Damn, that's involved. I mean, I knew it was somewhat, but that description just makes it all the more amazing to me how little people sell rings for on Etsy, sometimes. There's so much work involved!!
That's just another thing I'll add to my list of [once I win the lottery and can spend all my days making whatever kind of art I want] ideas. :P
I loooove that 'I JUST ORDERED SUPPLIES!' feeling. I usually avoid firemountaingems and riogrande because I am way cheap, but they have some things that I don't think are found elsewhere easily, and you know the order will go through just fine since they are such a well-known name. Another good supplier that I have used in the past is http://www.metalliferous.com/ though their site is ghastly.
I ordered my faceted stones from an etsy seller though, a fun little packet that I am in love with. As a kid I always wanted like... a bag of gems, and now I literally have one.
Hahaha yesss! I honestly get like this...manic "high" when I enter a Utrecht art supply store, or a Home Depot, or a fabric store........yeah so basically any "creative" store I enter my pupils get big and I start floating around, wishing I could just BUY ALL THE THINGS to play with and built with.
Anyone know of a copper-like material with the same look as copper but doesn't stain the skin green?
What application are you looking for? Earrings/rings? There's niobium if you're looking for earwires (hypoallergenic material, too!). Rose gold is a nice bright copper-dolor, but might be expensive, unless you get plated.
Personally I'm not sure about other raw copper-looking metals that are safe from turning skin green, but perhaps Belruel can help.
Damn, that's involved. I mean, I knew it was somewhat, but that description just makes it all the more amazing to me how little people sell rings for on Etsy, sometimes. There's so much work involved!!
That's just another thing I'll add to my list of [once I win the lottery and can spend all my days making whatever kind of art I want] ideas. :P
I loooove that 'I JUST ORDERED SUPPLIES!' feeling. I usually avoid firemountaingems and riogrande because I am way cheap, but they have some things that I don't think are found elsewhere easily, and you know the order will go through just fine since they are such a well-known name. Another good supplier that I have used in the past is http://www.metalliferous.com/ though their site is ghastly.
I ordered my faceted stones from an etsy seller though, a fun little packet that I am in love with. As a kid I always wanted like... a bag of gems, and now I literally have one.
Hahaha yesss! I honestly get like this...manic "high" when I enter a Utrecht art supply store, or a Home Depot, or a fabric store........yeah so basically any "creative" store I enter my pupils get big and I start floating around, wishing I could just BUY ALL THE THINGS to play with and built with.
hahaha yeaaaah, lots of folks on etsy under price themselves sadly. It's a real problem. Of course somethings are soldered really easily and quickly once you know how to do it. Like a simple plain ring with just the one seam could be made from wire in just a few minutes. It's when you get into stone settings and multiple pieces that things get tricky.
(I always want to buy all the times. I spent about $70 on stainless steel wire last month and was so giddy when it arrives. All my pretty wire!)
there's a pretty excellent selection, and that shit is durable as hell
we mostly have been using copper-plated nickel because it's a little cheaper and it's way more durable than straight copper
also, you can put a couple very thin coats of brush-on polyurethane on your piece to avoid turning skin green. it'll rub off over time, but it'll last quite awhile. microcrystalline wax works even better, but that business is expensive
I wear silver almost exclusively. I say almost because I have two gorgeous pearl necklaces. Everything else is silver. Or white gold (wedding ring).
Yeah, I like silver or silver-colored jewelry as well. I went with a white gold wedding band but switched to a silver one because of allergies and my medical bracelet is stainless steel. I do, however, like copper and bronze and I've been looking for a nice copper or bronze bracelet and ring.
I'm honestly happy silver seems to be the more popular metal, here. :P Cheaper initial costs!
I think I've bought everything I need, save for one last order, which will involve the metals. Headpins, earwires, chains, clasps, round beads, D/S wire, H/H wire, jump rings, soldered rings. Not going to buy that stuff until I've played with my brass "wire gauge samples" I custom ordered for $4 from an Etsy shop. Going to play with different gauges, bend 'em, spiral 'em, hammer 'em, stick the ends through beads...so I get an idea of what wire gauges will suit me best.
huff huff huff
I'm reminding myself also that all these initial costs are not costs I will have to buy every time. Many are going to be longer-term supplies. Some of my stuff was also purchased years ago.
