How to Straighten Wire

How do you make your wire behave itself? 

Do you know the best way to straighten wire?  Watch this video and see if you're right.

What this video shows:

In this video I use nylon jaw pliers to straighten my handmade headpins after mangling them slightly in my rock tumbler.

Why did I put them in my rock tumbler? Why to polish them of course! See those headpins in the pic above? They have a nasty case of firescale. (See my balled wire headpin tutorial for more on firescale).

Using a rock tumbler or the considerably more expensive jeweler's rotary tumbler or vibratory tumbler is an absolutely awesome way to polish your jewelry, remove firescale, and harden the wire.

Here's a tip though - don't put headpins in your tumbler with delicate intricate wire wrapping. That's how my headpins got all bent and messed up. They got caught in my chain links and wire wrapping. But all is well because of my handy-dandy nylon jaw pliers.

Straightening Wire

To straighten wire, use the exact same action I use to straighten my headpins in the video.

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