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WigJig News: In our last newsletter we discussed techniques for minimizing tarnish in sterling silver. At that time we thought that it would be May before we had any of the new Argentium Sterling Silver wire that resists tarnish. As it turns out, we were lucky and now have this new sterling silver alloy available in round wire in sizes 18, 20 and 22 gauge. This wire is a patented alloy consisting of 92.5% silver, about 5.9% copper and 1.6% germanium. The tarnish resistance of this silver alloy stems from the fact that germanium combines with elements in the air to form a clear compound that coats the wire. This germanium compound prevents the sulfur compounds in air pollution from coming in contact with the silver in the wire and for this reason prevents the formation of the dark tarnish that results when silver combines with sulfur compounds. When this new Argentium sterling wire does tarnish, the tarnish is a light yellow in color and can easily be removed with a soft cloth and soap and water. Furthermore, this new sterling silver alloy can be soldered and heated just like "old" sterling silver. We really believe that this new alloy of silver is going to take over the jewelry markets. Within the next five years, our opinion is that the market for "old" sterling silver will slowly dry up as it is replaced by this new Argentium sterling silver. You can view our selection of this new wire here. One more new item to discuss. Many of our subscribers have difficulties in printing some of our web pages. For those people, we have one new thing to try. If when you print one of our newer web pages you find that the right hand size of the page gets cut off, we suggest that you go into your web browser software and change the "Page Setup". This is accomplished by selecting the <File> drop down menu and the command "Page Setup" from this menu. We suggesting using the Portrait orientation for printing and left, right, top and bottom margins of 0.3 inches. This will help print many of our newer web pages.
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Design: With every newsletter we provide a new jewelry design from WigJig University to spur the creative juices. The new design for this newsletter is the design for the 2 Tier Beaded Earrings shown at right. This is an advanced beginner's jewelry making project. The two earrings on the left were made using the round peg pattern of the WigJig Cyclops, Centaur, or Electra. The earrings at the far right was made using the square peg pattern of the WigJig Delphi, Centaur or Olympus. This design is one of our better earring designs and for the pattern on the Cyclops, Centaur or Electra we can add a third tier to the earrings to make them truly shoulder duster chandelier earrings. We haven't seen these earrings on the Red Carpet yet, but who knows. Please select either the picture or the name at right to view our instructions for making these earrings. |
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Past Techniques: We maintain a techniques web page that provides links to the discussion of techniques in our prior newsletters. You can visit this web page here. Follow the links on that page to the discussion of the technique in that newsletter. |
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Jewelry Technique: This weeks jewelry technique is a discussion of how to add a connector to leather, hemp or cord jewelry. Normally, this connector would be used to connect the clasp to the ends of the cord necklace. This technique will work well with all sizes of materials, from only 1mm in size up to cord that is almost 1/4" in diameter. The technique that we describe uses 20 or 22 gauge wire to make a wrapped connector on the end of a segment of cord, leather, or hemp. While our completed connector at right looks rather sorry, we used orange wire with our hemp cord so that the technique for making the wire connector would stand out. Standing out is great for instructions, but certainly not what you want with finished jewelry. For finished jewelry we suggest using a wire color that matches or compliments the color of the stringing material. (Orange and brown are probably not the best combination.) Please select either the picture or the name at right to view our instructions for this technique. |
We are continuing to improve our newsletter, so please feel free to provide feedback at custsrv@wigjig.com. Announcements: Shipping Policy. We ship all retail orders over $60 for free within the US. For International orders we ship via UPS international service and charge $34.95 (our average cost) for this expedited shipping service. Please select here to view our entire shipping policy. WigJig University. We provide Over 2,000 web pages of free information, tips, techniques and free jewelry making designs in WigJig University. We encourage everyone to view this information as a source for new ideas, projects, or a way to learn new techniques. We now have a page in WigJig University that shows our designs by sorted by the WigJig tool used to make them. Please select here to view that information. International Vendors. We do have vendors who sell our WigJig products outside the US. We encourage customers to contact these vendors in their home country. Please select here to view our list of overseas vendors. We are also happy to sell our WigJig tools to stores. Please send us an e-mail if you are interested in selling our WigJig tools. Classes. We have a listing of various jewelry-making classes using our WigJig tools that are offered by bead stores throughout the country. If you are interested in classes, please select here. If you know someone who has classes in using our WigJig tools, please ask them to send us an e-mail at custsrv@wigjig.com so that we can include them in these pages. FREE SHIPPING ON ALL ORDERS OVER $60.00 SHIPPED to USA - Customer Care - WigJig, PO Box 5124, Gaithersburg, MD 20882; (800) 579-WIRE (phone), (240) 597-2262 (fax), custsrv@wigjig.com (email). Privacy Policy. All content on this web site including jewelry and wire designs are copyrighted by WigJig. WigJig is a registered trademark. Last modified: January 11, 2008 |
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