Art Jewelry Boot Camp: Easy No Solder Hoop Photo Tutorial

by Barbara Bechtel

I noticed lots of positive comments (here and on our Facebook page) about boot camp posts where no soldering is used.

I rarely solder my hoops and while I sometimes use a tube rivet to add a little something extra, it isn't necessary. This style of hoop is perfect if you're just starting out with a torch since we're only using it for annealing. It also makes a nice petite drop with a lot of presence.

Begin with 2- 2" lengths of 10g wire. You can use up to 14g. for a lighter drop.

Anneal your wire with the torch until glowing and quench.

Using your hammer and bench block, flatten the ends of each wire until they're nice and thin.

If you're metal begins to get tough, anneal again.

File the burs from the ends of the wire to make a nice round curve. Anneal one more time.

Using your round nose pliers, find the center of your wire and bend in half around the based of the pliers to make a U shape.

Using your flat or chain nose pliers, slightly bend the flattened ends out straight.

....So it looks about like this.

Grasp both ends with your flat pliers and squeeze to meet in the center. 

 

 

 

 

Next, using a drill or punch, make a small hole in the top to hang.

Hammer the drop area near the curve to flatten it slightly and work harden it (it should already be pretty work hardened if you're using 10g). Next pickle or clean to removed the fire scale. I wait until the very end to pickle since I usually anneal them 3-4 times. Finish to your liking. (I antiqued mine in liver of sulphur)

Finish simply by attaching to earwires, doing a simple wire wrap as I did. Adding charms to the droplet at the bottom would also be cute!

Hope you enjoyed and I'd love to see what you make! Don't forget! Next week is our Boot Camp Blog Hop! Make sure you add your photos to our Flickr group or post them on Monday and come back here to add your link!

Hoop Boot Camp: Filling the Void - By Karen McGovern

This is my first boot camp post ever!  The theme is hoops, and I decided to show you one of my favorite designs--a hand constructed copper wire hoop, centered with a cold connected, gorgeous copper enamel disc by MaryAnn Carroll.  I use this design in many ways--as a pendant, as a bail, and as a connector, earring dangles, etc.  It's lovely, easy and super-versatile!

So, let's get busy!

For the purposes of this tutorial, I will be making a simple, stand-alone pendant.  You will need:

Wire snips or wire scissors

4.5 inches of 14 gauge copper wire
3 inches of 14 gauge copper wire
1 one-inch enamel copper disc with a 1/16th hole in the center

Decorative bead(s) with 1/16th holes (I used a textured aluminum disc and a nugget of turquoise)
1 brass micro screw and nut
Micro screw driver
Flat nose pliers
Round nose pliers
Easy Solder sterling silver solder paste
Solder pick
Dremel or flex shaft with a 1/16th drill bit or EuroPunch tool
Flat file
Round end hammer or riveting hammer
Solder block
Hand held micro torch
Quench pot with water
Pickle pot
Sanding sponges
Polishing cloth

Hammer flat and wide one end of the 3-inch length of wire and drill or punch a 1/16th hole in the end. File flat the ends of your 4.5-inch length of copper using a flat file, and form a nice, round hoop.  I use a ring mandrel, or any round thing that fits the wire (bottle tops, pipe, whatever I have handy).  Once the hoop is formed, place it on a solder block and leave the ends slightly apart.  Fit the drilled wire in the gap, centering the end with the hole inside the hoop (overlay your enamel disc to make sure it will be nice and centered inside the hoop and the holes line up).  Make sure all the wires fit snug and flush.  Add a dab of Easy Solder paste where the wires meet and fire with the torch until the solder flows.  Pick up with flat nose pliers (careful, it's screaming HOT),  quench and pickle for about 15 minutes.  Rinse, file away any excess solder and polish to your liking.  At this point  you can also texture and patina the hoop any way you like.  Copper is great to patina in heat, and the colors you see here in the finished pendant were achieved using only my micro torch.  Seal with wax or spray acrylic, whatever you like.  Next, place the enamel disc and decorative beads on the micro screw, feed the screw through the hole in the center wire and attach the nut on the back.  Make sure to tighten the screw well.  Snip off the excess screw length down to about 2mm, the place the whole thing face down on a bench block.  Hammer the end of he screw flush with the nut, flaring the excess so the whole assembly is fixed in place.  Use a round head hammer or riveting hammer for this.  Finally, hammer the remaining wire end flat or blunt and bend it over using round nose pliers to form a looped bail.  Trim the wire as needed to create whatever type bail you like.  You can wire wrap this or squeeze it tight with flat nose pliers.  I simply looped the wire over the fat part of my round nosed pliers and squeezed it tight together with flat nose pliers.
 

Clockwise:  Bits and pieces, setting up the wire for soldering,
lining up the disc with the center wire, adding a dab of Easy Solder paste

Clockwise:  Firing wires together, the hoop after pickle and heat patina, assembling the
disc stack onto the micro screw, view from the back prior to fixing in place with the nut.

View from the back after the nut is attached, trimmed and flared, below that
using round nose pliers to bend the wire to create a bail, and the finished pendant.

Voila!  You now have a cool pendant with endless possibilities.  Go bigger, or smaller. Make it in brass or silver wire.  Fill the center with stacks of flat beads, layers, resin papers, whatever!  Add dangles below (which I plan to do with this pendant), leave the bail end wire longer and add more beads before bending to form the bail, curve and twist the wire into a super-fancy bail, whatever you want!

If you make this, please share photos and let me know what you think.  Enjoy your hoops!!

**Note:  For the pendant pictured here, I went a step further and soldered a nugget of sterling silver to the head of the micro screw prior to assembling.  Sometimes I like the industrial look of the screw head showing, but wanted a more organic look here.  Just dabbed a bit of Easy Solder to the tip of the screw, used a third hand to hold it to the nugget and fired with my micro torch.  This is a simple, quick way to give the screw an upgrade!

Sources: 
Easy Solder Paste, Cool Tools
Enamel Copper Discs, MaryAnn Carroll
Copper Wire, Etsy, Rio Grande, Objects and Elements, Home Depot
Micro Screws, Objects and Elements
Micro Torch, Etsy, Objects and Elements, Amazon

household inspiration

mary jane dodd

large knitting needle

the challenge this month is for hoops and they are as versatile form as you will find. scaling them up or down for earrings or links can be a great source of experimentation and fun. 

while i am a firm believer that there are some tools that are necessary and worth the investment, i don't feel that way about what you need to shape wire. while proper mandrels are great, they aren't required here. just look around your house!

yes, prescription bottles - they come in different diameters and are pretty sturdy.

knitting needles, wooden dowels, pieces of pvc pipe - all round and of different sizes

the punches from a dapping set - use the handle side

this bottle of hand sanitizer makes a great oval shape

and i even was able to make an elongated form wrapping around the end of the handle of my pliers. 

once you have your shape, you can refine your form (or not, if you want it to be more organic) and work harden it on your block or anvil - 

while you cannot reinvent this wheel, with the low cost of copper wire to experiment with you can certainly create something that is uniquely yours. 

i used 16 gauge wire in these examples as they would be hanging from an ear wire. 

if i were to be making hoops that go directly into the ear, i would use 20 gauge wire (as i do for my ear wires).