Rachel. That wire is intended to be decorative and to form and bind
things. I doubt that any amount of tumbling will harden the wire
enough to give the piece structure. To do this, you need to start
with harder wire.
You can harden wire by buying it hard, forging it, drawing it,
rolling it or manipulating it in some way. You can also heat treat
it. I draw dead soft 16 gauge SS wire to 20 gauge. By then it is
hard enough to make ear wires that hold their shape. You can also try
twisting the wire back and forth. This will take some time, but it
may harden it without deforming it.
I do this when I make post earrings. I solder the earrings to the
post material as pairs, pull and twist the two earrings now connected
to a common post (obviously twice as long as the finished post),
finish (you can hold the two on the wheel better as a pair than
separate. You can also find them easier in the tumbler as a pair),
then cut the post in the middle and finish the post ends. The pulling
and twisting will both test the solder joint and harden the post that
was softened by the heat of soldering the post to the earring. I
don’t know what all this manipulation will do to your enamel. You
might just go to the hardware store and buy some small gauge copper
wire and try working with it to see what you can do. There is a
current discussion on Orchid about the purity of copper wire, but
that shouldn’t be a factor in this experiment. Don’t let your
frustration stop you. For me, solving these problems is the best part
of making jewelry, and each problem solved makes you a better artist,
jeweler, craftsman or whatever you call yourself. Good luck. Rob