Oh dang I need some bead stringing wire too BOOP BOOP
I am going to be going on a trip to see a friend next week for 5 days, and part of me feels like a guilty introvert in that I'm already excited about coming back from the trip and making things. :P
Also, I used to work in a jewelry-making/bead + crystals + gem store.
I always had customers come in and talk about how much they loved the store and how great the supplies were. It's only just now that I'm realizing how true that is. I have visited like, 4-5 beadstores that are within 30 minutes of me and NONE of them hold a single candle to the place I used to work. It's amazing how rare that kind of store is, I'm finding. We had such nice gemstones! And what a selection of Swarovski crystals! And misc. loose beads! And and and.
Too bad I now live hours away...it's on my home town, and whenever I'm back there next you'd better believe I'm spending some cash there.
Have you considered making your jump rings yourself with wire and a jeweler's saw? I am not a huge fan of working with my jeweler's saw (still learning, ugh) but then you could just buy the wire you want in bulk, in different gauges, and make whatever sized rings you need whenever you need them.
It does take away the huge convenience factor of just having rings already cut for you. Probably helps with costs though. If you're working with base metals, I would probably just buy them for the most part.
Use a nylon/rawhide/non-marking hammer to work harden them afterwards, and boom. I sometimes like to hammer the curved bit a little bit plat too, for extra strength and a bit of style. I usually solder the loop closed, but most people who like to do beading and wire wrapping don't, and they look lovely still.
If you get a little butane torch (I use one I got for like $9 at harbor freight) you can ball your own wire too, for headpins, or ear wires where the loopy bit has a ball. Suuper easy, and if you use .999 wire and not sterling, it won't even oxidize from the fire.
I make headpins myself with balled ends, but I don't have the tool I need to make flat ended ones yet.
Ugh I want to go make things, not sit here at work. I started a new embroidery project last night as a going away present for a coworker. Not sure if I will finish it in time, her leaving is rather sudden and immediate. I'm pretty new to threadcraft stuff (cross stitch/embroidery) but I am really enjoying it a lot.
Here's a Hobbit cross stitch I need to finish, I have a lot more done on it now than is shown here, but still a bit from being done. It's going to have some dwarven runes framed by this geometric border.
I have actually considered that! But I am finding myself a little too often going "oh, rather than buy this thing, why don't I just buy 3 separate supplies and make it myself!?" and I can tell I'm already going down a looooooong rabbit hole for that.
I'm actually considering buying some rectangular sterling wire (dead soft - the only temper I can find), and cutting it, drilling it, and hammering it into little necklace bar pendants (that seem to be popular right now), rather than buy them premade, which looks pretty expensive. I'm still not.....100% sure I want to bother with that, yet. Do you happen to know if I could use a nylon hammer ONLY to work-harden it enough, if I don't want the hammered texture? So frustrating that it doesn't come in half-hard!
I'm also going to be making my own hoops/bars/shapes and whathaveyou. I like the versatility more than anything. But yeah, I think I'm actually having to limit myself in how much I'm going to be making from scratch, haha...at least for now.
Dead soft is pretty much what you'll always want anyways, it is easy to work harden things, but you pretty much need a torch/fire to soften them.
And yeah, when you don't want dings all over your metal you gotta use the nylon/rawhide hammer. You can find one for pretty cheap at Harbor Freight if you have one nearby (This is the one I use right now actually.) They sell a small ball-peen hammer that I use a lot for texturing metal.
Yeah it's totally easy to fall down the hole of spending too much time on things that shouldn't be your focus at that moment. I haven't really tried to sell any of the jewelry I make; it is all still a learning process/for enjoyment thing for me, so making all the bits from scratch that I can is at least partially the goal. If I was trying to move a lot of product, and not spend a day or several days making one thing though, I'd probably spend some money to save on the tedious parts.
