| Making a Right Angled Figure 8 Connector: First let's discuss why make a "Right Angled" Figure 8 connector. This might seem like a lot of unnecessary work, but the rational is simple. You want your earring body to hang in the same orientation as it would normally hang if it were directly connected to your ear wire finding. With a normal figure 8 connector, the earring body wire component will normally hang in a plane parallel with the ear wire finding. In this case, we want the earring body to hang perpendicular to the ear wire finding. To make this happen we use the right angled figure 8 connector shown in two views below, right. Begin making this component by cutting a piece of wire about 1 1/2 inches long and making an eye loop in the end of this wire. Now grasp the eye loop with your chain nose pliers at the point where the loop becomes the wire tail and bend the wire in a plane perpendicular to the eye loop. This sounds complicated, but you just grasp the eye loop and bend the wire against the jaws of the chain nose pliers. The end result will appear as shown below, left. Now grasp the wire tail, adjacent to the bend you just made with your round nose pliers and make a loop in the wire. Making the loop is a two step process as you will need to re-orientate your pliers mid-way through this step. The completed loop will appear as shown below, center. Finally cut the excess wire and close the loop. The finished connector will appear as shown below, right. |
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