Real or Imitation Frosting on EKs ?

[Douglas 5]

OK ... the Mercury must make it runny . Not something that is hand held .
Any sign of the item being 'clamped ' some how for this procedure ?

Douglas

[Norm F]

It's an amalgam (in this case) of silver and mercury that is painted on the surface and then heated with a torch. The mercury vaporize the silver stick on the surface and the result is a bright layer of silver which probably is very pure and not easy tarnish. The process is very toxic and now forbidden in many countries. I believe in Italy it is still possible to fire gild ornamental pieces.

Maybe it was done when the cross was assembled and was the core protected against the heat of the flame by a protection sjablone?

Hi Wim,

That's very interesting. Sounds quite possible, but what are your sources to suggest that was the particular method used by Schwerin and others for the white frosting on the Minesweeper badges?

There were 14 makers of tombak Minesweepers and all employed some method of white frosting overtop the silvered water plume. Most makers, unlike Schwerin, continued the silvering and frosting over the entire reverse of the badge. In all cases the frosting was delicate, did not tarnish and was the first thing to wear off with use, even more so than the gilding.

That's a lot of makers and a lot of Minesweeper badges so I wonder if there was a cheaper and easier method used either instead of or as well as the method you describe?

Best regards,
---Norm

[Wim Vangossum]

Hi Norm,

I have no much idea's about the mine sweepers as I don't know them very well. The only thing that cached my eye was the strong similarity between the splashes created by the (fire)gilding and the splashes on the reverse fountain. That make me think that if the gold finish is fire gilded than the silver part is fire silvered? To me a procedure like this looks more likely than that they used some kind of high tech paint in that time that imitates silver finish. today we can take a modern silver spray and imitate silver in the blink of an eye but back then… ?


My goal is still to come to conclusions which solve this mystery. In all the reference works is written in general terms about possible used methods but no satisfying end-conclusion.

Pretend we didn't know anything about fire gilding, we would also talk and talk about some "painting like treatment' that imitate gold and give it a warm yellowish appearance but without naming it be the correct term namely the toxic old technique "fire gilding".

It would be great if we came to final conclusions about the silver treatment. The newt weeks all shall search and search in an attempt to find more.


Regards, Wim

[Dietrich Maerz]

Good examples of fire guilding are the eagles on the Mappe of the Oakleaves and higher. Mercury was a strategic resource and had to be requested. Same with the gold. The process was described in the article about the 50 German Cross with Diamonds and the award Mappe for the German Cross with Diamonds
I sincerely doubt that this expensive procedure was used on a regular war badge. Additionally, the surface of an Oakleave Mappe eagle is far superior to the one on a KM badge!

[Wim Vangossum]

Thanks for the input Dietrich. If mercury was restricted and the KM badges were not real fire gilded then the silver on them was not fire silvered and we must think about another, more cheaper treatment. I really hoped that I had found a good candidate for the procedure but it seems It goes back from the start..


Regards, Wim

[Wim Vangossum]

It seems there are two variations of fire silvering:

1. an amalgam of silver with mercury applied to the surface and then heated.

2. A metal surface coated with silver powder then heated to melt the silver into a continuous film.

[Douglas 5]

Here we a very interesting frosting scenario .

I do have this question . Why the 2 different frosting types for a really early made and short lived cross???
The one on the right is clearly the painted frosting type . The left cross with the dark bead groves and shiny bead tops I would think is galvanized .
Also both are made from different production dies ... on is the chip corner frame and the other is the cracked corner frame .

Douglas

[Wim Vangossum]

What we need is a time machine. It is probably as simple as can be but we fail to see the answers… And most people say just 'it's frosted" but they don't bother how it was exactly done.


Regards, Wim

[Douglas 5]

I should have asked straight out .

When was each of the 2 frosting methods put into use ... galv and painted type ?
Galvanized first and then painted - for example ?

Douglas

[Dietrich Maerz]

We only have the report from Deschler in which an early cross assembly is documented. That would indicate “first”, but who knows what the others did? A good starting point would be to look at WW1 and the 1939 Schinkel.