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intermediate
wire
chain mail

Corrugated
Knot Chain Bracelet
Combining basic wireworking skills
with a traditional Byzantine chain mail
pattern results in an eye-catching,
distinctive chain.
by Howard Siegel

This project involves two such wonder-

ts no secret that jewelry makers

are, quite often, tool junkies. We get

ful homemade devices: a wire feeder and

positively giddy over good tools

a jump ring opener. The raw ingredients

with good defined not just as high-

to make these tools arent expensive

quality tools from manufacturers, but

a wooden spring clothespin for one, and

also as those inventive little devices that

an old broom handle for the other.

our fellow jewelry makers cook up and

make themselves.

2009 Kalmbach Publishing Co. This material may not be reproduced in

any form without permission from the publisher.

www.A r t J e w e l r y M a g . c o m

Once youve made the tools, you can make this chain, which requires coiling,
cutting, fusing, stretching, forging, annealing, and corrugating fine-silver
wire, then connecting the corrugated rings with Byzantine knots made from
handmade sterling silver jump rings. When you finish this eye-catching
bracelet, youll have conquered a host of basic wireworking skills.

make your
own

tools!

materials

Rope recess

Slotted screw
(for flat head screwdriver)

Drilled hole

Wire

End of
dowel/broom handle
Clothespin tool (left): To make your own
jump rings, youll need to coil wire around
a mandrel. You can do this by hand, but
this handy tool, which you can make from
a spring-style wooden clothespin, helps
control the tension of your wire as you coil
it mechanically.

Fine-silver wire: 18-gauge (1.0 mm)

round, 5 in. (12.7 cm)
Sterling silver wire: 20-gauge (0.8 mm),
round, 4 ft. (1.2 m)
Sterling silver jump rings: 16-gauge
(1.3 mm), 4 mm inside diameter, 2
Crab-claw clasp

toolboxes, www.artjewelry
mag.com/toolboxes

Chain mail
Soldering
Sawing/Piercing
Wirework

additional tools & supplies

To make the clothespin tool, select a drill bit

thats slightly larger than the gauge of wire
youll use to make the jump rings. Insert this
bit into a flex shaft, and drill a 45 angle hole
through one leg of your clothespin, below
the rope recess. The 45 angle will allow
the wire to pass smoothly through the tool
without kinking.

Jump ring opener (above): To help you use

good technique while opening your jump
rings, you can buy a slotted ring tool from
a tool manufacturer, but making your own is
fairly simple. Start with a 34-in. (76102 mm)
length of dowel (I used an old broom handle)
and screw a slotted screw into one end.

Wooden spring clothespin

Jump-ring-opening tool; or 34-in.
(76102 mm) wooden dowel,
slotted screw (optional)
Coil winder
V-block tool (optional)
Shears
Tweezers
Ring stretcher (or snap ring pliers)
(optional)
Felt-tip pen
Corrugator (choose from): paper
crimper or tube wringer

suppliers

Mandrels, Blazer-type butane torch

(Harbor Freight Tools, 800.444.3353,
www.harborfreight.com)

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The clothespin tool was shown to me by master chain maker Cao Madina. He has
my thanks for sharing this very simple but useful tool.
The idea for corrugating the links in this chain is the result of taking a corrugation workshop taught by Trish Macaleer for the Society for Midwest Metalsmiths.
I was greatly aided in the composition and taking the chain process photographs by Herb Halpern of Herb Halpern Productions.

See Safety Basics at

www.artjewelrymag.com/howto

www.A r t J e w e l r y M a g . c o m

Part
1:
Make the jump rings

easier to cut with a jewelers saw. You

will need roughly 70 small jump rings
to complete the bracelet.

Position fine-silver wire in your

clothespin tool. Cut a 31 2 -in. (89 mm)
piece of fine-silver wire. Insert one end
of the wire through the drill hole in your
clothespin tool (see Make Your Own
Tools! page 2) so the wire comes out
inside the rope recess.
Pull the wire through the hole and
the jaws of the clothespin until you have
a 1-in. (25.5 mm) tail. Use chainnose
pliers to make a 90 bend about 3 4 in.
(1319 mm) from the end of the wire.

Cut the sterling silver coils into jump

rings . Thread a 2/0 or 3/0 saw blade
into one end of a jewelers saw . Thread
the blade through a sterling silver coil,
then into the other end of the saw frame,
and tighten. Lubricate the saw blade by
pulling the teeth through beeswax or
another lubricant.
Place the coil against your bench pin.
(Instead of using a bench pin, I use a Vblock tool that I designed and made for
myself [2].) Saw through the coil with the
saw blade tipped at roughly 45 so youre
only cutting through two or three wraps
at any time. Collect the jump rings as they
separate from the coil, and resume sawing.

