Post by Tela on Jan 2, 2012 23:09:41 GMT -5
I spent the entire day making a hummingbird with crystals to hang in a glass door in front of hummingbird feeders. Everything that could go wrong, went wrong. (I'll post pix later.)
The whole thing is netted and after the 3rd 26g copper wire broke, I decided to try to anneal trouble spots with a cigarette lighter as I worked. It worked absolutely fabulously and saved me a lot of grief.
I don't know what was up with that wire. It was a new package of bare copper Artistic wire. I have netted little hearts with tiny netting with 24g and had no problems, but this big bird gave me all kinds of trouble!!! From the frame/form to the netting- it was trouble. But, I learned quite a few things, including annealing as I worked.
The cig lighter didn't get it too hot and didn't discolor the wire very much, but it did anneal the 26g wire. For the bird, it will work just fine. AND, since I found out the my Speed Brite works for torched wire, I'm sure it will clean this wire. I haven't done it on this because you can't tell that I heated the wire. I don't plan to oxidize because I want a natural patina, so I don't know about los over the burned spots. I'm going to try it again on jewelry, if I ever need to, and see if the speed brite will clean it, if necessary, and if los will cover it if I don't clean it.
Just thought I'd share that. Saved me from pulling my hair out and saved the piece.
Anyone else do this?? I've never heard of doing it, but I'm sure others must of tried it.
I thought to do it because one time I had to burn some los off a tiny wireguard with my stove flame and it got so incredibly soft, so fast that the guard was almost useless.
The whole thing is netted and after the 3rd 26g copper wire broke, I decided to try to anneal trouble spots with a cigarette lighter as I worked. It worked absolutely fabulously and saved me a lot of grief.
I don't know what was up with that wire. It was a new package of bare copper Artistic wire. I have netted little hearts with tiny netting with 24g and had no problems, but this big bird gave me all kinds of trouble!!! From the frame/form to the netting- it was trouble. But, I learned quite a few things, including annealing as I worked.
The cig lighter didn't get it too hot and didn't discolor the wire very much, but it did anneal the 26g wire. For the bird, it will work just fine. AND, since I found out the my Speed Brite works for torched wire, I'm sure it will clean this wire. I haven't done it on this because you can't tell that I heated the wire. I don't plan to oxidize because I want a natural patina, so I don't know about los over the burned spots. I'm going to try it again on jewelry, if I ever need to, and see if the speed brite will clean it, if necessary, and if los will cover it if I don't clean it.
Just thought I'd share that. Saved me from pulling my hair out and saved the piece.
Anyone else do this?? I've never heard of doing it, but I'm sure others must of tried it.
I thought to do it because one time I had to burn some los off a tiny wireguard with my stove flame and it got so incredibly soft, so fast that the guard was almost useless.
I haven't gotten any of the small g wire in bulk, yet. I am running through the small packs that I bought when I began netting and coiling. I'll definitely need bulk when I buy again, though. 
Haven't tried it yet.
