Bails

It wasn't easy for us to figure out how to make a handmade bail finding out of jewelry wire and have them come out consistently and in a quality that was acceptable.  We actually worked on developing the technique for how to do this for over 4 months.  After many failures, we have finally developed a technique for making this finding.  The technique is rather simple to follow and makes a very nice bail. 

Shown left and right, we have two different styles of bail finding.  The teardrop style of bail finding can be found at right.  The round bail finding can be viewed at left.  A close-up of the round bail finding can be viewed below.

Some of our instructions are easy for us to prepare.  We often find that we can sit down and using practice wire make a jewelry wire component the first time and be satisfied with the results.  Rarely, we will find that making a nice jewelry wire component takes much more effort.  This is one of those skills where our first seven attempts at making this jewelry wire finding failed.  We have been working on this skill for about 4 months.  What this means is that the approach to making a bail finding like the ones shown left and right may seem to be obvious, but what we actually found is that it isn't as easy to figure out how to do this as it might seem.

With all of the above said on how difficult it was to figure out how to make a bail finding, should one assume it is that difficult to make?  Here is the good news.  Once we figured out how to do it, we learned that this is an advanced beginners jewelry making skill.  Determining what the steps are to make this finding was difficult.  Actually following those steps is relatively easy. 

As with all the skills we discuss on our web site, we strongly suggest that everyone practice making this jewelry wire finding with practice wire several times before cutting your good wire.  You will get better at this with practice.  We did.
 

Jewelry Making Skills Required:

• Ability to cut wire with with a flush cutter.
• Ability to straighten wire with nylon jaw pliers.
• Ability to use our WigJig tools to make wire components. 

Step 1:  Using your flush cutter, cut a 5 inch long segment of 22 gauge soft jewelry wire.  1/2 hard or hard jewelry wire will not work as well. 

Step 2:  Using your nylon jaw pliers, straighten this wire segment by repeatedly pulling the wire through the jaws of your nylon jaw pliers.

Step 3:  Position a 3/16" Super Peg near one side of your jig.  Place your 5 inch segment of wire so that 1 inch of wire is on one side of the 3/16" Super Peg and the other 4 inches of wire are on the opposite side as shown at right.

Step 4:  Hold the 1 inch segment of wire and wrap the 4 inch long segment of wire around the 3/16 inch Super Peg two full times.  When completed your wire should appear as shown at right. 

Step 5:  Remove the wire from your jig.  At this point the wire should appear as shown at right.

Step 6:  Grasp the wire as shown at right in the jaws of your round nose pliers.  Please note that we are gripping the wire slightly toward the side of the shorter 1 inch wire end.  We are gripping off to this side so that when we bend the long wire segment in the next step that the bend will be centered. 

Step 7:   Now bend the long wire segment up 90 degrees while continuing to grip the wire firmly with your round nose pliers. 

Step 8:  Remove the wire from the jaws of your round nose pliers.  Adjust the wire so that it appears as shown below-left with no pressure applied. 

Step 9:  Place this wire component on your jig, on the 3/16 inch Super Peg as shown below-center.  We are using the jig and the Super Peg to preserve the round shape of the bail while we wrap the 1 inch wire segment around the longer wire tail. 

Step 10:  Hold the wire on your jig and in position on the 3/16 inch Super Peg and using your fingers lift the short, 1 inch wire segment and bend it over the longer wire segment as shown below-right.  Push the wire down with your fingers as close to the bend in the short wire segment as possible.  This helps to keep this wrap tight. 

Step 8	Step 9	Step 10

Step 11:  Remove the wire from your jig.  At this point you have completed 1/2 of a wrap.  We want to ultimately complete 2 full wraps of the short wire segment around the long wire segment using the Super Peg to preserve the round shape of the bail.  For this reason, you will need to replace the wire on the jig as shown at right. 

Step 12:  As we did in step 10, we need to pull the short wire segment up and over the long wire segment.  Repeat steps 10 and 11 two more times so that you have two full wraps of the short wire segment around the long wire segment.  When you are done, the wire should appear as shown below-left.  Please note that it is easier to keep the wrap tight when the short wire segment is perpendicular to the long wire segment.  If the wrap should be slightly open, or not tight, you can correct this using your bent chain nose pliers to force the wire wraps to be adjacent to one another. 

