How Metals Are Formed

What do our rings, chains, bracelets, and earrings all have in common? Besides the fact that they are all jewelry. They’re all made of metal! Metal is one of the key materials that make up every piece of jewelry. And it wouldn’t be able to stay together very well without it. But what is it that gives the metal its power, durability, shine, and conductivity? How is it formed in nature and the manufacturing process?

Metals and metal alloys are found in the Earth’s core. They are naturally occurring elements (from the periodic table) that need to be extracted from the core, which is miles deep underground. Metals such as copper, tin, nickel, aluminum, gold, silver, iron, and platinum can be found in trace amounts inside the rocks miners dig out. The rock and the deposits are eventually separated after extraction so the metal can be taken to get fashioned into objects like jewelry. 

During the manufacturing process, the metal ore traces are melted down into a liquid form and then cast into molds, among other devices. This process allows the manufacturers to work the metal into the shape that they want. This makes it much easier for jewelry smiths to take the metal and turn it into the jewelry that they have been envisioning. This is how it works for pure metals. But what about metal alloys? 

Metal alloys undergo a similar manufacturing process to pure metal. But their manufacturing has a few extra steps because they are a combination of two or more metals. First, the ores are crushed into powder, heated to a high temperature to melt, rinsed with water, they get the sludge filtered out of them, the liquid is precipitated out of the alloy, and an electrical current is applied to break strong chemical bonds. This is really important to understand because metal alloys are the materials most commonly used to make jewelry. It also gives insight into how toxic metals can find their way into what would look like jewelry made from pure precious metals. 

If you’re concerned about toxic metals in metal alloys, I highly recommend you read some of my other articles describing toxic metals. And do further research of course. I hope you learned something new from this piece and have a good rest of your week!