TIPS AND TRICKS

by Warren Feld
blog.landofodds.com

Occasional insights into beading, jewelry making, and business…

CURRENT TIPS AND TRICKS BLOG ARTICLES

Crimping:
The "Tail"

The “Tail”
You need to leave about a 3-4” tail on each side of your piece.

While you are crimping, you want to hold the tail so that it runs parallel to the spine.

When you crimp, don’t let go of the tail. If you let go, the tail will either bend over far to one side, creating a “V” with it and the spine. Or, it will cross over the spine. Many people, when they push down on the pliers to squeeze the crimp, they inadvertantly let go of the tail. When you let go, the tail wire will either cross over the spine, or stick out too far to one side. When this happens, your crimp won't hold.

So, to repeat, you hold the tail parallel to the spine. It doesn't have to touch the spine, just follow the same direction.
When you squeeze the pliers closed over the crimp, you let go of the pliers to release the crimp, but you don't want to let go of the tail.

When stringing your beads on, you want to get at least your first bead, and preferrable several beads, on over both the spine and the tail.

When you finish off your necklace or bracelet, you want to feed your tail back through at least the last bead, and preferrable several beads. You then pull the tail out and cut it off as close to the hole as possible.

You don't cut the tail off at the crimp for three reasons:
1) you don't want a scratchy area that comes from the sharp edge of the crushed crimp, as well as the exposed nipple of the cable wire that you can't quite cut down even with the crimp bead
2) you want your ends to be as secure as possible, and make it as difficult as possible for any wire to pull back through the crimp.
3 ) you want the ends to look finished and professional