Skin reacting to ring
September 14, 2014 2:27 PM
My girlfriend and I have silver wedding rings. Unfortunately, they apparently contain nickel, which we are having a bad reaction to. We love these rings and want to keep them. But we can’t wear them now. Do you know of a protective coating we could apply to the rings, or anything else we could do to wear the rings in comfort?
As a for now solution, I've heard you can just use some clear nail polish. But I don't know if that's a great idea if they're precious rings (as I'd assume yours are, being your wedding rings!). As long as there's no plating though it shouldn't really harm them.
posted by Sweetchrysanthemum at 2:52 PM on September 14, 2014
posted by Sweetchrysanthemum at 2:52 PM on September 14, 2014
You can get allergy coatings. Quite a few are available on Amazon and have good reviews but you may want to explore higher quality options as this will be for such important items.
posted by joboe at 2:55 PM on September 14, 2014
posted by joboe at 2:55 PM on September 14, 2014
I have a nickel allergy and have always used clear nail polish (reapply as needed), but that is because I was putting it on inexpensive costume jewelry that I was not worried about ruining. I would recommend having them plated in a high carat platinum/white gold; you do not want to go below 24 carat if you have a nickel allergy.
I would also look into having them plated with titanium. It's inexpensive, a great nickel-free option, and looks great - I know several couples with beautiful titanium bands.
posted by nightrecordings at 3:36 PM on September 14, 2014
I would also look into having them plated with titanium. It's inexpensive, a great nickel-free option, and looks great - I know several couples with beautiful titanium bands.
posted by nightrecordings at 3:36 PM on September 14, 2014
Plating won't last forever but is likely to be a good option for you as it will certainly last longer than clear nail polish or any kind of plastic coating. There is no such thing as 24 carat (i.e. 100% gold) white gold; white gold is gold mixed with nickel or palladium. Palladium white gold is more hypoallergenic.
posted by quaking fajita at 3:52 PM on September 14, 2014
posted by quaking fajita at 3:52 PM on September 14, 2014
We get ours periodically re-coated with rhodium.
posted by Librarypt at 5:33 PM on September 14, 2014
posted by Librarypt at 5:33 PM on September 14, 2014
sterling silver should not contain nickel.. it's just fine silver and copper, or germanium in some of the newer alloys. It's possible that you either have non-silver rings (low karat white gold possibly?), or you are possibly reacting to either the silver itself (which is rare) or the copper contained in it (which is slightly less rare, though very surprising it's both of you.)
rhodium plating is your best bet, almost any jeweller you walk into can do it or send it away to be done. it doesn't really work great on sterling silver though, a pre-plating with nickel is recommended, which doesn't seem advisable for you :P I'd be willing try to plating silver with yellow gold and then with rhodium after for an allergy for a customer if I couldn't get the rhodium to take to the silver. You could also just have the ring plated 24 karat yellow and then have a goldsmith remove the plating on the outside.
I wear my grandpa's 10k yellow gold wedding band on my thumb, and I have weird skin pH so it leaves black marks on me, so I rhodium plated it.. the outside wore off quickly, but the inside is still going fairly strong (some wear around the edges now) for about 6 months. jewellers will charge you between $40 and $100 for the service, if you're having strong allergies you would probably be looking at redoing this about every 6 months.
make sure your rings are fitting you properly, and that you're not both getting something trapped underneath them (something acidic or basic probably.. lemon juice, some kind of common cleaner you use) that could be irritating your skin. also take it off and run your finger over the edges of it, if it's really sharp it could just be irritating you that way too.
There's also a fairly new process where you can coat metal with a thin layer of clear ceramic in a similar process of plating. however, I don't personally know anyone who does it. The set up is sold by Rio Grande, you could call their customer service and ask them if they know anyone doing it commercially that you could send your rings to.
posted by euphoria066 at 6:24 PM on September 14, 2014
rhodium plating is your best bet, almost any jeweller you walk into can do it or send it away to be done. it doesn't really work great on sterling silver though, a pre-plating with nickel is recommended, which doesn't seem advisable for you :P I'd be willing try to plating silver with yellow gold and then with rhodium after for an allergy for a customer if I couldn't get the rhodium to take to the silver. You could also just have the ring plated 24 karat yellow and then have a goldsmith remove the plating on the outside.
I wear my grandpa's 10k yellow gold wedding band on my thumb, and I have weird skin pH so it leaves black marks on me, so I rhodium plated it.. the outside wore off quickly, but the inside is still going fairly strong (some wear around the edges now) for about 6 months. jewellers will charge you between $40 and $100 for the service, if you're having strong allergies you would probably be looking at redoing this about every 6 months.
make sure your rings are fitting you properly, and that you're not both getting something trapped underneath them (something acidic or basic probably.. lemon juice, some kind of common cleaner you use) that could be irritating your skin. also take it off and run your finger over the edges of it, if it's really sharp it could just be irritating you that way too.
There's also a fairly new process where you can coat metal with a thin layer of clear ceramic in a similar process of plating. however, I don't personally know anyone who does it. The set up is sold by Rio Grande, you could call their customer service and ask them if they know anyone doing it commercially that you could send your rings to.
posted by euphoria066 at 6:24 PM on September 14, 2014
or anything else we could do to wear the rings in comfort?
If you know you can handle white gold (gold + platinum type, not gold + nickel type), you can have a jeweler make white gold duplicates of your silver rings using casting-moldmaking or hand skills. Or in nickel-free sterling silver, if your rings do indeed have nickel in them in the base metal or to help rhodium-plate them.
You may want to talk to a dermatologist and get an allergy screening done to see what metals you're allergic to. People who are allergic to nickel are sometimes allergic to cobalt, which is often used for casting platinum, for example. (I don't know if screening would be overcautious.)
posted by sebastienbailard at 9:22 PM on September 14, 2014
If you know you can handle white gold (gold + platinum type, not gold + nickel type), you can have a jeweler make white gold duplicates of your silver rings using casting-moldmaking or hand skills. Or in nickel-free sterling silver, if your rings do indeed have nickel in them in the base metal or to help rhodium-plate them.
You may want to talk to a dermatologist and get an allergy screening done to see what metals you're allergic to. People who are allergic to nickel are sometimes allergic to cobalt, which is often used for casting platinum, for example. (I don't know if screening would be overcautious.)
posted by sebastienbailard at 9:22 PM on September 14, 2014
Can you have them recast? Seems like more initial financial output, but less long term maintenance.
posted by WeekendJen at 5:59 AM on September 15, 2014
posted by WeekendJen at 5:59 AM on September 15, 2014
Yesterday jessamyn linked to TheRingTree, who make rings out of coins (which of course usually contain nickel). They recommend a sealant called ProtectaClear, so that might be worth a try.
posted by daisyk at 8:35 AM on September 15, 2014
posted by daisyk at 8:35 AM on September 15, 2014
My husband thought he was having an allergic reaction to a sterling silver ring. We were at the jeweler and mentioned it, and the jeweler mentioned that there was probably just a buildup of junk like soap residue and dead skin underneath the ring that was causing the reaction. A good ultrasonic cleaning and taking extra care to shift the ring slightly when washing/drying hands has cleared it up for him.
posted by cabingirl at 2:10 PM on September 15, 2014
posted by cabingirl at 2:10 PM on September 15, 2014
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by taff at 2:38 PM on September 14, 2014