Hobby & Craft Forums

I have been racking my brains for a solution to this problem for months. Now it will only work if your bead hole is slightly too large for the headpin, not one that totally swamps it. Nickie very kindly suggested wire wrapping the bead, which is one way, but it would have to be done at the other end of the bead which changes the look of the bead, and in so doing, changes the design.
Adding a small bead to the end to stop the headpin going through the hole is fine too, providing you can match up the beads you are using with smaller beads in the right colour and size.
A solution I came up with last night is........... to use 2 headpins instead of one, now as I say, this only works if the hole is just slightly too big. I then needed to come up with something to do with one of the head pin wires at the other end as it was difficult and looked a little odd using two to make the loop. So - I bent one at a right angle just above the bed, held the two with pliers and wrapped one wire around the other for two twists, then cut it off close. The other I went ahead and made the loop with. Obviously this makes your shaft longer than usual, and i think it will now take more beads to fill the space, but that to me is not too much of a disadvantage.

I was bought 50 packs of pearl beads in many many different colours for Christmas and was gutted when I planned the bracelets I wanted to make with them and couldn't because of this problem. I had the same problem a few months before Christmas when trying to make another bracelet.

Someone needs to make headpins with bigger heads!!

Hope this helps someone in the future with the same problem,

It depends what you're making of course but eye pins work really well for that too!

I would have done what my dad would.. slapped a bit of aradite on the pins and set the bead in place LOL but I prefer your more creative example!

Never tried eye pins.

As for the glue gord, was tempted, but the fact that I would probably get it everywhere.

I've used them in earrings when the bead had been too big for an head pin- having the loop on the end makes the likelihood of sensibly sized bead slipping off almost impossible and you can just add a smaller 2-4mm bead to the loop to finish them off. I'll try to get some pics up sometime to show you what I mean- doesn't come across very well when you try to write it lol!

No I get it, just with my bracelet - I knew exactly what I wnted to do, so I didn't want to have to add to it, ie smaller beads or whatever. I was determind to solve it without having too - especially with the amount of pearls I have to use up. (Although we did get a little taken for a ride by the seller who named many of the pearl colours different names for the same shades, which when I was bought £50 worth for 50 packets nd you only get 20 odd different packets - its more than a bit annoying, have resisted giving her feedback so far).