Tuesday, January 15, 2013

tutorial - starting persian chain

A full-persian chain is a ratbag (stealing a word from one of my favorite authors) to get started. I find the beautiful CGI tutorials at M.A.I.L. fairly useless. Once you have eight rings together, it is stable, and easy to continue. However, holding on to the six rings and keeping them in position to put in the seventh and eighth is pretty much impossible.

The best solution to this problem is to keep short lengths of several sizes of persian as templates upon which to start new chains. I have had a few, but they disappear, or get used in a chain, or something. So last night I set out to make a set, and this morning I continued, and photographed the method that I have found most satisfactory for getting started.

You need several jumprings in addition to those for the template section itself. In this case, I have copper 18-gauge 7/32” rings for the chain. Then I have two black rings, 18-gauge, 1/4”. These can just be the same rings as the chain. At any rate, they should be close in size, so that the chain rings can neither slip over them nor through them. A single very small ring is needed to hold the two black foundation rings in place -- here, a 1/8” pink one. Then there should be several additional rings of any size to make an easy-to-hang-on-to handle -- or this might just be a length of wire crimped on to the small ring.



Interlock the two black rings, and fasten them together with the small pink one. Put a chain of several links on the pink ring to hold onto it easily.





Arrange the two black rings at right angles. Hook a copper ring over the inner one on either side of the crossing.









Put a third copper ring through the two, and up over the outside of them, but through the  outer of the black rings. (I am speaking of ‘inner’ and ‘outer’ black rings based on their positions at the lower crossing, where the copper rings are added, not at the top where they cross through the pink ring.)








The fourth copper ring goes opposite the third. You now have one complete persian link, stabilized by the crossed black links. Start the second persian link by adding two copper rings across through the inner rings of the previous link, between the parallel outer ones.












Add the next two rings through these, up over the outer top curve, through the outer rings of the previous link.


Your persian chain is now well started. Keep going.

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