Thursday, April 10, 2008

A Simple Device

With the success of creating chainmaille earrings, came a few things. First, a need to get non-chainmaille supplies (pendants, earring hooks, clasps). Second, a desire to not have to bother with extra suppliers and try to get everything from one place.

Sadly, the Ring Lord doesn't have everything I could want. They have titanium, and niobium, and aluminum, some clasps and earring hooks, but alas, no pendants. They do have a curious device to make your own earring hooks. After seeing that, I wanted one, to make hooks from whatever I was making earring out of. After looking around a bit, and finding out how it worked, I wanted to make my own.

I'm a bit crafty, as people who know me will attest, and I have some skills to go with my knowledge and craftiness. I'm no machinist, so I couldn't make it out of a block of metal, with spring loaded guides and such. So a block of wood, a pin, and a couple of the right sized drill bits gets me close enough.

Which works pretty well. One side is 1 1/2", the other I'll cut down to 2". This will be great for different length shanks. The other thing I'll need is not so tall (or sharp) drill bit 'pins'.

And here are the results. Three fairly uniform hooks, of the appropriate size. The only thing my device doesn't do is the eye. Maybe I'll have to get one of the machined ones so that it can "do the eye perfect everytime". But in the meantime, I can do for myself.

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