WIRE GROOVE-WRAPPING A STONE

By Garry Mahan

How to turn your cabochons into simple, yet elegant pieces of jewelry

Tools and materials used in this tutorial

Hobby Vise

1/4” wooden dowel

Plastic-coated needle-

nose pliers

Wire cutters Uncoated needle-

nose pliers

Gold-filled wire

20 GA round, half-

hard

21 GA half-round, half-

hard Quilter’s rotary

cutting mat

Grooving machine is

shown on next page

This is a grooving machine. It is a Gryphon Gryphette. It was originally designed to put the grooves in

glass when working stained glass. This machine was purchased from eBay. Machine, 2 grooving grind-

ers, and shipping costs totaled about $100.

Grooving machine

This is the grooving cutter/grinder currently mounted on the

Gryphon Gryphette machine shown on previous photo.

Diamond coating on edge

of cutter/grinder

Set screw

You’re ready to start making your pendant. The first

thing to do is select a stone. Pick a good quality cabo-

chon. The purpose of wire wrapping is to showcase the

stone, not necessarily the wire.

A quality stone wrap always begins with a quality stone. This

stone is dendritic jasper from Burro Creek, AZ.

Use a soft touch. Hold stone with flat side down and turn on grooving machine to make the

groove. It is best to make 4 to 6 passes around the stone to prevent chipping and prevent

diamond from “wiping” off the diamond-coated grinding wheel.

Putting the groove in

the cabochon

Woof!

Measure the distance around your cab and cut a length of round 20 GA gold-

filled wire. The length of the wire should be equal to the distance around the

cab (plus approximately 5 inches for the bail). Groove-wrapping takes only

about 1/3 to 1/4 as much wire as conventional wire wraps.

Round 20 GA

gold-filled wire

Insert the wire in the groove made in the stone and hold the wire firmly. A small

hobby vise is used here to clamp down on the wire, holding it firmly in place. Alt-

hough the vise isn’t a necessary piece of equipment it comes in handy to free up

both of your hands.

Hobby vise

20 GA round gold-

filled wire for the

main wrap

Next, cut a small length of binding wire. For this wrap I used 21 GA half

round, half-hard gold-filled wire. Cut about 4-inches of this wire for the

binding that will hold the bail together.

Half-round binding

wire. Cut a 4”

length of this wire.

Using the uncoated needle-nose pliers, bend a small hook in

the end of your binding wire so you can get it started around

the bail.

Small hook in binding

wire to allow you to get

it started on the bail.

21 GA half-round

binding wire

With the stone & wire held by the hobby vise, hook the half-round binding

wire over the round wire as shown and start wrapping the bail.

Hobby vise

Half-round binding

wire hooked onto the

round wire. Getting

ready to bind the bail

together.

Take 5 wraps of your half-round binding wire going around

the round wire. Start about 1/2-inch above the stone and

wrap downwards toward the stone. When done with this

step, push the binding towards the stone to make the round

wire tight against the stone.

21 GA half-round bind-

ing wire. 20 GA round wire.

Push this binding down

towards the stone as

far as possible.

Bend the 20 GA round wire over a 1/4” diameter dowel

to form the bail. Bend from back to front so the back of

the wrap will be flat.

1/4” dowel

Binding wire is now ready to

wrap around all 4 round

wires, moving upward.

Now take the half-round binding wire and wrap it around the en-

tire bail. Remove the dowel and squeeze the binding wire after

every 90-degree bend to make the binding tight. Use plastic-

coated pliers for this so you don’t scar the wire. Cut off excess

binding wire and tuck it in at the top of the binding wrap.

Bail

Plastic-coated nee-

dle-nose pliers

Cut off excess binding

wire and tuck the loose

end into the bail at the

top of the binding wrap.

Add any desired decorations at the top of the pendant by bending

the round wire. Now your groove-wrap pendant is completed!

Front of pendant.

Lonesome pine at sunset

Back of pendant

People always look at the backs of your work, so be sure to

polish the back too.

Additional comments & tips

Where to buy wire. Here are the sources I use. There are many more places to buy wire:

Gold and silver: Rio Grande (www.riogrande.com) is where I buy my gold-filled and silver wire.

You can also get it at www.brandywinejewelrysupply.com.

Bronze: You can buy round or square bronze wire from Rio Grande, but not half-round bronze.

Half-round bronze wire can be purchased from wirejewelrybootcamp.com.

Craft wire: This is copper, brass, etc. & is very inexpensive. Joanne’s, Michael’s, etc. carry this.

You can also so get craft wire from www.parawire.com or www.brandywinejewelrysupply.com.

What size and type of wire to get:

When in doubt, buy 21GA, dead soft. You can use this size for just about anything.

For doing groove-wraps I normally use round wire, 20GA or 21GA. I buy the softest wire I can

get (dead soft) when possible. For doing a quality stone I always use gold-filled or silver wire.

For practice wraps you should use craft wire.

Always use half-round (20 or 21 GA) for the bindings, whether you are using round or square for the main wrap. You probably won’t be able to find half-round wire that is dead soft, so just get the softest you can find.

End of tutorial