Yeah once I have an idea of what gauges I'm interested in (with the brass wire samples) I'm going to buy a larger coil or two of copper wire to practice hammerin' on, since it's so cheap. I can live with myself if I mess up something in sterling (after hyperventilating for a bit) but I might actually keel over Hella Dead if I mess up something in the gold-filled.
I don't expect to hammer everything, though, so I think 95% of what I play with will be pretty "safe". :P
I just got three mini packages today of gemstone BEEEEEEEADS
(No problem! Talking about this stuff is pretty much my favorite, and I don't get to do it that often for fear of boring people to death.)
I bought a one pound spool of 16ga copper from monsterslayer that I use a whole lot, and I have a smaller 18ga that I have nearly gone through now. I got lucky and got some really thick gauge copper wire remnants from a cutting at home depot (it was hanging on a hook by their wire cutting by the foot station, and I just asked if I could buy it and the guy gave it to me for a song.)
Copper is really friendly, I really like it. I love how it can be a really nice ruddy polished color, or a dark brown, black, subtle rainbows with the right fire treatment, etc. I wish it didn't turn me green though, haha. I keep meaning to pick up some renaissance wax to seal it.
I do like what I can do with silver more, but I can afford waaaaay less silver than copper.
+2
Foolproofthats what my hearts becomein that place you dare not look staring back at youRegistered Userregular
Oh god, now I want to make chain mail. I blame this thread.
Foolproofthats what my hearts becomein that place you dare not look staring back at youRegistered Userregular
I think I could do this. Do you buy bags of ready made rings or do you wind wire around a ring anvil and cut it (somehow?)? Do you need to weld each ring or just line up the ends to make the links? Who has the best diagrams for patterns?
I have actually considered that! But I am finding myself a little too often going "oh, rather than buy this thing, why don't I just buy 3 separate supplies and make it myself!?" and I can tell I'm already going down a looooooong rabbit hole for that.
I'm actually considering buying some rectangular sterling wire (dead soft - the only temper I can find), and cutting it, drilling it, and hammering it into little necklace bar pendants (that seem to be popular right now), rather than buy them premade, which looks pretty expensive. I'm still not.....100% sure I want to bother with that, yet. Do you happen to know if I could use a nylon hammer ONLY to work-harden it enough, if I don't want the hammered texture? So frustrating that it doesn't come in half-hard!
I'm also going to be making my own hoops/bars/shapes and whathaveyou. I like the versatility more than anything. But yeah, I think I'm actually having to limit myself in how much I'm going to be making from scratch, haha...at least for now.
Might not be the best option for what you're looking for, but there's a sheet metal worker trick to getting tool marks out of metal. Scotch Brite makes a number of conditioning disks that work for finishing and polishing metal. They're primarily used for conditioning metal, getting that weird circular pattern everyone insists on calling "Brushed", and cleaning welds, they're also really good for taking out dents and dings. You want to use light pressure with them, and you can get a very easy shine out of metal with it. If you put too much pressure on it, it will eat at the metal however, but it's good for removing dents and dings from metalwork. There's a smaller version available for dremels, a larger version for bench grinders, and I've even been able to make one out of a scotch brite cleaning pad in a pinch (I keep some handy for hand sanding anyways).
They come in different grits (Brown - Course :: Red - Medium :: Blue - Very Fine), and I suggest the blue one for shining and removing tool marks as it's the least abrasive. They're also available fairly cheaply at places like Harbor Freight.
I think I could do this. Do you buy bags of ready made rings or do you wind wire around a ring anvil and cut it (somehow?)? Do you need to weld each ring or just line up the ends to make the links? Who has the best diagrams for patterns?
Sadly, I never took a picture of it, but I bent a 3/8" (I think) steel rod in two places making a crank. I made a crude stand with spare 2x4s and slid the steel rod through holes in the 2x4s (it looked exactly like a spit)
I gut a groove with a Dremel in the steel rod that I could fit the brass wire into and then spun it. I could make perfect little coils about 12-16" long and then I'd sit on the couch and cut individual rings with some heavy duty wire cutters. Then I'd use two pairs or needle nose pliers (one straight and one bent) and divorce all the rings. Start a pattern and keep on going.
