Lessons
Lesson Info
Shaping & Joining Links
Got your links they cool off pretty fast those and from there you're going to start to do the next links and then link them together I like I actually like to shape these first so I get half of them so they're totally shaped so I'm going to do first is show this kind of link it's kind of like a paper ship paperclip shaped link where I'm taking them and just stretching them out and you can do that with different things and different sizes you can take two towels and these for the papers paperclip shape you want to have two of the same diameter dowell or you can use thes punches over here they're actually different diameters but you can get some if you want two of them to be different which will show you'll use different shapes are different diameters or like this you could also use pliers so if you have two pliers that around you can't have the needle nose round pilot you can use to pliers and pull them out so for the sake of this use these two towels on and actually I'm not I'm gonna u...
se let's switch my mind for this is the smallest link which is the size for so I'm going to use this which is the round plier side and I'm going to use a center punch this earth sees me a tapping punch and just use the shank of it which is more or less, I'm just gonna eyeball and get it pretty much to be the same and put the places in, and I'm just going to pull it to make sure the beads or not right where you're gonna be pulling because they can crack and break here if you've got pressure on them, I'm just going toe pull it open with a gentle paul occasionally, if using didn't go well and as you pull, it will open up, you can go back and redo it, which is absolutely fine. It's good to learn at this stage or no at this stage that it was a weak link, hk instead of wearing it for a while and having it break. So then you have your link like that, and so you can do that with all of them, all right? Just pulling in this wires really thin. So it's not like tons of effort to get that to happen. You have your length in the shape, and then what I would dio so is take those links and start linking them with other ones that are open still. And as you see in this necklace up top, I only put the red beads on and then down below I'm having multiple strands, and I'm also adding those little cold. Gold links or the gold beads in between. So I put three of the red beets on than the gold length and three of the red beans or beads, and just gives more texture gives a variation there, so taking the links and you can put it together to like this one is the four to the six to eight to the six to the four kind of tapering in and out for for a dimension, you can have them be all the same. That could be all the four centimeters or all the six centimeters or any length that you really want, so you can play and have fun here, so the link things together, you've got half of them that are shaped already. I'm going to do exactly what's in there, I've got the four centimeter, one shaped, then I'm taking a six centimeter and I'm just cooking it on and then I'm going to take the eight centimeters. Click that one onto right, so I'm starting to create the links and from here it goes back to an open one of the six who the four and you can see just start to go. I wouldn't dio really like the whole necklace and one go like this sometimes again it can open up and this can come off gets fussy that these could fall off so you could go for a few of them at least once I mean you can play around there's no reason why you can't accept that it might be you might have a little more hassle than not so you've got your links you're starting create your chain and same thing you go back here it's just that you have same thing as before said you have the things dangling off them and you can use a third arm instead of the holding the tweezers if you want to are you going hold the tweezers you can also lay it flat and do it as well just lay on top of the tottering board and do it so and then there's actually a better clip tohave where you can just clip this in and it stays and you know if you know you're set up you can leave the torch going otherwise it's a little bit of a juggle here um with your hands but you can just use tweezers and move on to the next one. I mean, if you were keeping turning the torch on and off for every single one, it would take you a lot longer so talking about efficiency and you've got your links and it is pretty much the same thing that you're doing with opening them up you've got things hanging off of them, but you're just you're just super thin so pretty it's um cools down fast and where are these two you just have these links hanging off but you're doing the same exact thing with the shaping pulling and stretching the link till you have your paperclips shape that you want and you would go and do the whole necklace and this necklace that's here single single chain here and here it's three and they're just three different actually it's not three it's it's just adding what happened down at the bottom what I did was I put on a four centimeter one I added two links and then offer each of those I did two more so you can put multiple length together but this has it goes from one to two to four to two to one and it gives it the thicker the more textured so there's no reason why you couldn't have lots of pieces you could make like a tassel that way to you could just have this with all of these links hanging off of one thing and it's more of like a tassel hanging out they get kicked up like this too, but all chains do and you can kind of just shake it out question you are you stretching so that the saw during point is not at either of the ends to for the integrity or does that matter for integrity? It does not matter when you're stretching if it was if it just infuse well it got too thin sometimes you know it's melting together and you melt it a little bit too much and there's a thin spot uh that just when you pull it wants to open up, then you go back and re satur but you can place that I I think it's nice to just have a few random but you can place it wherever you want know that if it was right up where you're bending it, the shape is not as perfect like you're not going to get the nicest perfect shape if that that extra little beat up the balled up metal is right at the tip because it just won't bend as nicely but where it is as far as the integrity of the piece does not matter yeah ok so that's that's that one right that's making the links that's putting them together and using the paper clip style one the next one I'm going to show is just getting different this one is one long a necklace that you can double if you want there's no class you've been double it and it's the same beads for the whole thing so it has just a singular kind of look but different sizes of links and to make those here let me sought or a couple of these together refuse I should say a few of these together and I'll show you how to get the different shape to it, okay so to get the different shape I'm using on purpose to different sized towels or whatever, whatever, you know, the pliers that you're using, whatever it is that you're using to shape them, and in order to get them to be this dramatic, I had to step it a few apps this when I'm going to show you howto linking together, but I'm step it, you know, have it be a few jumps down, you're not just going from one to the next, otherwise it will look to similar won't be dramatic enough, so haven't be a fair amount of a difference in diameter to do this and it's the same thing you're pulling let's see my line these up so I know which ones I used, so I'm going to do something like this, you know this fairly different in the diameter of them to get the middle sized link here. And the only thing you really have to a be concerned with is not having this be where the beads are used to move the beads around, to be away from where you're pulling, so that you don't crack them and do the same thing pull. But you've got two different diameters, and so therefore you get a different shaped link, right, same thing.
Class Materials
bonus material with purchase