Introduction: Junkyard Jewelry: the Fuse Pendant

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About: I'm a maker and hobbyist living in North FL with my parents, brother, two dogs. one cat, one rabbit and 4-8 chickens

In this instructable I'll be showing you how to turn a few common materials (a fuse, hot glue gun, soldering iron, etc.) into a simple and beautiful pendant. This is a pretty easy project, good as a first introduction to salvaged jewelry for a beginner jeweler.

Step 1: Tools and Materials

    • a fuse, it can be blown or not (you might want to get a few as they might get broken)
    • small gauge steel wire: here
    • a soldering iron
    • solder
    • a flamethrower... just pulling your leg, maybe...
    • pliers
    • a hot glue gun and glue sticks
    • a pencil
    • optional: a vise, you don't need this but it makes removing the caps easier
    • a small bottle brush or a pipe cleaner
    • a helping hands, like this one: helping hands
    • something to fill your pendant with, more about this in step six
    • something to hang your pendant on, a chain, a cord, a leather strap, etc.

    Step 2: Removing the Fuse Caps

    Take the fuse and clamp one end gently in the vise. If you tighten the vise down too hard the glass tube will shatter, spraying shards of glass everywhere. Trust me this is NOT something you want to happen.

    Then grab the soldering iron and hold it onto the top fuse cap until you hear the glue that holds the caps on the tube start to sizzle and pop. You'll see a small ring of bubbling brown stuff ooze out from around the bottom of the cap. When you see this happening, hold on to the cap with a pair of pliers and give it a sharp pull, the fuse cap should come off easily.

    Now just repeat the same process again on the other side but be more careful when clamping the tube, without the cap the glass tube is much more fragile.

    Step 3: Cleaning the Tube and Caps

    There will be gunk and solder inside of the glass tube, you don't really want this on the finished piece so you have to clean it out. Use a tiny bottle brush or pipe cleaner and run it through the tube under a faucet to remove any crud stuck inside.

    Do the same thing to the caps and then leave them to dry for a while.

    Step 4: Soldering the Loop

    Wrap a piece of the small gauge wire around a pencil to make a small loop that will fit onto one of the fuse end caps

    Put one of the fuse end caps in a helping hand, like in the fourth photo, and place the loop in the other hand so that its touching the top of the fuse cap. Solder the two pieces together. There might be some small, sharp points that need to be sanded off but the joint should be pretty clean.

    Step 5: Gluing the Bottom

    Grab the fuse end cap that you didn't solder the ring onto. Clamp it in the vise because it will get hot. Put a glue stick into your hot glue gun and preheat your glue gun. Put some glue in the cap then quickly place the glass tube inside the end cap so that its firmly glued together.

    Step 6: Filling the Pendant

    You can put whatever you want inside of the pendant, but here are a few of the ones I've thought of or tried:

    • sand- taking a bit of sand from your favorite beach and then putting it into the pendant is a great way of keeping a little part of the beach with you. Sand looks perfect in these fuses and it's a really easy thing to put in them.
    • a map- a tiny rolled up map looks very cool inside the tube, you could cut a small piece of a larger map or make your own, there's a good instructable for that here; how to make a map
    • seeds- dried seeds from your favorite plants can be special to have in a piece of jewelry.
    • pet hair- a few whiskers from your pet (if you have one).
    • stones- small gems or stones from a place that you visited can look great in the fuse.
    • glow in the dark paint- putting something that glows will give the pendant a really cool look in the dark.

    I decided to use stones in my pendant and I think that they are perfect for the look I was going for. Fill your fuse with whatever you choose but make sure nothing is sticking out over the edge of the glass tube.

    Step 7: Gluing the Top End Cap and Adding a Chain

    Now take the top end cap and glue it, like you did with the bottom one, sticking it on the glass tube. I would suggest flipping the tube over so that the cap is upside down and on the bottom. Doing this will help with glue not going into your tube and messing up the stuff inside.

    I added a chain that I had lying around the house but you could use anything. It really doesn't matter all that much as long as you can wear it. If you do use a chain, there's not much to putting it onto the pendant. You can just thread the chain through the ring on the end cap or you could add another ring in-between them, its up to you.

    Step 8: Done!

    I hope you enjoyed making this little project from my instructions. This has been one of my favorite small jewelry projects and the finished thing looks really beautiful for something that was made out of an old fuse. This instructable is an entry in the jewelry contest 2021 so please vote for it.