Manly man knitting!
edit: You don't need to weld each ring, just join it back up.
edit2: I want to say I used 14 or 16 ga. brass for this. Back in the day (15 years ago, my god) it cost $8 a pound.
edit3: these are the three main tools I used DO NOT SKIMP ON THESE! Get ones with springs (trust me)
I think I could do this. Do you buy bags of ready made rings or do you wind wire around a ring anvil and cut it (somehow?)? Do you need to weld each ring or just line up the ends to make the links? Who has the best diagrams for patterns?
I bought a set of metal punches (this set actually) and I hook the size I want into my dad's lathe and wind my wire that way. The punches are short so this set up isn't ideal, but for my needs it works just fine (and gives me a good array of mandrels for really cheap). Then I cut my stainless steel coils using a set of really expensive mini bolt cutters (there are other options for cutting rings, especially if you don't use stainless steel).
Many people start out buying the rings, and this is probably the way to go, at least at first until you are sure you love the hobby.
Basically all you -need- to start are rings (or the means to make them) and two pairs of pliers. theringlord.com is the biggest online supplier I believe.
So, tonight I started and mostly finished my sons bed. He's been on a mattress on the floor for ages and it needed to be done. Also, now I can toss all his junk under his bed.
Measured twice, cut once:
Typical leg connection:
My son was excited that I was making a bridge .... after brief disappointment, he was excited about his bed:
This had to go:
Frame:
AAAAAHHHHHH! I can organize!!!:
So, what I'm going to do next is take 1x6 and trim out the bed. I'll draw cool scenes on it and burn it in with a wood burning pen. Then I'll stain the whole thing light, and add highlights with a darker stain!
also, the whole frame INCLUDING a brand new Miter Saw was less than $200 (the price of a crappy metal bed frame)
I think I could do this. Do you buy bags of ready made rings or do you wind wire around a ring anvil and cut it (somehow?)? Do you need to weld each ring or just line up the ends to make the links? Who has the best diagrams for patterns?
My buddy made his own rings for a chain-mail dice bag, so I asked him. He said he bought wire from home depot and picked up a bolt in the diameter he wanted for the rings. He used vice grips to clamp the wire on one end of the bolt, and then wound the wire into the threads. He then unclamped it, and unscrewed the bolt from the wire. This left him with a twist of wire that looked light a tightly wound spring. He then started at one end and used wire cutters to cut the rings out. If you keep all cuts on the same line perpendicular to the bottom, you end up with a bunch of rings of the same size and shape.
@Foolproof@Dedwrekka youtube is really great for this, I remember looking up how people coil and cut their rings a while back, there's a lot of good information and ideas out there. Make sure to watch a few videos on the right way to open and close the rings too, closures are really important in chain maille. Make sure that whatever you use to coil your wire around isn't threaded though. You want smooth metal so that you can slide the coil off afterwards. Instructables is a really good resource too, there is a great one on there (for making a triforce bag, though I didn't use the design) that I used when I wanted to make a dice bag
I think for most people starting with 'galvy' (galvanized steel) is a really good idea, because you can buy a coil for really cheap at your local store, and just mess around without worrying.
Also, hello thread. I finished this little freehand embroidery last night; it's for a coworker that is moving out of state.
Great job on the bed. We did the same thing for my son. His room in our apartment is painfully small so we decided he should have a loft bed and that we could do it ourselves instead of one of those cheap metal ones.
These are the original pics - he has a little play area under there:
Side View
Underneath
Since then we had my niece end up staying with us for a whole summer and built a temporary bottom with futon mattress for her to crash on.
I was an only child with a bunk bed and you better believe that bottom section was my Batcave: no mattress, no box spring, big and dark blanket fastened under the top mattress to drape down like a blackout curtain and a giant toybox filled with Lego.
Posts
Damn, that's involved. I mean, I knew it was somewhat, but that description just makes it all the more amazing to me how little people sell rings for on Etsy, sometimes. There's so much work involved!!
