I have a sister who makes light fixtures as a cottage industry. She called me
just now wanting to know how to go about getting or making stainless wire rings,
spring tempered, made from something like 16 ga. wire. I don't see any people
who directly source rings in lampshade-sized dimensions (like 3" up) so now I'm
wondering about making them.

What kind of stainless wire can be spring-tempered?

Is it possible to make a spring-tempered stainless ring using only O/A
equipment? Or is TIG welding completely required?

Any bright ideas?

Grant Erwin
Kirkland, Washington

Grant Erwin wrote:

I have a sister who makes light fixtures as a cottage industry. She
called me just now wanting to know how to go about getting or making
stainless wire rings, spring tempered, made from something like 16 ga.
wire. I don't see any people who directly source rings in
lampshade-sized dimensions (like 3" up) so now I'm wondering about
making them.

What kind of stainless wire can be spring-tempered?

Is it possible to make a spring-tempered stainless ring using only O/A
equipment? Or is TIG welding completely required?

Any bright ideas?

Grant Erwin
Kirkland, Washington

Ideas -- you decide if they're bright:

* Yes, you can get SS spring steel. Check http://www.smallparts.com.
The heat treat looks -- interesting.
* Braze (or solder) instead of weld -- depending on the stainless.
* Instead of the usual lamp loop with one wire, how about a
double length of finer wire, and no weld/braze/anything?
Strength wise it could easily add up to one welded loop,
the amount of work required may add up to much less.

--

Tim Wescott
Wescott Design Services
http://www.wescottdesign.com

Posting from Google? See http://cfaj.freeshell.org/google/

On Tue, 28 Feb 2006 10:14:51 -0800, Grant Erwin
wrote:

I have a sister who makes light fixtures as a cottage industry. She called me
just now wanting to know how to go about getting or making stainless wire rings,
spring tempered, made from something like 16 ga. wire. I don't see any people
who directly source rings in lampshade-sized dimensions (like 3" up) so now I'm
wondering about making them.

What kind of stainless wire can be spring-tempered?

Is it possible to make a spring-tempered stainless ring using only O/A
equipment? Or is TIG welding completely required?

Any bright ideas?

Grant Erwin
Kirkland, Washington

O/A would be fine for silverbrazing, which works well on stainless.

A bandsaw blade welder would probably also work.

Don Foreman wrote:

On Tue, 28 Feb 2006 10:14:51 -0800, Grant Erwin
wrote:



I have a sister who makes light fixtures as a cottage industry. She called me
just now wanting to know how to go about getting or making stainless wire rings,
spring tempered, made from something like 16 ga. wire. I don't see any people
who directly source rings in lampshade-sized dimensions (like 3" up) so now I'm
wondering about making them.

What kind of stainless wire can be spring-tempered?

Is it possible to make a spring-tempered stainless ring using only O/A
equipment? Or is TIG welding completely required?

Any bright ideas?

Grant Erwin
Kirkland, Washington



O/A would be fine for silverbrazing, which works well on stainless.

A bandsaw blade welder would probably also work.


Buy music wire to form. A home made spring machine for loops as you
describe would be pretty easy to fabricate. Do NOT think you can get
good consistent results by wrapping them on a spindle. What you need to
do is force fee the wire against a die.

ASCII drawings suck but:

Wire moves-- --------------[ wire guide ]-/// --Die

The die is hardened material and can move up and down (in/out) for
different diameter coils. The wire is usually fed via pinch rollers.

You might be able to see it a little on http://www.nucoil.com/ I
couldn't run the video so don't know if it shows any details. Of course
these machines are CNC and do one heck of a lot more forming than you need

It'll TIG like a breeze if you're careful, run about 12 to 15 amps, and
have a high-freq start. There will probably be a small blob though. A
modified band saw welder might give better results if you want better
end to end welds. Gas shield it if you use the blade welder though.

