Chainmaille Rose

I guess this should technically be called a helm rose, because it's made of a section of helm chain joined end to end. In the first few pictures I've used bright aluminum for the silver colored rings and anodized aluminum for the blue rings, to add a bit of color. I got the rings and pliers from The Ring Lord, although you can easily make your own rings at home. There are plenty of 'ibles already out there detailing this process, so I won't bore you with it (and I generally only do it with larger gauge wire anyway).

I got the idea for this after seeing Blue Buddha's Quantum Rose a little while back, and I wanted to create a simpler, cleaner version as well as respect their IP rights to that design. The nice thing about maille is that you can always add or subtract elements to suit your taste, making each and every design your very own. Plus, as this was a Mother's Day present for my mom last year, I wanted to make something special for her :) And true to that, I've only ever made one pendant with those lovely robin's egg blue rings.

As usual, feel free to ask questions!

Materials:
- Twelve 16 gauge 5/16" ID rings
- Four or eight 18 gauge 3/16" ID rings
- Two pairs of pliers (I like to use flat nose in my right hand and chain nose in my left)
- A bail of some sort, I used a spare 18ga. 1/4" ring I had lying around

P.S. If you're wondering why there's an extra "le" in chainmaille, it's the French spelling. Plus, it prevents any confusion between your works of art and those annoying emails you can't delete fast enough. xD

P.P.S. I'm only using four small rings in this 'ible because I don't have the exact components needed to make the double small ring version. Basically, because this process results in such a stiff weave, you need to have just a little bit of extra give to make it work. Unfortunately, I'm out of machine cut rings so I don't have that extra bit of leeway, and therefore making the version you see in the first few pictures is virtually impossible for me right now. However, the process is essentially the same either way.
If you're interested, what I've found works best is aluminum rings from TRL (the ring lord), bright or anodized, all machine cut. The reason for this is that the machines compensate for loss of material by rotating the coil of rings as they're cut. Saw cut rings, on the other hand, are fed through a very thin saw blade, but the thin blade still removes a bit of material, and this results in a marginally smaller ring. Normally this wouldn't matter, but on tight weaves, you better believe it does.

Comments

[MicioGatta]

That's beaufitul. I've tried to do it, I've not the big rings, so I've done it wire gauge wire, 7 mm. The little ones are 5 mm, I already had it. My problem is that it "falls" in a rectangular shape. What's my error? The rings are too big?

[gg1220]

Hey, it still looks good :)
I'm guessing that the AR (aspect ratio) of the small rings you're using is too large for the large rings. If you take a look at The Ring Lord they post the ARs of all of their rings, so mine would be 5.3 for the big rings and 4.2 for the little ones. Once you've got that data, you can adjust accordingly: find the ratio of the wire diameters and work from there.

If you tell me what gauges of wire you have and which rings you're making yourself, I might be able to help you out :)

[MicioGatta]

Thank you, I'll take a look. For real, I can't tell you what types wire is it, because I bought them at the market stands and on the package the writings are all in chinese ;D Same for the little yellow rings, I bought from a nice Idian merchant at the market, she has some of these types of think for jewerly, I bought some of those something ago for my fimo "jewels". :)

[gg1220]

Ah, ok. Well, another thing you can try to do is to add more yellow rings. This should stiffen up your weave quite a bit, depending on the number of extra rings you stick in there :)

[MicioGatta]

I'll try, thank you! :) In the meantime, I've tried doing rings with the some wire, big and little ones, but this time le little one are to big to be put in one of the big :D. I'll try again.

[MicioGatta]

Ok, done! It was a bit difficult for me to close the last rings, I had to put 4 of the little ones. Unfortunately the last one broke and I lost the one spare I had :D. I'll go to the market as soon as possible to buy some other. For now I've put a very thing wire to keep the rose still, and I think it is good. Thank you for your tutorial!

[jhall30]

Great solution, and the added rings make it look great! If you're trying to figure out AR, you can also use a pair of digital calipers to get a close approximation. Measure the inside diameter of the ring, and then measure the diameter of the wire itself. Divide the first by the second, and you've got your AR. The units aren't important, as long as they're the same for both measurements.

[gg1220]

It looks lovely! Glad you enjoyed it :)

[neilh]

Made a prototype using some copper wire 16 & 18ga formed around a 3/16th and 5/16th drill bit and cut with snips. I've got some proper machine cut rings on order, but wanted to experiment first

I added a few rings to tighten it up a bit.

Also made a color matched set of earrings using a simple box chain weave.

Thanks.

[gg1220]

Wow, these look fantastic! Great job (and thanks for actually following up with photos!) I'm sure your wife is going to love them :)

[mistyp]

I can do this! Thanks for sharing!

[gg1220]

Glad you enjoyed it :)
Don't forget to post pictures!

[canucksgirl]

Even though I commented on the jewelry challenge page, I think your project deserves another comment here!

Great job. I really like how it turned out (especially with the blue). Very pretty. ;)

[gg1220]

Thanks for the kind words, and glad you like it!