Fine Silver Wire For Jewelry Making

fine silver wire for jewelry making

For jewelry making, what is a good way to close jump rings?

I have been making jewelry as a hobby for a few years or so but there’s one thing I haven’t figured out how to do. How can I close jump ring so it doesn’t open and what I have on it doesn’t fall off? I’ve searched for questions and I saw that it was suggested to solder it, but I’m unsure of how to do that if I have things already on the jump ring like wire wrapped beads. The jump ring I’m using is sterling and the wire wrapped beads are .999 fine silver – I don’t want that to melt with a torch if I were to use that. Any ideas please?
Thanks!

1) Make sure you’re twisting your jump rings open, not pulling. Your technique here: grab each side of the ring (with pliers if it’s little, your fingers if it’s big) pull one side towards you, and one side away. To close, do it the opposite way.
2)Are you making your own jump rings? A lot of books actually show the wrong way to do it. While you can wrap some wire around your round nose pliers and use wire cutters to cut the rings, this leaves you with an ugly tip on each side of the ring which makes it harder to close. Alternative: wrap your wire around a small dowel, clamp it in a vise, and saw halfway through the rings. You’ll have nice smooth edges that are easier to close. Or, you can just file down the ugly edges from the ones you snipped with the wire cutters (if you need a lot, use the dowel approach and thank me later).
3) If you have anything that is not metal, DO NOT SOLDER. This especially goes for glass beads. Improperly heated glass will explode! If possible, solder the ring, then attach your beads.
4) Smaller jump rings stay closed better. Ditto for rings made with larger gauge wire. Experiment and find what works best for you. You might want to get some copper wire to practice with (it’s cheaper).
5) Handy tip if you ever do decide to solder your rings (again, this is the correct way to close jump rings, whenever possible): pick solder them. In this soldering technique, place a bit of flux at the joint and a couple chips of solder on your soldering surface a ways away from the ring. Heat up the solder until it melts into a ball. Keeping it heated, poke your soldering pick at it. The solder should stick to your pick. Keep the flame on the solder, and move the pick to where the ring is. Keeping the solder hot and melty, touch it to the ring. It should move from the pick to the ring, and solder it shut. DO NOT HEAT THE JUMP RING. It will melt. Again, practice a few times–it’s pretty tricky, even the easy way.

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