How to Use the BeadSmith Thing-A-Ma JIG

	Thing-A-Ma JIG Clear Acrylic Jewelry Wire Wrapping Tool SKU: XTL-6065 $8.99
	Thing-A-Ma JIG Deluxe Metal Jewelry Wire Wrapping Tool SKU: XTL-6066 $21.99
	Eurotool Nylon Jaw Pliers Chain Nose- For Scratch-Free Wire Work SKU: XTL-0074 $14.49
	Sharp Flush Cutter Pliers - For Cutting Beading Wire (1 Piece) SKU: XTL-5600 $23.99
	The Beadsmith Jewelry Fine Round Nose Micro Pliers SKU: XTL-5514 $8.49
	Beadalon Large Beading Mats - Prevent Bead Rolling 13 X 18 Inch (Set of 2) SKU: XTL-9935 $6.75
	The Beadsmith Jeweller's Micro Pliers Chain Nose Flat Nose SKU: XTL-5511 $8.45

Note: This audio transcript is auto-generated and may not be completely accurate.
Hi this is Megan with Beadaholique.com and today I'm going to show you how to use BeadSmith's Thing-A-Ma JIG which is a wire wrapping jig. This is the beginner kit that we sell. In the kit you'll find everything you'll need to start working with this type of tool. This is the actual wire jig. It's got little holes in it and then it comes with an assortment of little plastic pegs that you fit into the holes. It also comes with three different colors of craft wire. Then it comes with instruction sheet and a little set of templates that you can use to get started with. The other tools that you'll need are a pair of flush cutters a pair of nylon, chain nose pliers and it can be handy to also have a pair of round nose pliers. To start I'm going to show you just how follow one of these templates that's here. It's a really good way to practice and then you can go from there changing the size of your pegs and the types and sizes of wire that you're using to kind of come up with her own fun designs for components that you want to make. So to follow one of these templates you can start but putting the jig over the template and lining up the black dots with the holes in the jig. Then you take the little straight pegs, the ones that even on both sides. You've put one in each hole over the dark dot. Then you take a piece of wire. When you're using flush cutters there's the flat side of the flush cutters and then the angle side of the flush cutter. That flat side is going to leave what you cut a nice blunt end. The other side will leave it kind of sharp and pointy. So it's a good idea when you're cutting off a spool of wire or roll of wire, always use the flat side of against the spool so that's not sharp when your having it laying around. The first step to use when you're working with a wire jig is to make a loop on the end to start around you're peg. So just pinch the end of the wire with a pair of round nose pliers and wrap around and move the pliers over and keep wrapping until you have a circle. Then you're going to take that loop and hang onto that. The next thing you want to do is straighten out the wire. You do that by running that through the jaws of the nylon pliers. Just run it through a few times to straighten out any bends or kinks. You can go ahead and move your jig off of the instructions. It shows you an example of what they have. It shows you the the order and direction in which to go. So when you're following a template you can use that for reference otherwise you can kind of experiment and play around whichever way you want around there. So you'll place your loop over the peg. That is what you want to use first. Then you're just going to run through the order on the template itself. And just holding it down so it doesn't pop up off the pegs. You just wrap it around. You want to kind of pull it a little further past then you need to so that it keeps it's shapes when you let go. You don't want the tention of it being around the peg to be holding it in place. You'd rather have it wrap on its own and all the way to that direction. So once you have it wrapped around your last peg, go ahead and wrap it around to form a loop. Then pull it off the pegs. You see it is pretty three-dimensional at that point. I'm going to flatten it in just a moment. First you're going to go ahead and trim it with flush cutters. And you want the flat side of the flush cutters to line up with the edge of the loop that you're going to have that sit right inside. Then take your nylon jaw pliers and push your loop flat. you're also going to go through the rest of the piece and just squeeze it with the nylon jaw pliers and that will flatten out. When you're using a really fine gauge wire like the one that comes with this kit it will move around and you can just move it back to get it back into the shape if you want. So that would be, for this template that would be the result. I've also pulled a little piece of twenty gauge wire because I want to show you it can be a little bit easier to work with something that's a little bit thick and it doesn't bend out of shape so easily. So you could make up whatever pattern you want With the different pegs. You can use the different sized pegs. The larger pegs are going to give you a larger loop. So if you use three little pegs and then one large peg it'a going give you a different kind of shape. You'll start again with a loop that you use to hook onto the first peg. Straighten the piece of wire. You can do a lot of experimenting with this. If you have something in mind that you know you want to make then you can kind of play around with how you place the pegs and the order in which you wrap the wire in order to achieve exactly the look that you're hoping for. I'm just kind of playing around so I'm happy to see what my results will be. So you can just wrap it around and go around that way it's also sometimes if you're doing a lot of wrapping over the same place it's helpful if you can flip the wire over if it's a symmetrical design halfway through so that your designed lays flat on the both sides as opposed to getting really tall off the front. You can see that the heavier gauge wire really holds it's shape a little bit better. So even just by playing around with the different configurations that you can come up with and trying it out. You can find some really interesting shapes and turn them in the components. So you could use that as a connector or you could hang a dangle from it. You can kind of let your inmagination run wild. It's a really good creative tool the wire jig because it takes something that you want to do in your design elements which would be wrapping all this wire and it makes it really easy to do a nice clean even job. So let's you kind of make whatever you want but makes it look better without taking quite so much time. And that's how you use BeadSmith's Thing-A-Ma JIG. Go to Beadaholique.com for all of your beading supply needs!