There is a really neat friction welder for non-ferrous wires available.
It looks like a large pair of pliers that force the ends together and
rub them at the same time. Welds are beautiful and it's kind of amazing
that you can get such a good weld without any power but your hands.
Only works on copper and brass though.

Oh yea...make sure you reference the diameter instead of just saying 16
gauge. Many suppliers use the Non-ferrous ga. for stainless wire
instead of the US standard steel wire ga. Ya don't wanna be surprised
on the dia when you get the material.

Koz

You can buy 302/304 SS spring wire(already hardened) in a multitude of
sizes from Mcmaster. Look under "music wire" I have used it and it is tough
stuff.

Randy


"Grant Erwin" wrote in message
...
I have a sister who makes light fixtures as a cottage industry. She called
me just now wanting to know how to go about getting or making stainless
wire rings, spring tempered, made from something like 16 ga. wire. I don't
see any people who directly source rings in lampshade-sized dimensions
(like 3" up) so now I'm wondering about making them.

What kind of stainless wire can be spring-tempered?

Is it possible to make a spring-tempered stainless ring using only O/A
equipment? Or is TIG welding completely required?

Any bright ideas?

Grant Erwin
Kirkland, Washington

"Grant Erwin" wrote in message
...
I have a sister who makes light fixtures as a cottage industry. She called
me just now wanting to know how to go about getting or making stainless
wire rings, spring tempered, made from something like 16 ga. wire. I don't
see any people who directly source rings in lampshade-sized dimensions
(like 3" up) so now I'm wondering about making them.

What kind of stainless wire can be spring-tempered?

Is it possible to make a spring-tempered stainless ring using only O/A
equipment? Or is TIG welding completely required?

Any bright ideas?

Grant Erwin
Kirkland, Washington

How much of what do you want, let me know...I'll get samples from my wire
suppliers.

I have made stainless rings out of 1/8 inch stainless TIG rod. Just
bent around a mandrel and silver soldered ( brazed ). The joint is
almost invisible. This was from 308 stainless welding rod. I would
suggest you get some stainless rod/wire, make a ring or two and then
see if you really need something that can be spring tempered. If you
really do need spring tempered ( and I doubt it ), 15-5 ph stainless is
dead easy to heat treat.

If you do use silver soldering ( brazing ), try to get some silver
solder that is recommended for stainless. Ditto the flux. Some
stainless does not take silver solder very well, but there are some
silver solders with a little nickel in them that are recommended for
stainless.

Dan


Grant Erwin wrote:
I have a sister who makes light fixtures as a cottage industry. She called me
just now wanting to know how to go about getting or making stainless wire rings,
spring tempered, made from something like 16 ga. wire. I don't see any people
who directly source rings in lampshade-sized dimensions (like 3" up) so now I'm
wondering about making them.

What kind of stainless wire can be spring-tempered?

Is it possible to make a spring-tempered stainless ring using only O/A
equipment? Or is TIG welding completely required?

Any bright ideas?

Grant Erwin
Kirkland, Washington

Lamp shades are normally spring tempered to resist being dented. I'll keep your
ideas about solder/flux specific to stainless in mind, thanks, Dan.

GWE

wrote:

I have made stainless rings out of 1/8 inch stainless TIG rod. Just
bent around a mandrel and silver soldered ( brazed ). The joint is
almost invisible. This was from 308 stainless welding rod. I would
suggest you get some stainless rod/wire, make a ring or two and then
see if you really need something that can be spring tempered. If you
really do need spring tempered ( and I doubt it ), 15-5 ph stainless is
dead easy to heat treat.

If you do use silver soldering ( brazing ), try to get some silver
solder that is recommended for stainless. Ditto the flux. Some
stainless does not take silver solder very well, but there are some
silver solders with a little nickel in them that are recommended for
stainless.

Dan


Grant Erwin wrote:

I have a sister who makes light fixtures as a cottage industry. She called me
just now wanting to know how to go about getting or making stainless wire rings,
spring tempered, made from something like 16 ga. wire. I don't see any people
who directly source rings in lampshade-sized dimensions (like 3" up) so now I'm
wondering about making them.

