Just the other day I came upon this little gadget that seemed too good to be true for all its simplicity. I had been looking for an easy tool to punch holes into different materials that I had on hand and this promised to do the job. Could it be true? With my 50% off coupon from Michael’s craft store burning a hole in my pocket, I decided to give it a try. And if it didn’t deliver as promised I would just take it back along with my hard earned cash. So, here is the doohickey:
It simply makes little round holes where you need them, no electricity required, if you can turn on a spigot, you can work this thing – right up my alley. I’ve had these staring me in the face for far too long without much of an idea of what to create with them.
Washers, plain copper washers. So I hammered them. And then did nothing with them for months.
Everything I came up with involved putting little holes in them, but I didn’t have the nerve to try and drill them with my Dremel + I do not own a drill press, which I am pretty sure is THE way to drill these. Until I came upon said gadget. Saw an instructional video on YouTube and HAD to have it. So, here is how this “hole” thing works:
Take a washer of your choosing and mark it with your trusty old sharpie marker, like so:
Then you carefully position the marked washer in the hole punch. I chose the smaller of the two size holes for this project.
This is definitely the tricky part. You need excellent lighting for this and some type of magnifying contraption would not hurt here. I found it best to hold it fairly close so I could see exactly where the little pole would punch through. Then you twist the screw until it punches all the way through and then reverse so you can remove the washer or any other shape you chose.
After you are done punching all of the holes you need, take some extra fine steel wool or a polishing pad and buff off the remaining sharpie marks.
And then the fun begins! Here I decided to make a pendant with three beaded dangles. And because I was already in a hole-punching mood, I added a couple of smaller accent rounds as well.
After a quick little dip in Liver of Sulfur solution and a buffing, I added some chain.
And here is the finished product:
…and matching earrings!
Sorry, couldn’t help it!
This little, cheap, low-tech addition to my arsenal of tools has opened up an entirely new world of possibilities and I hope it will do the same for you, if you make your own jewelry.
If not, you can always head over to my Etsy shop and buy one of my creations for yourself!
Hey, you made it to the end! I hope you enjoyed today’s post enough to sign up for more!
Have a great day!
Karin
Disclaimer: I was NOT paid anything to write about this tool. I just love it and wanted to share my experience with others who might be wondering just like I was, if this was worth buying!
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