Making Jewellery - August 2016

72 makingjewellery.com

TIPS & TECHNIQUES

4. I found it was easier to have the lower handle
   pressed on my work surface and to push the top
   handle down. The blanks can get stuck on the
   top part of the punch that does the cutting. To
   pull them off , pull the top handle away from the
   bottom and the cutting punch will retract into
   the upper part of the jaw, pushing the blank free.


5. I cut a wide range of holes in a range of
   blanks before starting on the stamping. If you
   want holes in a particular spot, you can mark
   on the blank where you want the hole and line
   that up in the jaw.


6. I did try drilling a hole in the aluminium
   with a 1.5mm metal drill bit and my Dremel to
   have a comparison. The top blank in picture
   6 is the drilled hole and the bottom one is a
   punched hole. You can see that the punch
   creates a much cleaner hole. When you use a
   drill, the drill creates burrs that need to be fi led
   off before you start to stamp.


7. There are punch pliers available online, too.
   The hole sizes are a lot smaller than the bigger
   punch set but great for cutting small holes in
   soft metal. I bought EuroPunch pliers with a
   square 1.5mm hole to try out and liked it. It did
   cut through both the 1.2mm aluminium and

PHOTOGRAPHS: LAUREL GUILFOYLE, TANSY WHEELER

HOW TO MAKE

Blanks and cutting holes

1. Metal blanks come in all sorts of shapes and
   sizes, so simply fi nd the ones you want to use.
   You are better off sticking to the softer base
   metals like aluminium, copper and brass as
   they take the stamp impressions easily and
   won’t damage your stamps. If you want to make
   a Sterling silver piece, anneal the metal before
   starting. Aluminium comes with a protective
   layer on both sides, so leave that on as long as
   possible to help stop scratches and marks.


2. You can get blanks with holes already cut
   in them but the range is far more limited
   than the plain ones. So you will need to have
   some way of cutting holes in the blanks. My
   favourite tool to do this is the EuroPower
   Punch. It’s around £28 so it is not cheap, but it
   cuts seven diff erent sizes of hole and it works
   for pretty much every project.


3. The thickest blank I use for this technique
   is 1.2mm (16 gauge) aluminium and the punch
   cuts through those with ease. The copper
   blanks are 0.8mm (20 gauge) and the punch
   has no problem with those either. To use a
   EuroPower P unch, you screw in the size of
   punch you want, place the blank between the
   jaws and push the handles together.

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4 5 6

makingjewellery.com

MATERIALS & TOOLS

● Metal blanks

● Hole cutter (hole punch, punch pliers

or drill)

● Fine-point permanent marker pen

● Coloured permanent marker pens

● Electrical tape

● Ruler or tape measure

● Letter stamps

● Hammer

● Steel block

● Fine grit sanding block

MJ96_P71-75_Blanks and Stamping SHSF.indd 72 23/06/2016 11:23