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Hi. This is Julie from Beadaholique.com. Today I want going to show you how to make a hook
eye clasp using just some craft wire
and a pair of round nose pliers.
Here's the clasp we're actually going to be making. You can see that it fits nicely
together.
Here is that same clasp over here where I've added some beads and some
wire wrapping. You can really make it very decorative but I think this
nicely illustrates how you can do custom a clasp and have it really match the piece
of jewelry you're doing. So it's a really useful technique to know how to do
and it's really quite simple.
For this project we're gonna need a cylindrical object such as this pen and
that's going to help us to make the
eye part of our hook and eye clasp.
You're going to need
two lengths of wire and this is sixteen gauge craft wire. I've chosen
copper but it also comes in gold and
bronze tones.
I've mine to two and half inches each.
If you would make a little bit of a larger clasp
go ahead and just cut a little bit more
wire.
You're going to need a pair of round nose pliers.
You're going to need a flush cutter and a
flat nose pair of pliers as well. This is a chain nose flat nose but
it works well.
Now if you wanted to get fancy and you've started making a lot of these I would actually
recommend
purchasing some bail making pliers.
They're actually a little bit easier for this than the round nose because they stay uniform
in there width the entire length whereas with the round nose they taper down 0:01:35.250,0:01.:36.720 to a point
For this project I really wanted to use a round nose because I know it's a
tool that just about everybody has in they're beading arsenal.
Make sure you cut your wire and it's probably come out a little bit
bent.
Don't worry too much about that just go ahead and use your fingers.
Try to straighten it out a little bit.
Doesn't have to be perfect.
So let's start by making the
eye part
of the hook and eye clasp.
To do that we're going to pick a place on our round nose pliers.
This is about a third of the way down depending upon the size of your
round nose pliers that will make a difference but
I'm just going to grab
my wire between my plier prongs.
I'm going to twist back.
I'm going to release.
Grab it again
and twist
until it meets the body
of there wire.
I'm just going to go the other side and i'm gonna make sure
that I twisted in the same direction.
Again I'm going to try to find the same spot
that I used before because I want my loops to be the same size.
Grab the wire
and twist,
release,
and twist again.
This is the object that we have right now.
So now I'm going to take my
cylindrical object
and with the loops
facing me
I'm going to
start and what I find to be in the middle, it doesn't have to be exact because
you're going to be able to
wind this up as you go. Now I'm going to push
my wire
around my pen.
I'm just going to slip it off and now I have the eye part of my hook and clasp.
I can just set that aside right now.
Now to make the hook part
we're going to take our two and half each piece of wire.
I'm going to eye ball what I think is the middle of it
and
I'm going to
bend my wire in half.
And I'm just pinching it.
That wasn't quite perfect. That's no big deal.
I'm going to take my flush cutters
and snip off a little bit of a difference. Now that is perfectly in
the middle.
Now taking my round nose pliers
I'm going to again make a simple little loop
and I'm going to
go in an opposite direction
of my main loop. So instead of curving inward I'm going to curve outward
until
the end of the wire meets the body of the wire.
Flip it over
try again to line it up in the same spot.
This is what we have now.
I'm going to again pinch it together a little bit. You can see that those line up
nicely because I tried to make them the same size.
Now I'm going to take my round nose pliers
put it just about a eight of an inch down
from the very tip
and bend.
I actually like going from both directions because the round nose pliers
do taper.
I find it gets a little bit more of a even bend. Kind of work it from various
directions.
If you have the bail making pliers you won't have to worry about that but
with the round nose it's good to be cautious.
I'm gonna come in with my flat nose
and I'm just going to even it out a little bit.
Try to
straighten out any kinks so it's flat.
I like pinching it together.
And there you
have a very simple
hook and eye clasp made with craft wire and round nose pliers.
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