What kind of stainless wire can be spring-tempered?

Is it possible to make a spring-tempered stainless ring using only O/A
equipment? Or is TIG welding completely required?

Any bright ideas?

Grant Erwin
Kirkland, Washington

I have a sister who makes light fixtures as a cottage industry. She called
me just now wanting to know how to go about getting or making stainless
wire rings, spring tempered, made from something like 16 ga. wire. I don't
see any people who directly source rings in lampshade-sized dimensions
(like 3" up) so now I'm wondering about making them.

Does she specifically need stainless? I can find several suppliers of lamp
rings with a Google search but none of them actually say what their rings
are made of:

In the picture provided these look like brass but it doesn't seem likely:

http://www.lampshop.com/Merchant2/me...06_01_WIRE_BOT

And these look to be steel of some sort:

http://mainelyshades.safeshopper.com/208/cat208.htm?227

Best Regards,
Keith Marshall


"I'm not grown up enough to be so old!"

On Tue, 28 Feb 2006 18:33:18 -0600, "R. O'Brian"
wrote:

You can buy 302/304 SS spring wire(already hardened) in a multitude of
sizes from Mcmaster. Look under "music wire" I have used it and it is tough
stuff.

Randy

Music wire is good for springs, but it is not stainless.

"Don Foreman" wrote in message news
On Tue, 28 Feb 2006 18:33:18 -0600, "R. O'Brian"
wrote:

You can buy 302/304 SS spring wire(already hardened) in a multitude of
sizes from Mcmaster. Look under "music wire" I have used it and it is tough
stuff.

Randy

Music wire is good for springs, but it is not stainless.

Oh? Check McMasters pn 9495K36 ......Paul

"Grant Erwin" wrote in message
...
I have a sister who makes light fixtures as a cottage industry. She called
me just now wanting to know how to go about getting or making stainless
wire rings, spring tempered, made from something like 16 ga. wire. I don't
see any people who directly source rings in lampshade-sized dimensions
(like 3" up) so now I'm wondering about making them.

What kind of stainless wire can be spring-tempered?

Is it possible to make a spring-tempered stainless ring using only O/A
equipment? Or is TIG welding completely required?

Any bright ideas?

Grant Erwin
Kirkland, Washington

Seems to me you said you have a spot welder. I have the 110V version of the
harbor freight welder and it works great for welding stainless wires
together in an overlap. What I have in mind is to make a fixture to hold
the wire to the tongs so the ends come together when you squeeze the handle.
I was playing with the idea of making a fixture for doing bandsaw blades
with mine, though I haven't had time to experiment yet.
Glenn

"Joepy" wrote in message
...

Koz Wrote:

There is a really neat friction welder for non-ferrous wires
available.
It looks like a large pair of pliers that force the ends together and
rub them at the same time. Welds are beautiful and it's kind of
amazing
that you can get such a good weld without any power but your hands.
Only works on copper and brass though.

Koz


You got me curious. Who makes this device? I may have an app for
something like this. I Googled every combination of words I could
think of but turned up nada.


I googled

"handheld friction welder brass copper"

and got this:

http://www.read-wca.com/pwm.cfm

On Tue, 28 Feb 2006 22:14:26 -0800, "PJ"
wrote:

9495K36

Ya got me. I even looked at that page yesterday and didn't see the
"music wire" note.

OK, some stainless spring wire (e.g. 9495K36 from McMaster) is of
"music wire" temper -- but not all "music wire" is stainless. Music
wire from Small Parts Inc is not stainless.

Stainless wire is usually work hardened from being drawn to size. So
it is not spring temper, but not annealed either. You might look at
some 1/16th MIG wire and see if it is stiff enough.

Dan

Grant Erwin wrote:
Lamp shades are normally spring tempered to resist being dented. I'll keep your
ideas about solder/flux specific to stainless in mind, thanks, Dan.

GWE