Prepare a coil winder. Insert a 9 mm

mandrel into a coil winder and tighten the
chuck. Then insert the bent end of your
fine-silver wire into the jaws of the chuck,
tightening again if necessary. This will hold
the wire so you can wind the coil.
Wind the coils. Turn the coil winders
crank clockwise to wind the wire around
the mandrel. Use the clothespin tool to
guide the wire so the wraps lie side by side
with no gaps [1]. Continue until you have
wound all the wire; the coil should have
about seven or eight wraps. Slide the coil
off the mandrel.
Coil the sterling silver wire. Using 8
10 in. (20.325.4 cm) of sterling silver wire
and a 3.6 mm mandrel, repeat the previous
steps to make another coil. Wind a coil
about 2 in. (51 mm) long, then use flush
cutters to cut the wire. Continue winding
and cutting 2-in. (51 mm) coils until you
have coiled all the sterling silver wire.
NOTE: Limiting the length of the sterling
coils to about 2 in. (51 mm) makes them

NOTE: Be careful to align the saw blade

with the cut end of the last ring. If not
properly aligned, there will be two cuts
in the ring, one only partially through the
ring. If you try to open a ring with a second
partial cut, the ring will break, making
instant scrap metal.
Continue sawing until youve cut
all the wraps on the coil. Then, cut the
remaining sterling silver coils into
jump rings.
Cut the fine-silver coils into jump
rings. Grasp the fine-silver coil in your
nondominant hand between the heel of
your thumb and your fingers. Hold a pair
of shears in your dominant hand and
insert the lower blade inside the coil [3].
NOTE: The shears should point down the
center of the length of the coil to ensure
that you dont cut your hand.

4
Continue cutting until it becomes
difficult. Then, collect the cut rings and
resume cutting, taking care to align the
blades with the cut end of the last wrap
on the coil. Continue cutting the coil until
you have cut all of the wraps.
Open the sterling silver jump rings. Pick
up one sterling silver jump ring, and grip
one side of the ring with chainnose pliers,
positioning the pliers tip close to the cut.
Place the other side of the jump ring in
the groove in your jump-ring-opening tool
(see Make Your Own Tools! page 2; as an
alternative, you can use two pairs of pliers
) and twist the tool away from your
body until the ring is open about 60 [4].
Repeat to open all the sterling silver
jump rings.
Prepare the fine-silver jump rings for
fusing. Place a fusing or soldering board
on top of a firebrick to prevent burning
your bench.
Using pliers or your fingers, close a
fine-silver jump ring so that the cut edges
make good contact. To do this, over-form
the ring (bring the cut edges past each
other), then carefully pull them apart, and
line up the cut edges. Make sure the edges
are aligned both when viewed from the
edge of the ring and down the center of
the ring. Place the closed ring on the
www.A r t J e w e l r y M a g . c o m

5
fusing board with the cut facing forward.
Repeat for the remaining fine-silver
rings, placing them in a row across the
fusing board and leaving a little space
between each ring.
Fuse the fine-silver jump rings. Put on
an Optivisor so you can clearly see the join
in each ring as it fuses.
NOTE: If you hold your torch in your right
hand, start with the ring at the rear left of
the fusing board; if you hold your torch in
your left hand, start at the rear right. This
will minimize the danger of accidental
burns by keeping your hand away from
previously fused rings.
Move the torch flame in a circular
motion around the first ring until it turns
a dull red. (I use a propane-fueled pencil
torch, but any standard jewelers torch
setup will work, including a handheld
butane model.)
TIP: When youre fusing, turn
down your studio lights to
make it easier to see the
metal change color as you
heat it.

will cause the join to thin

out, then melt completely
and form a ball of metal on
either side of the join. If this
occurs, the ring is scrap. Try
deliberately overheating the
first ring so you can observe
what happens.

Fuse all the fine-silver jump rings.

You will need about eight fused rings to
complete the bracelet. Use tweezers to
push the fused rings off the fusing board
and into a water-filled container to cool.
Stretch the fine-silver rings. Place
a fused ring on a ring stretcher about
halfway down the jaws [6]. (You could
also use roundnose pliers.) Mark this
location on the stretcher with a felt-tip
pen so you can position all the rings in
the same place and stretch them to the
same size.
NOTE: Position the fused join on the
outside of one jaw of the stretcher. This
will stretch the ring so that the join will
be inside the chain and not visible on the
finished bracelet.
Stretch all the fine-silver rings.

