your beautifully polished silver 3D print back from Shapeways and your retinas are now burnt from the gleaming shine, want to know how to to the gloss down a notch or ten? Boiled Eggs.

Mark Cheng has given his Duality Ring the boiled egg in a ziplock bag treatment to give his intricate design a little more pop in Silver (below left).  He also tried a short bath of aluminum foil/baking soda/salt/hot water (below right).

What post processes have you used to make your silver prints shine (less).

Comments

As I’m currently in a metalworking class I’d recommend picking up some Liver of Sulfur, putting it in hot but not bubbling water (low heat). It will slowly darken until it’s completely black. You can then use a rag or shammy to lighten parts of it while leaving the deep grooves black.

  1. Sterling silver can be darkened by placing it in household bleach (doesn’t always come out as black as with liver of sulfur though), or you could just heat the piece up with a jewellers torch and get the surface to oxidise.
  2. To take the shine back a bit on a highly polished piece you can give the model a bit of a rub with a Scotchbrite.
  3. Or you could satin finish the accessible parts of it by using emery paper.
  4. If you’ve got access to a sandblasting machine this can also achieve a matte finish.
  5. Using jeweller’s drills and diamond drills, the surface can be textured in various ways.

🙂 Janelle

  1. some extra polishing
  2. Household bleach
  3. Scotchbrite
  4. kitchen scourer
    I uploaded images to unellenu.com -> techniques -> finishing

🙂 Janelle