Electric spur embedder

01 · HOW TO RUN IT

One pass, without stopping

Lay the sheet on the wired frame, switch the tool on and run the wheel along each wire with light pressure. The wax melts where the wire touches it and, as it cools, the wire is stitched inside the sheet.

The mistake that ruins the first sheet is always the same: stopping. The wheel does not tell melting from drilling — pause for a second on one spot and you go straight through, leaving a hole. Go in one movement, end to end, and if a stretch has not taken, run it again rather than pressing on the same place.

02 · THE THREE CONDITIONS

What has to be right before you switch on

The wire, tight. A slack wire moves aside as the wheel pushes, and instead of sinking in it stays sitting on top of the wax. If the frame gives when you pluck the wire, tension it first.

The wax, at room temperature. Cold, it cracks at the slightest pressure; straight out of the sun, it distorts on its own and sticks to the wheel. On hot days, work in the cool part of the store.

The hand, light. The heat does the work, not the force: pressing only gets the wheel through to the wood.

03 · SAFETY AND THE ALTERNATIVE

A soldering iron is a soldering iron

Worth keeping in mind what it is: it plugs straight into 230 V mains, draws about 30 W and heats the whole shank, not just the wheel. It comes with no stand, so have somewhere ready to put it down between frames — an iron stand, a roof tile, anything that will not burn and that keeps it clear of the cable and the sheets.

And an honest word about who it suits: for making up frames now and then it is the cheapest, most direct tool there is. For hundreds of frames, people who do it daily tend to end up with a transformer and clips, which heats the wire itself from within and sinks it along its whole length at once instead of travelling down it.

04 · BEFORE YOU BUY

A simple tool, with two things to settle first: