I've been enjoying the chain maille, which takes a lot of jump rings. So when I saw this jump ring maker, I thought I'd splash out. It came today (from The Bead Shop Nottingham, £9.95) and it's great! I got some silver-plated wire in two thicknesses, and some turquoise wire to play with as well.
You choose one of the widths of mandrel and screw it into the base like this:
Then you put the wire through the little hole to hold it in place and wind the wire round the mandrel as many times as you want jump rings. You cut the wire and take the resulting spiral off the mandrel and you get something like this:
Then you just cut through the spiral with wire cutters and your perfect little jump rings are complete. Like these:
I made these ones with 1mm wire on the 4mm mandrel. I got 0.6mm wire too, which is fine for 4mm jump rings for attaching clasps and headpins and so on, but is a bit thin for much bigger. It's really easy to use, mine came out perfect the first time I tried it, and wire is cheap so I think it's definitely worth just making my own from now on instead of buying them. 
2 comments:
That is so cool! In the long run, it's cheaper to make them than buy them. :)
Yep, I think so. Though it's a tenner for the thing, if you use a lot it's worth it.
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