Charlotte Tattersall: Tool Review! Emery Boards

Tool Review!

Emery Boards

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Here we have a review of Emery Boards, which I know is more of a consumable than a tool, but they are something I use pretty much constantly whilst making Jewellery.

I wish someone had introduced these to me sooner during university, my sandpaper days would of been long gone! I cant imagine making any thing without these, they are pretty much an essential to me now.

These come in a variety of grades from fine to coarse so you can work your way through them to achieve your desired finish, they also come in different shapes which are the best things ever!

They come in flat, round and triangular.

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The Flat:

The flat are great for pretty much any aspect of sanding. Depending of the job I usually start with a Red stick working my way through to a dark grey stick and then a lighter grey stick for finishing, occasionally I skip out the red stick as this is really coarse and sometimes isn't needed.

(I realise that this probably isn't the 'proper' way to do it but I don't really pay much attention to the grades, I just go with my instinct which seems to work)

The Round:

Next we have the round ones. These are life savers when it comes to making rings/bangles, it means you can get to the soldering join with ease without over sanding

(which I found happened quite often when using a file or sanding paper and a split mandrel in my Dremel) These make life 10x easier and I don't know what I'd do without them now!

The Triangular:

And Finally we have the triangular ones. These are a recent addition to my tools. I found this one to be really useful for getting into angles/corner of joins, I don't tend to use these as much as the other two as I find the flat ones tick most of the boxes for my requirements, but when I do stone setting these are good for sanding the join between the setting and the ring.

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Overall I highly recommend these and I don't know what I'd do without them. If you don't already use them, what are you waiting for!

I don't live too far from Birmingham, so whenever I take a trip to the Jewellery Quarter I tend to stock up on these I buy them from Sutton Tools as they are slightly cheaper then Cooksons.

If your ordering offline I suggest ordering from Cooksons as thats mainly where I buy 99% of my things from and they often have free postage.

By the time you've done a separate order on Sutton tools and added the postage on it works out about the same price

They range from 95p - £1.90 exc VAT on Sutton Tools

http://www.suttontools.co.uk/emery-sticks.html

And range from £1.10 - £2.14 exc VAT on Cooksons Gold

http://www.cooksongold.com/category_select.jsp?query=ermery+sticks