Corkie Bolton
Jeweler, educator and founder of Metalsmith Society.
*This article contains affiliate links that help me to continue to create daily, free content on jewelry making for all.
Pliers, a jewelry making essential with an overwhelming amount of options. Have you ever looked at a pair and had no idea what it's purpose is?!? We've all been there!
This article is sponsored by our friends Gesswein! They sent me some awesome pliers from a company called Xuron. What I love about Xuron is they are made in Maine, the quality is excellent but the price points are middle of the road. They are much nicer than economy pliers but affordable. Okay, let's do this!
Hard Wire Cutters
The tool I didn't know I needed, these are perfect for cutting steel binding wire! Previously I would cut my binding wire with a cheap pair of flush cutters that were quickly getting destroyed (when you cut steel binding wire with steel cutters the blades get messed up over time.)
These also cut both sides of your wire pretty flat so if you wanted to use them on silver or gold and quickly get two relatively flat sides, they work great!
Maxi-Shear™ Flush Cutter
A pair of flush cutters is an essential in my book. I have owned many, many pairs and this one from Xuron is a work horse! They can cut up to 12g wire on soft metals. For example brass, copper, silver and gold. Did you notice the little ™ on the name? That is because the blade edges bypass each other in a shearing motion rather than striking, resulting in clean square cuts with no spikes. Your blades stay sharper and last much longer than conventional nippers because there is no edge-to-edge impact.
Xuron Metal Shear
A heavy-duty pair of scissors that can be used for cutting sheet metal up to 20g thick. Iif you are a fan of using sheet solder you can use these to cut your own solder chips! They also cuts jump rings leaving a flat end on both sides. I was able to cut through a coil of 20g jump rings and it left both sides pretty flush not quite as perfect as sawing through them slowly but this saves a HUGE amount of time. There is also a built-in return spring which always brings the blades back to the open position.
Xuron Flat Nose Plier
Flat Nose pliers have jaws that are flat and wide for bending, forming, grasping, holding and flattening wire and other materials.
Xuron Short Nose Chain Pliers
These Short Nose Pliers are similar to the Flat Nose in their shape however they have shorter jaws. These would be primarily used for closing jump rings, and bending smaller items. For many jewelers we may not find a need for these smaller flat nose pliers however I do like how easy they are to maneuver and because they are on the smaller side they make working with smaller pieces easier. If you’ve tried to close a tiny jump ring with a really large pair of pliers you know what I mean 🙋♀️
Xuron 90° Bent Chain Nose Pliers
Prior to writing this blog I had never owned a pair of bent nose pliers and now that I’ve used them I can confirm that the bent nose makes picking up jump rings quicker. If you make a ton of chain I could totally see how investing in a pair of these would save you time when you learn to quickly pick up a ring with one hand and then close the ring with the other! The other benefit of the bent jaws is to reach hard to reach spots and allow you to see your work without the handles getting in the way of your line of sight.
I am going to continue to add to this article as we go over other speciality pliers! Thank you again to our sponsor Gesswein for making this article possible. They are offering our community 15% off any of these Xuron pliers with code MSS13 this promo will end 9/1/2020. Support of our sponsors helps support the page!
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