How to make wire glasses

[leavyc]

In the newest issue on pg. 22 are several ornaments with wire glasses on them. I would appriciate any tips you may have about how to construct them. I have made a few, but find them fairly difficult, and could use a few tips. Love the Santas.

[Shimmy]

I have made a few glasses for small carvings (5-7") tall.I bought Bell wire and stripped the insulation off. Put a wood dowel the size I want for the eye in the vise leave enough on that side to go around the ear.then wrap around the dowel ,leave enough for bridge of the nose ,then around the dowel.and enough to go to the ear.If you get what I mean.Hope it helps.




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[Irish]

A touch of super glue at the top of the eye glass circles that Shimmy described will really help when it comes time to bend the ear wire portions back into the 90 degree angle.

Susan

[Callynne]

Makes sense to me, Shimmy, wrapping around the dowel would make perfect round shapes.

I was thinking when I read Shimmy's post that maybe a touch of super glue would work well for making them more stable, thanks for your reply too Susan.

I can definitely see a 'bespectacled' Santa in my future! Thanks for the replys and to you Leavyc, for asking the question! Deborah

[MelNM]

Hi I would like to try it also. But what the heck is bell wire, is it wire for door bells?
Mel

[leavyc]

Thank you for the tips. It makes sense to me, and easier than what I was doing. I didn't have ears on the carving, but tried to put them at the hairline. I used a turkey lace pin (out of my kitchen) to poke a hole where I wanted it to go, then used a small flat plier to push it into the basswoood, and then added a dab of glue.I hold it backwards and do the right side, then I'm able to do the other side face front to get them even.

[AlArchie]

Yep, that's bell wire, the stuff to wire doorbells. Single strand copper wire. You can also check at the hardware store and see if they have different sizes of bare single strand stuff. You might want a little heavier than bell wire depending on the size of your carving.

Hobby shops also stock brass and copper rod in small diameters that might do even better than that soft bell wire.

Al

[Thomp]

for wire you can look in the beading section of your local hobby lobby or Micheal's, they got rolls or coils of just about any size bright clean wire you would need, they also have several great tools for making bends and cutting , needle nose pliers that have round cylindrical jaws just made for bending small wire to about any dimension they also have wire of different brightnesses copper brass gold and silver.

no im not into beading or necklace making but its amazing how you can mis use other craft supplies to fit an immediate need.

beads make nice fishing bobbers, for carvings

[Blinky Bill]

For what it's worth, I use the above methods then mix a small amount of clear epoxy, gather some on a bamboo skewer, touch it to the rim of the glasses and stretch the epoxy across the frames (like the soap across the wire ring for blowing bubbles) carefully done, this will give you lenses for your spectacles. Hope this is of use to somebody.
John

[Hi_Ho_Sliver]

Not sure if I can describe this in words, could show you in a second! I take a piece of clothes hanger, find the center and holding it up I take the right side (or left doesn't matter) and bend it around a piece of round whatever the size of the glasses I want, I continue the bend until the wire is a complete 360 degrees and is on the outside(or in front)of the wire where I started...I then do the other side the same way, with the wire ending at 360 deg. on the outside again(or again in front), this makes the glasses semetrical, I can then bend the side or ear pieces back, find the length and give it a 1/4 of of inch or so, put a 90 degree bend and put in a hole and glue......hard to picture this I suppose, but the first pair of glasses I did were not semetrical and looked strange...



Here is a picture of one I did, I didn't use a dowel or anything on it, freehand and as you can see thats obvious, but what the hay, its just a mutilated golf ball!