Step 13:  Remove the wire from the jig.  At this point the wire should appear as shown below-center. 

Step 14:  Using your flush cutter, cut the excess wire as close to the rest of the wire component as possible.  After cutting the excess, there will be a very short wire tail sticking up, where you cut the wire.  Using your bent chain nose pliers, squeeze this short wire tail and twist, so that the wire wraps around the longer wire segment.  When you have accomplished this step, your wire should appear as shown below-right.  Squeezing the wire tail flat is easiest to do while holding the circle of wire with your thumb and fore-finger from your non-dominant hand, while you squeeze and twist the wire with the bent chain nose pliers held in your dominant hand.  

Step 12	Step 13	Step 14

Step 15:  Now we need to bend the wire using our bent chain nose pliers so that it will easily go through the hole in our pendant bead or gemstone.  To start this process grip the wire with the tips of your bent chain nose pliers and bend the long wire tail about 45 degrees as shown at right. 

Step 16:  In this step we need to measure so that when we bend the wire, it will ultimately be horizontal through the pendant.  Hold your pendant in position and measure how much wire you will need.  Grip the wire above this point with the tips of your pliers and bend the wire so that it will be horizontal as it goes through the pendant.  This requires a bend of about 135 degrees.  See the picture below-left. 

Step 17:  Slide the long wire tail through the hole in your pendant.  You may need to adjust the wire slightly by hand so that it is horizontal inside the pendant and the wire to the circles is vertical.  See the picture below center-left. 

Step 18:  Using your fingers, bend the wire tail up at the point where it passes outside the pendant.  Bend it until it crosses the vertical wire segment below the circles as shown below center-right. 

Step 19:  Using your bent chain nose pliers, grip the wire near the pendant and bend it 45 degrees so that it will be perpendicular to the vertical wire segment below the circles.  See the picture below-right.  We are preparing to wrap the long wire tail around the short wire segment below the circles.  To do this, we want the two pieces of wire to be perpendicular to one another. 

Step 16	Step 17	Step 18	Step 19
Step 20:  Holding the pendant tightly with the thumb and forefinger of your non-dominant hand, wrap the wire tail tightly around the wire segment below the circles about 2 times until there is no gap in the wrap.  See the picture below-left.  If possible wrap this wrap in the opposite direction to the initial wrap.  If this is done perfectly, the cut end of the lower wrap should end up next to the cut end from the upper wrap with a very small gap between them.  This may require you to change the bend of the long wire segment so that is it on the proper side of the circles.  Step 21:  Using your flush cutter, cut the excess wire.  Using your bent chain nose pliers, squeeze and twist the cut end of the wire until it lays flat.  When completed your pendant should appear as shown below-center.  Step 22:   At this point, you can separate the two circles slightly as shown below-right.  Do not separate by more than about 1/16th to 1/8th inch.

Some people may decide that they don't like the small gap between the two circles.  This is personal choice.  When you don't separate the two circles the jewelry wire bail will appear as shown at right. When making this into a necklace, we recommend using a medium size chain in the curb style.

Alternative Design:

The jewelry wire bail shown at right is in a teardrop shape.  Many people like this shape better than a circle because it is slightly more complex.  Our instructions for making the teardrop jewelry wire bail will be provided within the next month.

The earrings shown at left use the round bail instructions.  They are made with a single loop of wire around the 3/16" Super Peg instead of two loops as we did with the bail for the necklace.  You will find that it is important to use soft wire when making the necklace bail.  It is also important to use 1/2 hard wire when making the bail for the earrings.  The earrings shown use our 7x18mm pendant Cubic Zirconia. These earrings use a 3/16" bail and because the pendants are larger, the 3/16" bail works very well.

What do you do with smaller pendants?  Certainly for smaller pendants like the pendant shown at right, a 3/16" bail will be too large.  For this pendant we made a handmade bail finding with a 3/32" loop at the top. 

The two bails shown at right look rather large in these pictures.  These two bails are actually 3/32nd inch in diameter.  The pictures are enlarged so that you can see the finished bail better.  Our instructions for making these bails begin below. 

