Headpin help please

Craft Talk
1

Im after some 3" headpins but don’t want the thin metal that bends so much they arnt really usable.
I have a few usable headpins I bought years back,but not the packaging with info on it,so I don’t know what to search for to buy more.
Any idea what kind of thickness I should google for. Is there a gauge? Are they referred to as soft/hard?

Any help appreciated.
Il keep the packaging next time.

2

Hi

I bought a bulk bag of really good quality headpins a while back from EBay. There were various bags of different sizes but I’m sure there was an option for bags of one sized pins.
I will see if I can root out the invoice and find the name of the shop :0)

Karen

3

Hi,

Yes there are different guages the same as when you buy wire. I use The Silver Corporation for sterling silver head pins and Burhouse Beads for the plated ones.

4

I have bought some plated headpins from beadtime they have soft and hard headpins and have 50% off at the moment

5

Thanks, il take a look.

6

Hi there! Depends on the guage and the metal you are using. Silver plated brass is quite soft, silver itself slightly hard, copper probably too soft to be that usable. Plus you can buy hard and annealed softened too. Most headpins are annealed soft because it makes it easier to make wrapped loops and most are 0.6 mm or less. I make my own headpins, so if I want them more robust I use 0.8 mm silver wire and chuck them in the barreling machine for 4 hours to toughen them up. I seem to remember that you’ve done some soldering yourself, so you could use your torch to make some more from silver wire if you can’t find any to meet your requirements.

Love Sam x

7

Ooh and if you want them really strong, make eyepins from surgical steel wire because then if your beads have narrow holes the wire guage won’t be a problem. Surgical steel will give you rsi if you decide to make lots of wrapped loops, though, because it work hardens extremely quickly.

Love Sam x

8

Thanks for info. I realised yesterday I don’t need ot get 3" long headpins. Im trying to make arms and legs and I can use 2 shorter pins and use the join in the legs as the knee.
Im slow, but I get there eventually.