What have I started you may ask?? well its my biggest project so far. A chainmaille shirt. So far I am only on the right shoulder but work progresses. Also I have made a few interesting earrings out of the byzantine style as well as the square box 4-2 style. These are pretty easy especially since I use only the spring washers that I have found at the builders warehouse up the road from me at a really good price of R82.70 per kg of steel.
That translates to almost 200 rings per kg of steel for the larger links and even more for the smaller rings that are available. My only gripe with them is that their ratio of wire thickness to ring inner width is a bit to small and hense I cannot make my favorite weave from them, The dragonscale weave which i am posting below!!! have fun!
This pattern was not made by myself and I acknowledge it thus.
Submitted by DeadManWalking
These are the instructions for creating Dragon Scale.
Red links are the current step and blue are the previous step
First off, you need to have 2 ring sizes, one being able to fit in the other with room to spare, I use 17 gauge 3/16" and 6/16" (3/8").
Step 1: Make a 1-2-2 chain alternating ring sizes.
Step 2: Next, place closed large links over the small links as shown
note: They are not connected to anything yet.
You may want to do this one at a time in conjunction with the next step.
Step 3: Now connect large links to the small rings, trapping the other links inside.
Step 4: Connect the trapped large links to each other using small links.
Step 5: At this point, I usually like to add the connecting links to the top row.
Step 6: Attach large links to the connectors (not the links you just added, but the links from step 4).
Repeat steps 5&6 to lengthen the piece.
Okay, I hope I didn't confuse you too much.