Step 1:  Using your nylon jaw pliers, straighten a segment of 22 or 24 gauge wire that is at least 2 inches long.  The two bails shown at right were made with 24 gauge wire.  One was made with soft wire and one was made with half-hard wire.  It is slightly easier to make this bail finding more consistently using half-hard wire.

Step 2:  Using your flush cutter, cut a segment of the straightened wire 2 inches long. 

Step 3:  Position one regular metal peg in a WigJig Olympus, Olympus Lite or Electra. 

Step 4:  Position your wire so that 3/4" of the wire is on one side of the peg and the remainder, longer portion of the wire, is on the opposite side of the peg.  With the wire positioned in that manner, wrap the wire completely around the peg as shown below-left. 

Step 5:  Remove the wire from your jig.  It should appear as shown below-center.

Step 6:  Now we need to grasp the loop in our round nose pliers as shown below-right.  It is slightly hard to view, but we want to grasp the wire slightly off center on the side of the shorter, 3/4" wire segment.  When you have the wire gripped in this manner, bend the long wire segment until it is perpendicular to the shorter wire segment and points toward the center of the circle of wire. 

Step 7:  When you have completed bending the wire from step 6 it should appear as shown at right.  If the long wire segment isn't centered and pointing to the middle of the circle, adjust it slightly until it is.  You can put the circle of wire on your round nose pliers to help preserve the circle of wire while you adjust the long wire segment.

Step 8:  At this point we need to bend the wire using our pliers so that the wire will go through the hole in your pendant.  The pendants that we used here had a side-to-side hole.  These procedures would need to be modified slightly if you have a pendant with a front-to-back hole.  The first step in bending the wire is to grip the long wire segment with the tips of your bent chain nose pliers as shown below-left.  You want to grip the wire as close to the circle as possible.

Step 9:  While holding the wire as indicated in step 8, bend the wire about 30 degrees as shown below-center.  This initial bend is necessary to bend the wire to avoid the top of your pendant. 

Step 10:  After completing this first bend the wire should appear as shown below-right. 

Step 8	Step 9	Step 10

Alternative Configuration (Continued):

Step 11:  At this point we need to bend the wire so that it will go through the hole in the pendant.  Grasp the wire with your bent chain nose pliers so that if you make the bend at that point, it will go through the hole in the pendant with a little room at the top of the pendant.  See the picture at right.

Step 12:  After making the bend, the wire should appear as shown below-left. 

Step 13:  Thread the long wire tail through the hole in your pendant.  See the picture below-center. 

Step 14:  By hand, using your finger tips, bend the end of the wire up until it crosses the wire below the circle of wire.  See the picture below-right.  Try to push the wire with your fingers as close to your pendant as possible.  

Step 12	Step 13	Step 14

Step 15:  Using the tips of your bent chain nose pliers, grip the wire above the pendant and bend the wire so that it is horizontal as shown at right. 

Step 16:  Using your bent chain nose pliers, grip the wire immediately above the pendant as shown at right.  The purpose of gripping here is to preserve the shape of the wire while you wrap the wire tail around the short vertical wire segment below the circle of wire. 

Step 17:  Wrap the wire tail around 180 degrees.  We are not going to wrap the wire fully around here, just a 180 degree bend as shown below-left. 

Step 18:  Using your flush cutter, cut the excess wire.  After cutting the excess wire, use your bent chain nose pliers to squeeze the cut end of the wire flat. 

Step 19:  Now we need to wrap the beginning wire segment around the wire below the circle.  To begin this, we need to grip the circle of wire with our bent chain nose pliers as shown below-right. 

Step 17	Step 18	Step 19

Step 20:  Wrap the wire around until the gap between the circle and the top of the pendant is filled with wrapped wire.  This will take about 1 to 2 full wraps of wire.  See the picture at right.  Once you have completed the wraps, cut the excess wire with your flush cutter.  After cutting the excess wire, there will be a small wire tail that sticks up.  To flatten this short wire tail, grip the circle with one pair of bent chain nose pliers and squeeze and twist the wire tail until it is flat. 

The finished hand-made jewelry wire bail is shown at left and below.  The pendants shown her are actually smaller than they appear in the pictures.  They are our 7x10mm pendant beads.