Once you see the color change, move

the flame to the join in the ring and move
the flame in a small circle. Concentrate the
heat evenly on both sides of the join [5].
In a short time, the silver at the join
will melt and surface tension will pull the
molten metal together, fusing the join
without the use of solder.
TIP: When youre fusing
jump rings, remove the flame
from the join as soon as the
metal melts. Overheating

Forge the fine-silver rings. Place a

stretched ring over the corner of a bench
block so that only half of the ring is on the
block [7].
Use the flat face of a ball-peen hammer
to flatten this side of the ring to about
twice its initial width. Reposition the ring
so that the other side of the ring is across
the corner of the bench block, and flatten
this side.
Try to forge both legs to the same
width. Do not forge the curved ends of the

8
rings. Forge all the fused jump rings in the
same manner.
Anneal the fine-silver rings. Forging
the rings work-hardens the silver. Since
our next step will be to corrugate these
rings, we need to soften the metal.
Annealing softens the metal and is
done by heating the metal .
Place the forged rings in a row on the
fusing board and turn down the lights.
Heat each ring until it is dull red, then
move on to the next, keeping the torch
moving in a circular motion so you dont
melt the rings. After heating all the rings,
push them into the container of water to
cool them.
Corrugate the fine-silver rings. Use
chainnose pliers to place the narrow end
of a forged and annealed ring into the
corrugator. I used a paper crimper from
a local craft store as a corrugator; you
could also use a tube wringer. Whichever
style of tool you choose, use it according
to the manufacturers instructions to
corrugate the ring [8]. Corrugate all the
fine-silver rings.

www.A r t J e w e l r y M a g . c o m

Process photos by Herb Halpern.

Part
2:
Assemble the bracelet

Byzantine knots until your chain reaches

the desired length. End the chain with a
Byzantine knot (rather than a single ring).

Weave the chain. Pick up a corrugated

ring. (If desired, you can thread a paper
clip or twist tie through this ring for a
better grip.) Thread a 3.6 mm sterling silver
jump ring through the corrugated ring and
close it; repeat with a second 3.6 mm ring.
Thread a third 3.6 mm ring through the
first pair of rings and close it; repeat to
add a fourth 3.6 mm ring [1].
Grasp the corrugated ring and the first
pair of 3.6 mm rings between your thumb
and forefinger. Separate the second pair of
3.6 mm rings and flip them back, one to
each side of the first pair [2].
Grasp the corrugated ring and the
second pair of 3.6 mm rings between your
thumb and forefinger, and push up on
the second pair of rings. Insert a scribe or
needle tool above the corrugated ring
to hold the first pair of rings open and
expose the second pair of rings [3].
Thread a fifth 3.6 mm ring through
the V-shaped opening in the knot, then
through a second corrugated ring, and
close it. Repeat to add a second 3.6 mm
ring through the same path, going
through the two 3.6 mm rings and the
corrugated ring.
You have just completed a Byzantine
knot at the end of the first corrugated ring
and added a second corrugated ring to
your chain.
Each corrugated ring and Byzantine
knot is slightly under 1 in. (25.5 mm) long;
you can estimate the length of the chain
by counting the corrugated rings.
Continue adding corrugated rings and

Add the clasp and finish the chain.

Open two 4 mm inside diameter (ID)
sterling silver jump rings. Thread a single
4 mm jump ring through the Byzantine
knot at the end of the chain; add the clasp
to this jump ring and then close the ring.
Thread a second 4 mm jump ring
through the corrugated ring at the end
of the chain, then close the ring. This
ring will form the other half of the clasp.
Alternately, you can skip this second jump
ring and close the bracelet by closing the
clasp through the final elongated corrugated link.
Place the chain in a tumbler with
mixed stainless steel shot and burnishing
compound. Tumble the chain for 12
hours. Remove the chain from the tumbler,
rinse it with running water, and then dry
it. Pull the chain through your hand. If
the chain feels rough, put it back in the
tumbler, and tumble it until the chain feels
smooth. Additional tumbling will not harm
the chain.

3
Bonus Videos
Check out these bonus tutorials
for fundamental techniques used
in this project:

Making jump rings

Threading a saw blade
in a saw frame
Opening and closing jump rings
Annealing metal

Videos, www.artjewelrymag.
com/howto

Howard Siegel
has a masters
degree in metallurgy and works
in lapidary,
silversmithing,
and chain
making. He
teaches at the William Holland School
of Lapidary Arts, the Society for Midwest Metalsmiths, the Craft Alliance,
and the Jacoby Arts Center.

www.A r t J e w e l r y M a g . c o m

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