Wire Wrapping - Coiling on a Drill 

Lol, I been there before though. Couldn't find my vice and swivels. The wire went crazy smacking all over the place 😅

Awesome, so glad you could take away something even as a already skilled coil maker.

Lol. If you have a place at your work area to screw in a hook at drill level then you don't need a clamp.

Exactly. Like I said on Facebook... I can usually do it without looking once I got it going. The more you do it the more second nature it becomes.

Size is not really important as long as the wire fits on it. I have a pack of assorted sizes and I have used all of them and get the same results.

Sorry that I missed this comment. So the wire breaking is always going to be a tension/pressure issue. There are three main causes. Either the swivel is not spinning or skipping, there is too much tension from the pull back on the drill, or the wire your feeding onto the core has too much tension on it. Remember that copper is a very very soft metal, much softer than brass or silver. Make sure all of your wire is dead soft so that you can work it without much pressure. If your core is breaking trying to wrap the smaller coil onto a thicker core I suggest giving it maybe 4 rotations and then finishing by hand while gripping where it is already coiled. I have had to do this with thicker coils.

Good question... only one way to find out. I don't really use coils that beefy, but I may give it a shot just cuz I'm curious.

@@sethedelinski348 I use alot of thicker coils for my art style when I sculpt copper, I feel like a thick looking coil would look sick !

I prop up my vice on a thick hardback book. I have found one that gets it right where it needs to be so I pretty much just keep it by my vice all the time.

@@sethedelinski348 Thank you. I will try that

I use bare copper and oxidize it myself. Everything I use is deadsoft. If I want something a little more stiff for a frame or something, I will work harden it with my fingers and nylon pliers.

Less tension both from the drill and the feed wire. That and slower speeds. Thicker gauges tend to fair better. Copper is very soft and if the drill head (chuck) is spinning more than the wire that means the core is twisting and can only twist to much before it snaps.

So I just use one of my work drills which is a dewalt. All that matters is that the chuck (head of the drill) is adjustable. So a impact drill will not work. I'm pretty sure most any standard cordless drill should work.

The root of the issue is copper is extremely soft. The thinner the gauge the more you will have snaps at the drill head. You want to use the least amount of pressure needed both on the drill and your feeding hand. I just did some coils yesterday and did have some snaps while spinning on a 24g core. I just clipped it and reinserted into the drill. I lessened all of the pressure and tension i was useing on both ends and no issues.