Basket Settings

Lesson: Basket Settings

Basket settings are commonly used for faceted stones that you would like to seat higher on a piece than prongs allow or for larger faceted stones as the basket offers more structure and security.

• Form a piece of wire to sit under your stone. The edges of the wire should meet the edge of your stone. This is the seat for the stone
• Form another wire shape smaller than the first.
• Solder each shape closed.
• Using your round needle file, file grooves on each ring to orient the prongs for soldering.
• Cut 1 piece of wire (long) for every 2 prongs you want.
• Form prong wires into U shapes.
• Using third hands and pumice rocks hold the U shapes in an X pattern.
• Slide the smaller ring inside the wires and orient so that the grooves match up with the wires.
• Solder smaller ring to wires.
• Slip larger ring inside the wires and hold with a third hand.
• Solder larger ring to wires.
• Clip off the bottom of the U shapes and file the ends of the wires to meet flush with the bottom ring.

• Do any other soldering.

To set:

• Place stone in the setting, and mark where each prong meets the girdle.
• Clip off the prongs and round the ends with a cup bur
• Use a hart bur to cut a groove about 20% through each prong at your mark.
• Use nylon-jaw pliers or the prong pusher to push the prongs over the stone.
• They will bend where you have the grooves.
• The stone should be secure in the setting with no movement.

Other soldering options for basket settings:

• Place large ring on soldering board.
• Place U shapes tips down and push into soldering board until the grooves meet the wires.
• Solder ring to wires.
• Slip smaller ring into setting and hold with third hand.
• Solder smaller ring to wires.
• Clip off bottom of U shapes and follow above steps.
• You can also use a soldering aid clay or casting investment to hold all of the pieces in place and do all of your soldering at once.