These instructions continue for making a teardrop shaped bail finding as shown at right. 

Now we are ready for a slightly more advanced bail project.  This project has a lot of steps.  We are going to document all 25 steps because following all these steps is what allows us to make this bail finding in a very consistent manner.  This is an intermediate jewelry making project. 

Step 1:  Using your flush cutter, cut a segment of 22 or 24 gauge round wire three inches long.  For this project, soft wire works much better. 

Step 2:  Position a 3/16" Super Peg and a regular metal peg in your jig as shown below-left.  Place your wire on the jig so that 3/4" of wire are on one side of the peg and the remaining 2 1/4" of wire are on the opposite side. 

Step 3:  Hold the short 3/4" wire segment, down with one hand while you wrap the wire around the pegs two times.  See the picture below-center. 

Step 4:  Remove the wire from the jig and it should appear as shown below-right. 

Step 2	Step 3	Step 4

Step 5:  Using your round nose pliers, grasp the teardrop loop as shown at right.  Please note that your goal is to grasp the loop slightly off-center on the side of the loop with the short wire segment.  The reason for this is that in the next step we are going to bend the long wire segment down and want it to be in the center of the teardrop loop after we bend it down.

Step 6:  Bend the long wire segment down.  When completed the wire should appear as shown below-left. 

Step 7:  Now we need to replace the wire on the jig.  We do this so that the teardrop pattern in the pegs will support the teardrop pattern in the wire and allow us to start wrapping the wire at the appropriate position.  Place the wire on your jig as shown below-center.  Try to get the wire firmly against the pegs with as little gaps as possible.  Please note that the short wire segment is on the bottom, with the long wire segment on the top.

Step 8:  While holding the wire firmly against the pegs, lift the short wire segment up and over the long wire segment as shown below-right.  We started this wrap with the wire on the jig so that we could precisely begin the wire wrap and  preserve the shape of the teardrop.  We will complete this wrap in a later step. 

Step 6	Step 7	Step 8

Step 9:  Remove the wire from your jig.  At this point the wire should appear as shown at right.  The teardrop shape in our wire is essentially permanent because the bend in the wire sets the teardrop shape.

Step 10:  In this step we are beginning the process of shaping the wire so that it will pass through the hole in your pendant.  Grasp the long wire segment immediately below the teardrop with the tips of your bent chain nose pliers as shown below-left. 

Step 11:  Bend the wire about 30 degrees as shown below-center.  In order to bend the wire, push the long wire segment with your thumb on your dominant hand while you hold the bent chain nose pliers in your non-dominant hand.  When you push the wire, have your thumb as close to the pliers as possible.  This will cause the bend to be crisp or sharp and not rounded. 

Step 12:  Now we need to reposition our grip on the wire so that we can make the bend that will cause the wire to pass horizontally through the hole in your pendant.  Grip the long wire segment about 3/16" below the bend in the wire that you made in step 11.  See the picture below-right. 

Step 10	Step 11	Step 12

Step 13:  When you have completed the bend in step 12, the wire will appear as shown at right.  Please note that the bend at the edge of the pliers is a sharp angle, and not rounded because we pushed with our thumb close to the pliers. 

Step 14:  Remove the wire from your pliers.  At this point the wire will appear as shown below-left.  You may notice that the orientation of the teardrop loop is not correct for allowing the chain to pass through the loop and have the pendant hang in the proper orientation.  We will correct this in a latter step.

Step 15:  Slide the long wire segment into your pendant as shown below-center.  Slide the pendant until it is touching the wire on the left that leads to the teardrop loop. 

Step 16:  With the pendant held all the way at the left, using your thumb on your dominant hand, bend the wire up until it crosses the wire below the teardrop loop as shown below-right.  Again, push with your thumb as close to the pendant as possible.  If the bend happens to be too rounded, you can use your bent chain nose pliers to help squeeze the wire near the pendant so that the bend will be less rounded.  If possible position the wire so that both the short wire segment and the long wire segment are on the same side of the wire below the teardrop loop.  This will slightly improve the quality of the finished piece. 

