I want to have a go at making chain maille - I've been looking at the tutorials at CGMaille.com. The difficulty I'm having is working out a good range of ring sizes to get so that I can try a lot of different weaves.

I've been looking at buying pre-made rings from BeadSisters in a variety of aluminium, brass, copper, bronze and steel. (I'd like to be able to play with different colours in the weaves). If anyone has suggestions of better suppliers, please say!

I was thinking of getting 0.8mm rings with about 4 different ARs (6.6 as most used) and one set each of 0.5mm (AR ~3.9), 1.2mm (AR 5.7) and 1.6mm (AR ~3.9). Does that sound sensible?

But it's doubly confusing because what's available on that site is tricky to match up with the suggested sizes from CGMaille. (It lists 1.63mm wire as being AWG 14. CGMaille says AWG 16 is approx 1.6mm...). I think the main problem is I don't know the tolerances - if I'm after 1.6mm wire with an AR of 3.9, and the ones available are 1.63mm to 1.64mm with ARs of 3.6, 3.7, 4.1, 4.2, 4.3, which ones are suitable?

Too many options!