Loose grip

[tessie]

Hi !

I had a go at pulling wire through a drawplate today, its not that easy is it ?? LOL

Then I tried to saw a piece of Silver sheet but I found that the pliers (They were big Silver grips with a blank piece at the tip and a serated section behind that) kept slipping and my loose grip meant that the sheet was not cut properly....My star came out as a ,well not equal star lol

I asked my boyfriend if he had an idea, he told me to use "Mole" grips which lock in place, but is this the right name or do jewellers have different names for locking grip pliers and where would I buy them ?

TTFN

[ps_bond]

If you're referring to the drawplate, then drawtongs are what you want.
If you mean for holding a piece in place when sawing then no, Molegrips are not the answer. All they'll do is chew up your silver. Piercing is done on top of a bench peg, with fingertips holding the piece in place while sawing.
A video picked more-or-less at random on the subject:

[Tabby66]

Don't use molegrips As Peter has said, they will chew up your silver!!!!!! (Any pliers you use on your silver need to have a smooth jaw, serrated jaws just mark your metal).

As Peter has also said, you need to hold your metal against/on a bench peg with your fingertips. You can adapt your bench peg to help support your metal. I'm sure if you look through old posts, or google something like 'adapted jeweller's bench pegs' and look at images, you will get some ideas on various options.

[Dennis]

For drawing down, these hand draw tongs are good value, but they are very rough on thinner wires so much so that they tend to mash them too much to reinsert into the next hole. http://www.suttontools.co.uk/budget-...raw-tongs.html

I would suggest you persevere with your handymans pliers, but get someone to grind a few more serrations on one side of the smooth end to make it grip better. If you need to pull very hard, make sure you are well braced against falling backwards. Dennis.

[Wallace]

I sometimes cut out really tiny things and then use my old Lindstrom pliers that are flat, polished, and with rounded edges , as my fingers are too big to hold the pieces along with a poor grip issue in general. You can always coat pliers with a layer of leather. Tools can often be adapted to the way you work. My Lindstrom's are ten years old (at least) and have the best grip of all my pliers.

It might be worth experimenting if you are trying to do little things. But, for general day to day, certainly, as everyone states. I think it comes over time, practice and more practice. I don't even think of using my shears for most metal needs now, but in the early days, I found it troublesome.

Part of the solution was having the peg at the right height, and the right type of peg, and blades. Oh, I cannot stress how much a good, lubed blade feels when sawing through the metal.

You can get a hand held mini vice, to which, you can glue on a layer of leather, if you wanted. This type was recommended to me http://www.rdgtools.co.uk/acatalog/J...ING_TOOLS.html. But adding leather was certainly a bonus to stop any damage to the metal.

[CJ57]

You can always wrap masking tape round your pliers as well to cushion them, it's what our lecturers showed us centuries ago but it works well and can be renewed when necessary.
If you were using a draw bench and not just the plate if I remember rightly the wire was clasped by a stout pair of pliers