That's just another thing I'll add to my list of [once I win the lottery and can spend all my days making whatever kind of art I want] ideas. :P
Hahaha yesss! I honestly get like this...manic "high" when I enter a Utrecht art supply store, or a Home Depot, or a fabric store........yeah so basically any "creative" store I enter my pupils get big and I start floating around, wishing I could just BUY ALL THE THINGS to play with and built with.
it's almooooooost warm enough to start working on my table again
You could try anodized aluminum if you don't mind it not being real 'copper', too. I think there is some copper colored chain here, as well as just some coppr chain (that will turn you green possibly) http://theringlord.com/cart/shopdisplayproducts.asp?id=186&cat=Chain
(might not be the best place to get it, that's the supplier I use for chain maille things)
Monsterslayer.com sells some copper chain too, I bought some copper ball chain from them, but have no idea about the rest.
incredible!
edit: didn't know you did chain maille
I'll have to post a pic of my one and only creation
hahaha yeaaaah, lots of folks on etsy under price themselves sadly. It's a real problem. Of course somethings are soldered really easily and quickly once you know how to do it. Like a simple plain ring with just the one seam could be made from wire in just a few minutes. It's when you get into stone settings and multiple pieces that things get tricky.
(I always want to buy all the times. I spent about $70 on stainless steel wire last month and was so giddy when it arrives. All my pretty wire!)
And yeah, anodized aluminum would be a really good option as well.
there's a pretty excellent selection, and that shit is durable as hell
we mostly have been using copper-plated nickel because it's a little cheaper and it's way more durable than straight copper
also, you can put a couple very thin coats of brush-on polyurethane on your piece to avoid turning skin green. it'll rub off over time, but it'll last quite awhile. microcrystalline wax works even better, but that business is expensive
hitting hot metal with hammers
Democrats Abroad! || Vote From Abroad
Yeah, I like silver or silver-colored jewelry as well. I went with a white gold wedding band but switched to a silver one because of allergies and my medical bracelet is stainless steel. I do, however, like copper and bronze and I've been looking for a nice copper or bronze bracelet and ring.
I think I've bought everything I need, save for one last order, which will involve the metals. Headpins, earwires, chains, clasps, round beads, D/S wire, H/H wire, jump rings, soldered rings. Not going to buy that stuff until I've played with my brass "wire gauge samples" I custom ordered for $4 from an Etsy shop. Going to play with different gauges, bend 'em, spiral 'em, hammer 'em, stick the ends through beads...so I get an idea of what wire gauges will suit me best.
huff huff huff
I'm reminding myself also that all these initial costs are not costs I will have to buy every time. Many are going to be longer-term supplies. Some of my stuff was also purchased years ago.
Oh dang I need some bead stringing wire too BOOP BOOP
I am going to be going on a trip to see a friend next week for 5 days, and part of me feels like a guilty introvert in that I'm already excited about coming back from the trip and making things. :P
I always had customers come in and talk about how much they loved the store and how great the supplies were. It's only just now that I'm realizing how true that is. I have visited like, 4-5 beadstores that are within 30 minutes of me and NONE of them hold a single candle to the place I used to work. It's amazing how rare that kind of store is, I'm finding. We had such nice gemstones! And what a selection of Swarovski crystals! And misc. loose beads! And and and.
Too bad I now live hours away...it's on my home town, and whenever I'm back there next you'd better believe I'm spending some cash there.
It does take away the huge convenience factor of just having rings already cut for you. Probably helps with costs though. If you're working with base metals, I would probably just buy them for the most part.
You can make ear wires yourself suuuper easily too! Then you can do any shape, like these. (And in my opinion they look way better than those mass-produced ones with the spirally metal around the base. I make my ear wires in matching pairs like this
Use a nylon/rawhide/non-marking hammer to work harden them afterwards, and boom. I sometimes like to hammer the curved bit a little bit plat too, for extra strength and a bit of style. I usually solder the loop closed, but most people who like to do beading and wire wrapping don't, and they look lovely still.
If you get a little butane torch (I use one I got for like $9 at harbor freight) you can ball your own wire too, for headpins, or ear wires where the loopy bit has a ball. Suuper easy, and if you use .999 wire and not sterling, it won't even oxidize from the fire.
