Orders and medals manufacturing techniques

[Lapa]

Well, I'll start the ball rolling.

As far as I know, all soviet award were struck, which is a common process for medal and order making.

The mint usually first creates one or a few samples/prototypes/models, whatever name you want to give that piece. from this working model, skilled mint engravers engrave the die(s); in some cases (single piece medal or order), it can be a simple pair of dies (front and back), in the case of multipart orders, each part requires its own set of dies.

At this point in the manufacturing process, there appears a first option:
. either the mint decides to engrave a set of dies, then, after an involved process of design transfer and hardening, produces a set of working dies which is then used to strike the medal/order. However, dies wear off due to friction with the blank being struck and to pressure exerted, and sometimes even break. The engraver(s) then need to engrave new die(s) which will not necessarily be exactly identical to the original one.
. or the mint can decide to create a master hub, which as its name implies, is used to make impressions to produce identical working dies. In this case, every subsequent working die sets are identical.

Once struck, the pieces are then "processed": rivets are added, pieces are soldered together, etc.

The enamelling process can happen either before or after assembly. To keep the enamelling process simple (there may be a few variations in the materials or techniques used):
. the piece to be enamelled is cleaned with chemicals to remove all impurities, grease, etc
. a special underlay substance called flux is then carefully placed all over the surface to be enamelled. The flux allows the enamel to properly adhere to the metal (there is always some traces of flux visible close to the edge of the enamel, sort of yellowish looking)
. The glass enamel, which is a very fine powder, is then spread thinly all over the area to be enamelled. Point to note, the color of the powdered enamel is not necessarilly related to the final color of the enamel; for example, red enamel is actually a white powder.
. The piece is then fired in a special high temperature oven. THe actual temperature used depends on the metal used (gold/silver/bronze) and on the enamel color (different enamels can have different fusion points)
. Once cooled off slowly (otherwise the enamel will crack), the process is repeated for other enamel colors (in the case of multicolor enamel order). Once the piece has been fully enamelled, it is then polished using a variety of abrasives, starting with coarse and finishing with extra-fine ones.
. If needed, the piece is then plated (gold/silver/nickel/chrome) by eletroplating. Plating DOES NOT adhere to enamel.

The order is then assembled, the suspension is added (if any), and there you have it. If you are Monetniy Dvor, you just produced a nice, rare and valuable order; if you are anybody else, you just finished assembling yet another fake that hopefully will escape the eagle-eyes of the members of this forum for long enough to defraud as many people as possible .

Marc