Sunday, March 1, 2009

Bead making with Friendly Plastic and AMACO Bead Rollers

In my last post I mentioned that I've been preparing a project sheet for AMACO on how to roll beads from Friendly Plastic Designer Sticks using AMACO's bead rollers. And I'm pleased to announce that the project sheet has now been uploaded to their website.

You might wonder how on earth you can turn these pretty metallic sticks into unique, one of a kind beads. It would seem rather impossible, but you know, it really can be done and the project sheet shows you the method I use to heat and roll the plastic to produce some really individual beads.

So, pop on over to AMACO to check out the project sheet, grab some Friendly Plastic, a bead roller and have fun making your own beads. And once you've got the hang of the basics, why not try adding some extra colours and create your own original, one of a kind beads.

Would you like to comment?

  1. Im curious, how would you go about making these with larger holes so they could be threaded on say braids or dreadlocks?

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  2. It will be quite a challenge to make large the holes on these beads. You could try using a hot metal skewer to make the hole whilst the bead is still warm. The difficulty with this will be keeping the bead in its shape as it will need to be quite soft to push the skewer through.
    I usually drill holes in the beads with a 1mm drill bit once they have cooled so as to not distort the bead's shape. The friction from the drill bit causes the Friendly Plastic to soften and melt, so using a larger drill bit might be another method you could try.

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