Class Ring Company?
Q.Anyone know if you can size a class ring up? Is it possible to stretch a ring up 2 sizes max? I have found several stretching or enlarging devices on the internet and wondered if this is done by cutting the ring or not? I have recently started to collect these rings and would like to be able to size. As I am not the orginal owner the orginal warranty will not apply.
A.You don't want to try to stretch it yourself, all kind of nasty things can happen. I don't mess with them and I've been donig this for a long time. Send it to the manufacturer and pay what they ask. Very few knowlegeable jewelers (those who've made the mistake of trying these before) will bother with class rings. It's not that their lazy. Here's a more complete discussion of sizing class rings... First, even the manufacturers, like Jostens, don't size their own rings. What they do, for the original owners, is to simply remake the ring. In the first place, sizing many of these rings is either impossible to do well, or very risky. And second, it would cost them more to have a repair department set up to do this, than it costs them to simply pull the mold and process another order. The original purchaser pays enough for the ring that on average, the company is still making money if they have to remake a few rings for sizing, plus it means that all their "sizing" or repair jobs end up looking perfect, like new rings, because of course, they ARE new rings. Given that they're making a new ring to size the ring, it's not surprising they only offer this for the original owner. First, some basics on ring sizing: For some simple, plain bands, rings can be stretched or "shrunk" in size. This applies usually to simple wedding bands without stones, or with very small ones in a few cases. Stretchers generally cannot be used on class rings. There are "roller" type stretchers of a couple designs that roll the shank only, thus enlarging the size of a ring. Somewhat tricky to control, they work best for softer metals than most class rings are made of, but in some cases, with yellow golds especially, I've been able to enlarge, slightly, even some heavy gents college rings with the "plier" type of roller. But it's a lot of work. The type of roller that looks like a little bench mounted micrometer is less suited, as it cannot follow a tapered shank. But it too, sometimes works. These tools, though, work by thinning the shank, and thicker shanks are thinned more for a given enlargement of size than thinner ones, as it's a proportional thing. So rollers can easily do a lot of damage very quickly, especially if you've not got much practice. And heavy stiff rings like college, or even many high school rings, are difficult to do an acceptable job with these tools. That leaves, for most purposes, the traditional methods of sizing rings. The back of the shank is cut, and either a second cut is made to remove an appropriate length of material (about 2.5mm per size)and the shank sides bent to bring the cut ends together, or the cut ends are spread apart in order to allow you to fit in a new additional bit of metal. The Seams must be tight fitting, not approximate, and then they are soldered with white or yellow gold solders appropriate to the metal of the ring. The problems encountered in sizing class rings are several: First, the castings for these are generally heat treated, so the gold is quite hard and springy. This makes it quite difficult to get the gold to bend, and stay, in the needed new position for soldering. Smaller ones, like many high school rings or ladies styles, can be done. But the heavy college rings? They can be almost impossible to bend without severe damage elsewhere to the ring, sometimes from cracking elsewhere, or from stresses built up around stones or inlays that then break, or simply from tool marks resulting from the heavy forces needed to bend the rings. Second, the highly detailed ring designs are easily damaged by pliers and such, which means that these hard to shape rings become even more delicate, as a jeweler often cannot have free use of the tools he/she would ordinarily be able to use to bend/shape the ring in sizing it. And most important, many of these rings are quite sensative to heat damage as might occur in soldering the shanks. While the jeweler can insulate the top (stone, inlays, etc), some of the heavier ones are hard to fully protect. The heat damage can occur in a number of ways: Inlaid stones can loose their encrustations, and many times, the stones themselves are set on a plastic gasket just under the stones edge, which acts as a seal and shock absorber, but which will easily melt if the ring gets hot. And many of the rings are sealed behind the stone, with resin fillers. These keep water and dirt from the back of the stone, but are also heat sensative. Most of these aspects are things not normally enountered in other types of jewelry.
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