Roughly two months ago, Yilin and I were out looking at wedding rings for her. She was trying to decide what style she wanted, and what would compliment her engagement ring the best. Hopefully, the two would coincide. It seemed that she was favoring either a plain band (possibly titanium, as it is darker than her platinum engagement ring and she liked the contrast), or a platinum band encrusted with diamonds. Naturally, I was hoping she would choose the former, as tradition (supposedly) claims that the groom buys the bride's wedding ring, and vice versa. (Not that I am a cheapskate, but I am still paying for her engagement ring...)
I had heard that titanium wedding bands exist, and I know that Mike has one, so I was intrigued. I mean, how many guys don't think titanium is cool? Besides, it is ultra-practical. As a non-jewelry wearer and a rather practical guy, if I have to wear a wedding ring, I want a ring that I won't even know I am wearing. Lastly, what really represents 'love' better: a heavy ring which weighs down upon the hand and is made of a semi-precious metal drastically overpriced by consumer demand, or a ring that is virtually indestructible yet light as a feather?
Titanium is 93 times more abundant than copper in the Earth's crust, weighs about 55% of the equivalent volume of steel, and is uber-strong. Why would anyone choose another metal? Gold has an ultimate tensile strength of a mere 15,000 psi. Platinum? Barely stronger at 18,000 psi. Pure titanium has an ultimate tensile strength of 31,900 psi. The alloy most commonly used (grade 5 aerospace 6Al-4V-titanium alloy) has an ultimate tensile strength of 170,000 psi, and would be drastically lighter than a gold or platinum ring of equivalent size. Hell, I could probably use it as a piece of pro when rock climbing. ;)
Of course, knowing how cheap titanium really is (I have a $9 titanium spork for camping, and given its abundance it can't be that expensive), I knew that the $150-$200 that jewelry stores were charging was entirely too much for a simple unadorned rounded band. So I went to eBay. (The idea of buying one's wedding ring at eBay amuses me.)
Good God, there are thousands! I quickly realized that the exact style titanium wedding band I wanted could be had for about $20, even $10. But that wasn't cheap enough for me. So after about 20 minutes of Yilin saying "Just spend $20 and get that one!" I found the one ring for me (not to be confused with The One Ring).
With 27 minutes remaining and no bids on the auction, I signed on, bid, and won my wedding band for 99¢. That's right: not even a full dollar. The shipping was $10.50, which is 1061% the cost of the ring. The seller offered insurance for $3. I asked Yilin if she thought we should get the insurance and she replied, "It's 3 times the cost of the ring! We'll just buy a new one if it's lost in the mail." She had a point.
So in the end, I got the exact wedding ring I wanted, I bought it on eBay, and it was less than $1. What does all of this mean? (No, not that I am loony.) It means that Yilin got off easy, while I am looking forward to buying her diamond-encrusted platinum wedding ring. Oh joy.
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12 comments:
Dude, that is by far the greatest wedding ring story I have EVER heard. I can't believe Yilin spent less on your wedding ring than I spend at McDonalds for lunch. And your rationalization of not only choosing titanium, but purchasing it on ebay was amusing to say the least.
Perhaps you should consider doing the same for her...buying some used wedding band from a failed marriage has a certain earth-friendly recycling kind of feeling to it. Plus, you'd be fulfilling that wedding bands destiny. You should seriously consider it. You don't want to deprive something of its destiny, do you??
Man, you are so smart. We got ripped off with Mike's ring...and I bet it isn't even titanium. I think it is made of aluminum foil by children locked in a closet in N.Korea....But we paid A LOT for it. That's what matters.
Mike and I kept joking that we should bend our sporks until we got it into a ring form. But alas, we are lazy and not very strong.
I think your ring is cooler than the One Ring [gasp!]. I bet you could beat Frodo in a fight with that bad ass ring. I mean, come on, remember how the ring was weighing him down? Not titanium obviously.
"Lastly, what really represents 'love' better: a heavy ring which weighs down upon the hand and is made of a semi-precious metal drastically overpriced by consumer demand, or a ring that is virtually indestructible yet light as a feather?"
This is excellent logic. Very poetic too. You should keep this and stick in that novel you will eventually write.
Excellent logic. Excellent deal. Now how come your wife-to-be requires the dirt-encrusted platinum? Does she not see your legendary rationale?
