Homemade Wiggle Wire Tool
I’ve noticed that quite a few people use a “wiggle wire” to cut their freshly thrown mugs off of the pottery wheel head which gives the bottom textural interest and also negates the need to trim a foot. I’ve wanted to try one for quite awhile and decided to attempt making a homemade one myself after I came up empty handed at my local ceramic supplier. I could order the Bill Van Gilder Wiggle Wire Tool online, but then I remembered that Emily writes a lot of tool reviews and “how to’s” so I went in search of a wiggle tool on her site. Lo and behold, I hit pay dirt!
I looked around my studio which also happens to be the woodworking/tool shop and gathered many of the tools and supplies I thought I might need to make one. The following images show how I made my wiggle wire tool – click on an image to enlarge.
Emily has a great list of resources of where to find wire to make a custom cut off wire tool on her blog. While making mine, I improvised and ended up using a fairly thick 19 gauge wire I had lying around the garage which makes it very sturdy – but after a quick web search, also found coiled springs at automotive shops online, hardware stores and other non-pottery general purpose shops. I tried using some thinner beading wire, but it was too fine and didn’t hold its shape. I also vaguely remember reading a tutorial in a clay magazine that suggested using piano wire – but since a piano shop is not on my regular route, I decided to skip this outlet.
Meanwhile, I did a little housekeeping yesterday – not actually cleaning my home, but rather straightening up all the files on my computer including documents, desktop, programs, email addresses, photos etc. I feel so much better now and can actually find what I’m looking for easily which should help me be more productive. I made & organized folders and deleted old files, duplicates, and addresses I don’t recognize and then did a complete maintenance clean up of my system.
This coming week, I have Monday – Friday, 9am – 3pm to work in the studio while my daughter is in school and I’m looking forward to getting back in the swing of things. I need to make work for 2 local Colorado galleries, and the Colorado Potters Guild Fall Sale is fast approaching – not to mention the holidays. I know I’ve written about Wholesalecrafts.com before, and this weekend I made the decision to drop this sales outlet. I took a hard look at my schedule & priorities and realize that at this point in my life, I just don’t have the time to devote to adding more obligations on top of everything else. It’s too much stress and that’s no way to live.
As my daughter grows older, needs me less, and eventually leaves home, I know there will be plenty of time to build a full time career out of clay. In the meantime, I’ll nurture my part time foray into clay and my patch work quilt of a life making ceramic work, being a mom, teaching, subbing and volunteering. Geez, in the past 2.75 years of blogging, I’ve learned so much about myself, my limitations, my inspiration and where I want to go and what I want to accomplish. It’s been a weird, exhilarating and humbling ride.
Have a great week,
~Cynthia
Coming soon to my website: glaze recipes, gallery images, how to’s!
6 Responses to “Wiggle Wire Tool”
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I’m always struggling with the “should be doings”. I was just saying to Adam how I feel guilty if I take two full days off a week with him. Like working five days a week isn’t enough? I gotta remind myself it’s my life, and as long as he and I are both okay with what we’re doing, then that’s fine. I organized my photos last week. What a difference that made. I had a billion folders, some with only a couple of pictures. Now they all make sense, and my pottery photos are in folders with labels like, bowls, pitchers, plates. I’m trying to keep in the habit of when I load photos onto the computer to immediately sort them into the appropriate folders. I’ve personally not used a wiggle wire, but I think some people also use them to facet the sides of a pot, so you might want to try that too.
There are a lot of different pottery tools, aren’t there… I learned that this weekend!
Good point, Deborah – that’s another thing I decided to do – enjoy my weekends with my family without feeling like I should squeeze in some time to make work. Although, I did load my kiln and fire a bisque yesterday, but that took all of 30 minutes maybe. Organizing my photos and docs was huge – I got into a bad habit of just downloading my photos and dumping them into my pictures folder and didn’t label them or anything. It makes it so much harder to try an add a date or title to them months later after memories fade. I didn’t think about faceting with a wiggle wire – something else to try.
There’s a ton, Diana – I really do try to keep my fairly minimal. But, slowly…I’m accumulating more and more.
It is an interesting fact that we make most of our stress up in our heads and then multiply it there also. I think coming to that realization is huge and here you are a mere babe to my crone, and you are finding it out already. Way to go Cynthia!
Thanks for the demo. The wiggles in your wire are so even. I am amazed at all the tools I’ve collected in my short time working with clay, lots of molds and texture tools, some of which take up a lot of room. Good idea about organizing computer files. I guess I should tackle my files too and make some sub-folders – things are actually getting rather cumbersome. I just have to set aside the time to do it. Looking forward to all your new posts, you sound renewed.
You can say that again, Mary – about making that stress up in our heads. Totally self manufactured.
I do feel renewed Linda – and that feels good! I don’t have a ton of tools, partly out of financial considerations, but also space ones. Organizing my files was a huge undertaking and a task that’s been on my list for the past year.