Skip to main content

Double Twist Copper Bangle



I love the look of twisted wire and thought I'd have a go at making a double twist copper bangle.

I took a length of thinner gauge twisted copper wire I'd had hanging around for a while and decided to twist it together with a length of 3.25mm copper wire to make a round bangle. 
As this bangle started off as just a practice piece I didn't pay too much attention to what gauge wire the thinner twist was but I think it was two pieces of 18g {1mm} that I'd twisted in my flexshaft.


In order to twist the two pieces of wire together I was going to need to use my vice and a pair of locking pliers. I soon realized that the vice and the pliers weren't going to hold the two separate pieces of wire together securely due to the amount of tension produced as they were twisted so I needed to solder both wires together at either end to keep them in place. 

Once I started twisting the two wires they soon became work hardened and I could feel the tension produced keeping the two pieces twisted together. Having the ends soldered together made sure the two pieces of wire stayed together and didn't ping apart once I took the ends of the wire out of the vice and pliers.


I made the length of wire longer than I needed to allow for trimming it to size. I marked the length I needed then soldered the two wires at those points too to keep the wires together. I had a feeling that cutting the wire at a point where the two pieces weren't soldered together would release the tension and they would start to come apart.

At this point the bangle was still a practice piece so I'll be honest I didn't worry too much about cutting either end at the same point in the twist. This would've made it easier to match the two ends for soldering together. I kind of just cut the ends and didn't worry :D


Filing the ends in the mitre jig to get them nice and straight.


This was the resulting join before soldering. The thicker wire meets up nicely but the twisted wire is definitely off {because I didn't take the time to cut the ends at the same point in the twist!}

I could see the join was ok so decided to solder it anyway and see what happened.


The thicker wire join soldered fine.


The thinner twisted wire soldered ok although obviously the ends didn't meet properly but I decided the join was good enough to work.


With a bit of clean up work I could see the joins would eventually be ok....


The rounded up bangle after filing, sanding and the use of eveflex wheels and radial polishers in my flexshaft. Looking at the photo the join is at 1 o'clock. It still needs a bit more tidying up but it does blend in pretty well now. I decided at this point that the bangle was good enough to sell :D


The finished bangle. The join is bottom left about 8 o'clock. 


I listed the bangle a few weeks ago now and it sold within a few days. I'm definitely making more of them and also think a double twist of silver wire would look fab combined with the thicker copper wire.


Comments

  1. I love this bangle! (As I've already mentioned!) How do you twist wire in your flexshaft? What do you use to hold it in there?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hello Claire! I had to solder each end together then use my vice to hold the wire and locking pliers to twist them together. It was too wide to fit in my flexshaft.

      Delete
  2. Have you tried putting twisted wire through the (square) grooves in your roller? You might get some interesting effects that way. If I had a mill, I'd try it myself.

    David.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. That is a really good idea, thanks David will definitely try that!

      Delete

Post a Comment

Your comments and questions are very welcome!
If you would prefer to contact me directly please use the contact form on my "get in touch" page.

Popular posts from this blog

Combining Soldering And Enamel

The need to make cute, brightly coloured enamel studs propelled me into the world of combining soldering with enamel a couple of years ago. I knew from reading up on it that it was possible to enamel and solder on the same piece but wasn't too confident I was able to do it back then. It was a slightly embarrassing occurance that made me just get on with - I'd made some enamel studs with glued on stud posts. I'd used 2 part epoxy resin which was a job in itself as it set hard after 5 minutes so I had to keep mixing more up. The finished studs looked ok but that little voice in my head kept asking "are you sure you want to use glue?" I wasn't but didn't think I had any other way to do it so I used glue. I sold my first pair and merrily sent them on their way to Canada. A couple of week later the buyer got in touch to say the stud post had come off one of the earrings and the other was hanging off. I was mortified, apologized profusely and refunded her m

Etching Silver Using Nail Art Stamps

So my love/hate relationship with etching sterling silver continues. I've tried a few times now and always end up with different results most of them not that great to be honest. I've tried connecting the silver and a piece of copper to a 9v battery and also heating the ferric nitrate. Sometimes the results are good sometimes not so good. I currently have an etched piece of silver sheet waiting to be reticulated and rid it of the mess that is the etched "pattern".  I now know that using stamps and Stayz On ink just doesn't work with silver - the time needed to etch using ferric nitrate is much longer than etching copper and the ink starts to wear away after about an hour. This results in the pattern being patchy as the resist is eaten away and the silver ends up quite lumpy and course looking. I have yet to try using pnp paper. I don't know why but it all seems a bit of a faff to do. I don't have a laser printer so would need to find somewhere or

Embossing Metal With My Sizzix Bigshot

I must admit up until a few weeks ago I was vaguely familiar with the name Sizzix but as to what you actually did with a "Sizzix" I was completely in the dark! That was until I stumbled across a video from Vintaj showing how you could use their embossing folders with a Bigshot to create designs on metal ("metal" - my favourite word after chocolate!) I was really impressed and itching to have a go, I just needed a Bigshot........ I waited a few weeks then when the urge to possess one overcame me I went out debit card at the ready..............and the shop had sold out! So I trundled off to The Range on the off chance and came home clutching my own surprisingly heavy pink and black wonder machine. It sat on the dining room table for a couple of days while I waited for the embossing folders I'd ordered online to arrive then the time came to start playing! I started with some pre-cut 24g copper hearts and the Wildflower Vines and the Butterfly Swirls Deco