When the Spanish conquistadors first found platinum in Columbia, they named it platina, meaning “little silver” and regarded it as a worthless impurity in the silver they mined. Who wants a worthless impurity!!??
Discovered in 1791, titanium was named for the Titans of Greek mythology.
Josh's ring was named after a God and Yilin's ring called an impurity. I would choose to be a God. Get a dirt-encrusted titanium ring and smite your enemies!
This blog entry was a big hit today at O&G, Josh!
adiamondisforever.com says:
"whatever you spend, your diamond will represent one of life’s deepest emotional investments. It may eventually be passed down for generations, cherished not just for what it is worth, but for what it means"
You two are an excellent shopping team!! Nice job!
In case anyone was wondering...my point was...no matter what the cost of Yilin's diamond wedding band vs Josh's titanium band...it's about the meaning of it...but it's always good to have a killer story! And that one takes the cake!
i am glad that you were amused by my little story. one of the reasons that i love yilin is that she listens to my reasoning and logic, no matter how wacky it may seem at face value, and then has no objections at all! of course, this only works with decisions that affect me and me only (it wouldn't work for her ring, for instance).
eric and dusty: great arguments for the design concept/construction of yilin's ring, but i'm not the one that needs convincing. perhaps once she reads your comments she will be sold. (cross your fingers.)
hyunmi: everyone knows that hobbits are no threat in a fight. they're like 'pecks' in 'willow': even people condemned to death and locked in cages on lonely roads laugh at them.
dan: if i were to put that in my novel, it would be the proud ship of thoughts of the unwitting hero who would see it crushed upon the rocks of the irrational shore of his fiancee's fashion-conscious ego. (how's that for a poetically confusing metaphor?)
julie: i understood what you meant, and that is partly my point. but it also comes down to how dearly you hold the 'traditional' way of doing these things. (note that 'traditional' is written surrounded by single quotes; genius marketing execs from debeers want us to believe that these things are a tradition, when they have only been around for 100 years at the most.)
A couple Christmas seasons ago, we saw this lovely ad on tv.. all white background, beautiful music.. and a diamond ring. I said to Ken, "I want THAT!" Then that stupid little smily face popped up and the voice-over said... "only at Wal-Mart..."
I crossed it off my list immediately.... that just sort of tarnished the beauty of it.
Wal-Mart is the largest jewelry retailer in the U.S. McDonalds is the largest fast food chain in the U.S. I read somewhere a while ago that Wal-Mart and McDonalds were investigating a partnership. It won't be long before you walk into a McDonalds and say "I'd like a number 7, a hot cherry pie, a bundle of socks, 3 quarts of motor oil and can you supersize that all please?
Very nice, Josh! And here I was considering all of these expensive metals because that is what society brainwashed me to think!
On a side note, did you check out Tungsten? It is 18x harder than gold and 4x harder than titanium! (It also has something like 6,192 degrees F. melting point!) It also can be combined with cobalt to get even harder, and higher melting points, however it also becomes brittle.
My one concern is wear and tear on my ring. Gold, platinum, titanium, etc. all scratch easily. Platinum however is malleable and dents (looks like a scratch), where gold loses metal when scratched. I'm not sure where titanium lies, but it's inexpensive enough to not care if it loses metal.
Maybe with titanium being as inexpensive as it is I'll have 2 wedding rings!! haha
i looked into it. most tungsten carbide rings go for $35 or so on eBay, instead of nearly $1000 at jewelry stores.
however, tungsten carbide, while harder than titanium and more scratch resistant, is more likely to shatter than to simply deform (as you said).
some internet sources say it has a higher ultimate tensile strength than grade 5 titanium, yet i haven't found numbers to support that.
also, tungsten carbide weighs 4 times as much as grade 5 titanium. i'd rather have a scratched lightweight ring than an unscratched heavier ring. and save $34. ;)
the truth is, i value a high strength-to-weight ratio over being scratchproof (i doubt that decades of wear will not result in scratches in tungsten, especially on me). ergo, titanium wins.
of course, if tetracarbon rings were available (made using carbon nanotubes), then that would probably win, as it is calculated that they have an ultimate tensile strength of 2,900,000 PSI!
We must now investigate the properties of Hafnium, Tantalum and of course, tantalum carbide graphite composite. Heck, this stuff is used for nuclear reactors. Gotta have it strictly for the coolness factor. I imagine it's cheap on the French black market. haha. Still, carbon nanotubes are cool. I wonder about titanium nitride or silicon carbide?
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