Step 14	Step 15	Step 16

Step 17:  When wrapping one wire around another, it is important that the two wires remain perpendicular to one another.  For this reason, we are going to need to bend the long wire segment so that it is perpendicular to the wire below the teardrop loop.  To start this bend, grasp the wire with your bent chain nose pliers as shown at right.  Note that you want your pliers slightly below where you want the bend.

Step 18:  Push the wire so that it is perpendicular to the wire below the teardrop as shown below-left. 

Step 19:  At this point we need to wrap the long wire segment around the wire below the teardrop loop one time.  To do this without distorting the shape of the wire, we need to hold the wire with our bent chain nose pliers.  Change your grip on the wire so that you are holding both wire segments above the pendant as shown below-center.  Hold your bent chain nose pliers in your non-dominant hand. 

Step 20:  While firmly holding the wire with your bent chain nose pliers, bend the long wire segment 180 degrees as shown below-right. 

Step 17	Step 18	Step 19

Step 20:  To finish this teardrop bail wire component we need to do a couple of things.  We need to wrap the short wire segment around the wire below the teardrop loop to fill the space above the pendant and we need to cut the excess wire on both the short wire segment and the long wire segment and then squeeze the cut ends flat.  The order for this isn't terribly important.  Based upon the last step your wire and pendant will appear as shown at right.

Step 21:  In these instructions we are going to wrap the short wire segment first.  It might have been easier to cut the excess wire from the long wire segment first so that it wasn't in our way, but the pictures below don't show that.  To wrap the short wire segment you need to hold the teardrop loop either with chain nose pliers or with the thumb and fore-finger on your non-dominant hand.  Because we had to use soft wire for this project so that the teardrop loop would be shaped correctly, making this wrap is going to be more difficult than normal.  We used our bent chain nose pliers to help us keep this wrap tight.  You can also make this wrap with just your fingers, but using your fingers the wrap tends to be loose and not as consistent.  A good technique is to wrap one loop in the wire by using just your fingers and then use your pliers to twist that wrap so that it will be tight then make a wrap the same way.  When using your pliers, the pliers will be gripping the wrapped loop and not gripping the end of the short wire segment.  Make about 2 wraps until the space above the pendant is filled with wrapped wire.  See the picture below-left for what your wire should look like.  This part takes a little practice. 

Step 22:  Using your flush cutter, cut the excess wire.  After cutting the excess wire, squeeze and twist the cut end of the wire with your bent chain nose pliers so that the cut end lays flat.  Your wire should appear as shown below-center. 

Step 23:  Using your flush cutter cut the excess wire from the long wire segment and using your bent chain nose pliers squeeze the cut end until it lays flat.    Your wire should now appear as shown below-right. 

Step 21	Step 22	Step 23

Step 24:  The process that we followed would work perfectly for a pendant with a front-to-back hole.  For the pendant shown here with a side-to-side hole, we will need to twist the teardrop loop until it is oriented as shown at right.  This is easy to do with just your fingers.  You will want to twist the teardrop loop 90 degrees so that you are adding 90 degrees to the wrapped wire from the short wire segment and not in the opposite direction.  This actually helps to tighten the wrapped loops and makes the finished piece look slightly better. 

Step 25:  The final step is to separate the two loops by about 15 degrees as shown below-left.  It is best to accomplish this step by using your bent chain nose pliers to slide between the two loops and bend each loop slightly away from vertical. 

Step 26:  A close up of the finished product is shown below-right.  This teardrop bail has a front side and a back side.  Ideally, you would wear the pendant with the back side toward the wearer's body.  The front side is the side shown below-right.  On this side you can not see the end of the wire from the short wire segment but you may be able to view the end of the long wire segment.  The back side of the pendant is the side shown below-left.  On this side you can view the end of the short wire segment and it is slightly less esthetically pleasing. 

The pendants shown here are our 22x30mm pendants.

Step 25	Step 26

Triangular Jewelry Wire Bail Shown at right

Our Triangular Jewelry Wire bail is another way to make a pendant out of a larger gemstone or CZ.  Shown at right are two pendants, one with a side-to-side hole and one with a front-to-back hole.  These instructions will cover how to make a bail finding for either bead.  The bead shown near right is our 22x30mm Pear Cubic Zirconia Pendant and can be found in the Pendants sub-department to our "More Bling" area of our Internet store.  The pendant at right is a product that we have on order and hope to add to our Internet store in May 2009.  Our instructions for how to make this bail finding begin below.  These instructions use our WigJig Centaur or Cyclops and 4 inches of 22 gauge wire.  This is an advanced beginners to intermediate jewelry making project. 

