Disassembling and reassembling

[mellicious]

I couldn't go to sleep this morning so I got back up and took apart that watch/bracelet I posted the picture of yesterday.



Here is the mostly-disassembled watch. (It looks sort of like the flower bead is still attached to it but it's not.) I didn't have to detach the two squiggly pieces from the watch face because they were fine as they were. But I took all the charms and beads off, and also the clasp (which you can see on the far right) and the other squiggly piece.
Then I made a new squiggly bit and reassembled as so:



I am really pleased with it. I have it on right now and it's extremely comfortable. Also, except for the watch-face itself (which was of course purchased) I made every bit of this myself, from wire - even the jumprings, and the clasp, too. So that's kinda cool.

Then I started over again, so to speak. I didn't get too far in the time I had, but here is the start of it:



I wasn't sure I had enough of the 16-gauge copper left for another whole bracelet, so I decided to do the base part of this in silver. It's going to be very mixed metals, though, as you can see from the dangles. (I have silver - which is not sterling, but silverplate - plus two colors of copper, and brass, in various gauges.)

Also, notice the variety of tools visible in these pictures. I have spent a LOT of money on tools lately. Nylon-jaw pliers, bent-nose pliers, concave pliers, mandrels, a chasing hammer, a new flush-cutter, and more. Making things out of wire ought not be quite so expensive!

Comments

[columbina.livejournal.com]

Just you wait. It gets worse. After all the various pliers then you're going to want scribes and other marking/chasing tools, a jeweler's saw, and so on. Then, if you decide you seriously want to work with heat, you'll need a variety of specialized solders, both portable and fixed torches, tongs - and, if you get hardcore, small crucibles, casting compounds .... And we haven't even considered work surfaces - you can't just pound metal any old place ....

It's a lot of fun, and I play around with it a little when I have the time - I still retain a lot of the equipment - but I happen to feel that a jewelry maker should have small hands, and I do not.

[mellificent.livejournal.com]

Well, I have the small hands, for what that's worth. :)

I have already come up against the 'where to pound metal' thing a bit. I have a (very small) bench block, which I forgot to put on that list. It wasn't cheap, either. The best advice I've heard so far about where to use it is to put it on the floor. Although my downstairs neighbor would probably not like that too much. On the other hand, it's not like I'm doing a large amount of pounding.

(And I haven't ruled out working with heat in the future but I'm not going there yet, except for the bit I did in class.)