Here are our “Top Ten Myths of Palladium

1. Palladium can’t be cast – Traditional 950 Palladium/50 Ruthenium alloys are difficult to cast. These palladium alloys want to absorb oxygen and hydrogen producing severe gas porosity. Unless you have an expensive vacuum casting machine most jewelers can not cast the traditional palladium alloys, until now. Hoover’s 950 TruPd™ palladium alloys was developed as a casting alloy. Their new alloy greatly inhibits the amount of gas that’s dissolved, allowing investment casters to cast TruPd™. An argon gas cover is still recommended when melting palladium.

2. Palladium can’t be soldered – The old palladium alloys were difficult to solder and limited solders were available. Today, Hoover provides Easy, Medium, and Hard Palladium Solders for small soldering jobs. Their 20k white hard solder is the best solution for seamless soldering when sizing rings.

3. Palladium can’t be Laser welded – Traditional palladium/Ruthenium alloys were difficult to laser. No more with TruPd™ palladium. Lasers are very effective for repairing porosity for both palladium and platinum. Hoover offers palladium laser wire.

4. Palladium can’t be machined – With proper lubricants and polycrystalline cutter palladium can be machined. Hoover & Strong manufactures are full line of machined channel anniversary and wedding bands.

5. Die struck solitaire and earring settings have soft prongs – First generation new palladium alloys were soft. However, Hoover has improved its TruPd™ alloy and manufacturing techniques so that TruPd™ settings have prongs that won’t bend. Allowing for a secure setting.

6. Palladium ear posts & earnuts are too soft, they bend easy – Hoover has increased the hardness or temper of their alloy for their posts and nuts, so that they won’t bend with use. Hoover’s TruPd™ alloy for their posts and nuts has a Vickers hardness of 160, or equal to 14K white gold.

7. Palladium is much grayer than platinum – Many jeweler’s confuse the color of 14K and 18K palladium white gold with 950 palladium. Palladium white gold is grayer because they are gold alloys that use palladium to change their color to white or white/gray. 950 palladium alloys are whiter that palladium gold alloys because the pure palladium is white in color. Jewelers have commented that TruPd™ is even whiter than Palladium/Ruthenium.

8. You can’t get a full product range in Palladium – True of the past. Today, Hoover & Strong is the leader in palladium products. Their full range of products includes: grain, sheet, wire, blanks, solder, laser wire, settings, shanks, bands, anniversary bands and engagement rings. They even refine and custom cast palladium.

9. Palladium products do not have consistent color match – Hoover provides its TruPd™ alloys for their whole product range. A jeweler can be assured that if he uses Hoover & Strong’s mill products, custom casting services, findings or bridal ring they will receive a consistent color match in addition to a high quality product.

10. Palladium is the poor’s man platinum – Palladium is rarer than gold and is an element as part of the platinum group metals. Its purity, white color, strength offer consumer a superior product to white gold. TruPd™ palladium is nickel free, needs no rhodium plating, can be cast and soldered. Just because its price happens to be close to the price of 14K gold does not make it poor man’s platinum, it makes it a wise choice the smart consumer.

©2009 Hoover & Strong, Inc.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 10th, 2009 at 10:59 am and is filed under Metals. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.