I make headpins myself with balled ends, but I don't have the tool I need to make flat ended ones yet.
Ugh I want to go make things, not sit here at work. I started a new embroidery project last night as a going away present for a coworker. Not sure if I will finish it in time, her leaving is rather sudden and immediate. I'm pretty new to threadcraft stuff (cross stitch/embroidery) but I am really enjoying it a lot.
Here's a Hobbit cross stitch I need to finish, I have a lot more done on it now than is shown here, but still a bit from being done. It's going to have some dwarven runes framed by this geometric border.
I have actually considered that! But I am finding myself a little too often going "oh, rather than buy this thing, why don't I just buy 3 separate supplies and make it myself!?" and I can tell I'm already going down a looooooong rabbit hole for that.
I'm actually considering buying some rectangular sterling wire (dead soft - the only temper I can find), and cutting it, drilling it, and hammering it into little necklace bar pendants (that seem to be popular right now), rather than buy them premade, which looks pretty expensive. I'm still not.....100% sure I want to bother with that, yet. Do you happen to know if I could use a nylon hammer ONLY to work-harden it enough, if I don't want the hammered texture? So frustrating that it doesn't come in half-hard!
I'm also going to be making my own hoops/bars/shapes and whathaveyou. I like the versatility more than anything.
And yeah, when you don't want dings all over your metal you gotta use the nylon/rawhide hammer. You can find one for pretty cheap at Harbor Freight if you have one nearby (This is the one I use right now actually.) They sell a small ball-peen hammer that I use a lot for texturing metal.
Yeah it's totally easy to fall down the hole of spending too much time on things that shouldn't be your focus at that moment. I haven't really tried to sell any of the jewelry I make; it is all still a learning process/for enjoyment thing for me, so making all the bits from scratch that I can is at least partially the goal. If I was trying to move a lot of product, and not spend a day or several days making one thing though, I'd probably spend some money to save on the tedious parts.
I can't wait to see what you make!
Yeah once I have an idea of what gauges I'm interested in (with the brass wire samples) I'm going to buy a larger coil or two of copper wire to practice hammerin' on, since it's so cheap. I can live with myself if I mess up something in sterling (after hyperventilating for a bit) but I might actually keel over Hella Dead if I mess up something in the gold-filled.
I don't expect to hammer everything, though, so I think 95% of what I play with will be pretty "safe". :P
I just got three mini packages today of gemstone BEEEEEEEADS
I bought a one pound spool of 16ga copper from monsterslayer that I use a whole lot, and I have a smaller 18ga that I have nearly gone through now. I got lucky and got some really thick gauge copper wire remnants from a cutting at home depot (it was hanging on a hook by their wire cutting by the foot station, and I just asked if I could buy it and the guy gave it to me for a song.)
Copper is really friendly, I really like it. I love how it can be a really nice ruddy polished color, or a dark brown, black, subtle rainbows with the right fire treatment, etc. I wish it didn't turn me green though, haha. I keep meaning to pick up some renaissance wax to seal it.
I do like what I can do with silver more, but I can afford waaaaay less silver than copper.
I made this ages ago .... now my eyes are too old to do this anymore and I get a headache after 10 minutes or so
Might not be the best option for what you're looking for, but there's a sheet metal worker trick to getting tool marks out of metal. Scotch Brite makes a number of conditioning disks that work for finishing and polishing metal. They're primarily used for conditioning metal, getting that weird circular pattern everyone insists on calling "Brushed", and cleaning welds, they're also really good for taking out dents and dings. You want to use light pressure with them, and you can get a very easy shine out of metal with it. If you put too much pressure on it, it will eat at the metal however, but it's good for removing dents and dings from metalwork. There's a smaller version available for dremels, a larger version for bench grinders, and I've even been able to make one out of a scotch brite cleaning pad in a pinch (I keep some handy for hand sanding anyways).
They come in different grits (Brown - Course :: Red - Medium :: Blue - Very Fine), and I suggest the blue one for shining and removing tool marks as it's the least abrasive. They're also available fairly cheaply at places like Harbor Freight.