 Step 1:  Using your nylon jaw pliers straighten a segment of 22 gauge wire 4 inches long.  1/2 hard wire will work better than soft wire if you have it available.  Our 22 gauge non-tarnish brass Artistic Wire, Item 0523, is good wire for this project. 

Step 2:  Using your flush cutter cut that segment of wire to a length of 4". 

Step 3:  Using your fine step jaw pliers, make a "P" loop in the end of the wire sized so that it will fit on a peg in your WigJig Cyclops or Centaur. 

Step 4:  Place three regular metal pegs in a WigJig Cyclops or Centaur as shown at right.  Place the "P" loop in your wire on the furthest left peg as shown. 

Triangular Jewelry Wire Bail (Continued):

Step 5:  Wrap your wire tightly around the three pegs in the center of the WigJig Centaur or Cyclops two times.  You may find that it will be easier to wrap tightly by removing one peg at a time to allow you to push the wire past that peg.  There are two wraps of wire around the central pegs shown at right, but from this perspective you can only see the top of the two wire triangles. 

Step 6:  Remove the wire from the jig and it should appear as shown below-left.

Step 7:  Using your round nose pliers, grip the triangles of wire slightly on the left of center at the point of the triangle, and bend the long wire tail down as shown below-center.  Your goal is that the long wire tail points to the center of the triangle. 

Step 8:  Place your wire back on the jig with the initial loop in the position shown below-right.  You can remove the left-most peg if this will help.  We are putting the wire back on the jig because in the next step we have to start the wrap of the initial wire segment around the longer wire tail and the jig will help to preserve the shape of the triangles of wire. 

Step 6	Step 7	Step 8

Triangular Bail (Continued):

Step 9:  Pull the initial segment of wire up and over while holding the triangles of wire in position on the pegs in your jig.  This step gets the wrap of wire started in the correct position.  See the picture at right. 

Step 10:  Remove the wire from your jig.  It should appear as shown below-left. 

Step 11:  Using your bent chain nose pliers grasp the long wire tail immediately below the triangles and bend the wire about 30 to 45 degrees as shown below-center. 

Step 12:  Grasp the wire at the 30 to 45 degree bend with your bent chain nose pliers and bend the wire so that it is parallel to the beginning wire segment as shown below-right.

Step 10	Step 11	Step 12

Triangular Jewelry Wire Bail (Continued):

Step 13:  Add your pendant bead or gemstone to the long wire tail as shown at right.  Slide the pendant all the way onto the wire.

Step 14:  With the pendant or gemstone pushed as far to the left as possible in the picture below-left, bend the wire tail up and ultimately across the top of the pendant bead or gemstone as shown.  You can push the wire with your thumb or forefinger. or some my find that pushing with the jaws of your bent chain nose pliers will help.  Try to push the wire so that the initial wire segment and the long wire tail are on the same side of the wire triangles if possible. 

Step 15:  Grasp the wire with your bent chain nose pliers as shown below-center. 

Step 16:  While holding the wire in your pliers, bend the wire tail until it is parallel to the beginning wire segment but pointing in the opposite direction.  See the picture below-right. 

Step 14	Step 15	Step 16

Step 17:  Change your grip on the wire as shown at right.  You want to grip both sides of the wire immediately above the pendant bead or gemstone.  The goal by griping the wire here is to preserve the shape of the wire above the pendant bead or gemstone while you wrap the wire around the wire segment between the pendant bead and the triangles.   

Step 18:  Push the wire tightly around the wire segment between the pendant and the triangles in wire.  Your goal is to wrap the wire around 180 degrees one time.  Half-hard will naturally wrap tighter than soft wire.  See the picture below-left for how the wire should appear after the wrap. 

Step 19:  Remove your pliers from the wire and the wire will appear as shown below-center. 

