Spring clasps and magnetic clasps

Is anyone familiar with the clasps that John Hardy uses on his
pieces? I am very interested in finding out how difficult they are
to create.

Also, do any of you use the magnetic clasps? How well do they work?
Can you buy the magnets and create your own clasps around them?
Would it help to connect a safety bar along with it or is that
overkill? I am new at this so I would appreciate any info or resources
you all could give me. Thank you in advance.

Heidi Peters

I’ve recently purchased some magnetic clasps. I’ve found that they
work ok on necklaces, but don’t work as well on bracelets – several
customers have asked for “safety chains” because brackelets kept
falling off. Creating your own clasps around the magnets. . . I
supposed if you made the surrounding piece and then glued the magnet
into it it would be ok. Heating the magnet (as in soldering metal
around the magnet) doesn’t work at all, it causes the magnet to stop
being magnetic.

Good luck

Hello Heidi, I have made a few locks with magnets in it. You need to
use neodium magnets. they are the strongest. The sizes I use are for
heavy necklaces round 6 x 5 mm. for a light one round 5x4 is enough.
and even Round 4x3 will do. You can put two magnet towards each other,
but a piece of steel against the magnet is also good if it is as thick
as the counter magnet. If you want to know more just mail me your
specific questions.

Martin Niemeijer

Heidi - You can order VERY strong and tiny magnets on-line from
http://www.wondermagnet.com/ . Very nice folks, and they even sent
me samples as I wasn’t sure which magnets were the right ones for what
I wanted.

Ivy

Just a word about magnets . . . those with “pacemakers” should be
warned NOT to wear anything with magnets in them. Magnets could
cause the pacemaker to malfunction.

Another word of caution to add to the pacemaker warning: do you
really want your customer to unthinkingly wear to work a new
bracelet or necklace with a magnetic clasp and wipe out the hard
drive on her computer? Although small neodium magnets make great
clasps, especially for someone with arthritis etc., people do tend to
behave habitually, and the above could happen. I guess that when you
wear a pacemaker you have to be hyper-vigilant and therefore wouldn’t
even try a magnetic-clasp piece on. At any rate, prominent
warnings/verbal reminders/tag reminders seem called for. (There
really is something very satisfying about the ‘snap’ those powerful
little magnets make on contact, isn’t there?) Elna

    Just a word about magnets . . . those with "pacemakers" should
be warned NOT to wear anything with magnets in them.  Magnets could
cause the pacemaker to malfunction. 

Well – this depends on the pacemaker. And where the magnet is going
to be in relation to the pacemaker. The modern ones, such as mine, are
not all that susceptible to magnets (except for huge ones, such as in
an MRI). Nor do microwaves bother them. But the manufacturers say that
you should, for instance, hold your telephone on the other shoulder.
And I might be a bit leery about using a necklace clasp that had a
fairly powerful magnet in it. When making jewelry for sale to others,
this is something that you do need to keep in mind. But I think
mostly just a matter of informing the person of the presence of
magnets. On the other hand, to some people, a magnet could be an added
“plus” – I seem to recall that some people think that magnets in the
soles of your shoes make for healthy feet, etc. etc. – and that they
are good for arthritis.

Margaret

With regard to:

Another word of caution to add to the pacemaker warning: do you
really want your customer to unthinkingly wear to work a new
bracelet or necklace with a magnetic clasp and wipe out the hard
drive on her computer? 

How much exposure to how big a magnet is required to damage a
computer? Could a necklace clasp really do any harm, if the person
didn’t lay their head on the hard drive? In short, does somebody out
there know just how paranoid one needs to be about magnets near
computers? Thanks! Noel

Don’t worry about a magnet small enough to used in a clasp. It takes
a magnet much larger than that to do any damage to computer equipment.
Now if you left the thing lying on a floppy for a few days…well you
might have a problem, but certainly not with any component that would
be inside a computer.

I was curious about the computer/magnet question that Noel asked a
couple days ago and emailed a computer expert friend of mine about
it. He was in the middle of some crisis at work so answered a bit
cryptically, but his answer certainly gives cause for concern. Noel
asked:

In short, does somebody out there know just how paranoid one needs
to be about magnets near computers? My friend replied: 

A “tiny” magnet close or a “big” magnet far away.

Keeping credit cards and floppy disks in the same pocket is not a
good idea. Keeping your credit card in a top pocket and leaning over
the monitor to turn the computer on will often erase the credit
card’s magnetic stripe. Mounting a loudspeaker close to the hard disk
can make the hard disk unreliable, or make the display go out of
focus if it’s close to the display. But electrical spikes are much
more of a worry than magnetism. Hope this helps.

Beth