Scotch Bright website: http://solutions.3m.com/wps/portal/3M/en_US/3MIndustrial/Abrasives/Products/~/Abrasives-Product-Catalog/Abrasive-Discs/Scotch-Brite-Surface-Conditioning-Discs?N=7581642&rt=r3
Example of Dremel version: http://www.amazon.com/Polishers-Buffers-Abrasive-Scotch-Wheels/dp/B00FUUHH10
Sadly, I never took a picture of it, but I bent a 3/8" (I think) steel rod in two places making a crank. I made a crude stand with spare 2x4s and slid the steel rod through holes in the 2x4s (it looked exactly like a spit)
I gut a groove with a Dremel in the steel rod that I could fit the brass wire into and then spun it. I could make perfect little coils about 12-16" long and then I'd sit on the couch and cut individual rings with some heavy duty wire cutters. Then I'd use two pairs or needle nose pliers (one straight and one bent) and divorce all the rings. Start a pattern and keep on going.
Manly man knitting!
edit: You don't need to weld each ring, just join it back up.
edit2: I want to say I used 14 or 16 ga. brass for this. Back in the day (15 years ago, my god) it cost $8 a pound.
edit3: these are the three main tools I used DO NOT SKIMP ON THESE! Get ones with springs (trust me)
is it used by welders?
hmmmmm
It's been a while, but I had catalogs by metalliferous or something
one sec
edit: hot damn!
metalliferous.com/
edit2:
metalliferous.com/1lb-Spool-Rich-Low-Brass-Wire/products/3158/
wow .... gone are the days of cheap brass =(
I bought a set of metal punches (this set actually) and I hook the size I want into my dad's lathe and wind my wire that way. The punches are short so this set up isn't ideal, but for my needs it works just fine (and gives me a good array of mandrels for really cheap). Then I cut my stainless steel coils using a set of really expensive mini bolt cutters (there are other options for cutting rings, especially if you don't use stainless steel).
Many people start out buying the rings, and this is probably the way to go, at least at first until you are sure you love the hobby.
Basically all you -need- to start are rings (or the means to make them) and two pairs of pliers. theringlord.com is the biggest online supplier I believe.
Measured twice, cut once:
Typical leg connection:
My son was excited that I was making a bridge .... after brief disappointment, he was excited about his bed:
This had to go:
Frame:
AAAAAHHHHHH! I can organize!!!:
So, what I'm going to do next is take 1x6 and trim out the bed. I'll draw cool scenes on it and burn it in with a wood burning pen. Then I'll stain the whole thing light, and add highlights with a darker stain!
also, the whole frame INCLUDING a brand new Miter Saw was less than $200 (the price of a crappy metal bed frame)
-Indiana Solo, runner of blades
it is!
I figure between him, me, his brother, and the dog, we're pushing 400 lbs
Don't know if your worried about that
-Indiana Solo, runner of blades
I did
Yay!
Also I like your drawrings of dragons and mountains.
-Indiana Solo, runner of blades
hmmmmm
there's still time!
edit:
someone is insanely excited about hiding under his bed ....
My buddy made his own rings for a chain-mail dice bag, so I asked him. He said he bought wire from home depot and picked up a bolt in the diameter he wanted for the rings. He used vice grips to clamp the wire on one end of the bolt, and then wound the wire into the threads. He then unclamped it, and unscrewed the bolt from the wire. This left him with a twist of wire that looked light a tightly wound spring. He then started at one end and used wire cutters to cut the rings out. If you keep all cuts on the same line perpendicular to the bottom, you end up with a bunch of rings of the same size and shape.
I think for most people starting with 'galvy' (galvanized steel) is a really good idea, because you can buy a coil for really cheap at your local store, and just mess around without worrying.
Also, hello thread. I finished this little freehand embroidery last night; it's for a coworker that is moving out of state.
These are the original pics - he has a little play area under there:
Side View
Underneath
Since then we had my niece end up staying with us for a whole summer and built a temporary bottom with futon mattress for her to crash on.
I kind of wish I had thought of that lol
Fuckin' Batcave.