Step 20:  Using your thumb and forefinger on your non-dominant hand, tightly grasp the triangles and hold them while you wrap the initial wire segment (with the loop) tightly around the wire between the triangles and the pendant.  Wrap as many times as is required to fill the space in the wire as shown below-right.  You may find that using your bent chain nose pliers to help push the initial wire segment around will help allow you to wrap tighter.  You will also find that 1/2 hard wire will wrap tighter naturally while soft wire will be more difficult to get a tight wrap. 

Step 18	Step 19	Step 20

Step 21:  Using your flush cutter, cut the excess wire on both the wire tail and the initial wire segment. 

Step 22:  Where you cut both wire segments, you will need to squeeze the cut end of the wire flat using your bent chain nose pliers.  It will be best to squeeze with your pliers and twist at the same time while holding the triangles with your thumb and forefinger on your non-dominant hand. 

Step 23:  In the picture, above right, you should notice that the triangles are not oriented as needed for the pendant to hang properly.  At this point, we need to twist the triangles 90 degrees so that they are orientated as shown below-left.  It is important to twist the triangles in the direction so that you are adding 1/4 turn to the wrap of the wire and not so that you are undoing the wrap by 1/4 turn. 

Step 24:  The final step is to use your finger nail to slightly pull the two triangles apart.  Once you have them slightly apart, you can use your bent chain nose pliers to bend the triangles so that they are open by about 15 degrees as shown below-center. 

Step 22	Step 23	Finished!   ;-)

See the picture above right for a pendant necklace made with the triangles wire dangle and a pair of earrings made with the round bail instructions. 

Occasionally you will find a glass bead that has a larger than normal hole and you will want  to hang that glass bead as a pendant.   You can see that we made a triangular jewelry wire bail for these beads, but used a rounded bottom to hold the beads. 

The two glass beads shown at right were made by Louise Erskine. Unfortunately, our pictures don't portray all of the beauty in Louise's beads. 

Our instructions below show how to make this triangular bail with the rounded bottom. 

Step 25:  Follow steps 1 through 10.  When you have completed step 10, your wire should appear as shown at right.

Step 26:  Using your bent chain nose pliers, grasp the wire immediately below the triangles on the long wire segment and bend the wire 90 degrees as shown below. 

	Step 26

Step 27:  Place your triangles of wire back on the jig and add a 3/16" Super Peg as shown at right.  This peg is slightly off center and we will correct for that in a later step.  Your goal is to place your Super Peg so that it is barely in contact with the wire as near the 90 degree bend in the wire as possible. 

Step 28:  Now wrap the wire tail around the Super Peg as shown below-left. 

Step 29:  Remove the wire from your jig and it should appear as shown below-center.  Please note that the circle of wire is slightly off the center line of the triangles. 

Step 30:  Place your 3/16" Super Peg back in your jig and place the circle of wire back on this peg.  Now adjust the wire circle so that it is centered below the triangles of wire and the wire tail is parallel to the beginning wire segment as shown below-right. 

Step 28	Step 29	Step 30

Step 31:  Remove the wire from your jig and it should appear as shown at right. 

Step 32:  Now connect your bead to the round loop in the wire.    You may need to open the round loop in the wire with your bent chain nose pliers slightly to get the bead into position. 

Step 33:  Once the bead is in position, grasp both sides of the wire loop immediately above the bead with your bent chain nose pliers.  This preserves the round shape of the loop.   

Step 34:  While holding the loop securely, wrap the wire tail around the wire segment below the triangles 180 degrees or about 1/2 way around.  This step is very similar to steps 18 and 19.  

Step 35:  Now wrap the beginning wire segment tightly around the wire below the triangles to fill the space below the triangles with wraps.  This step is similar to step 20.   

Step 36:  At this point you are ready to cut the excess wire using your flush cutter on both the long wire tail and on the beginning wire segment.  See step 21 for a similar picture. 

Step 37:  Using your bent chain nose pliers, squeeze and twist the cut ends of the wire flat. 

Step 38:  Using your fingernail, open a small gap between the two triangles.  Use your bent chain nose pliers to expand this gap to about 15 degrees as shown above-right. 

This completes our Triangles Jewelry Wire Bail jewelry making project.  We hope you like one or more of the variations.