If you follow this blog, you know I love making beads from beer and soda drink cans. Today, I have four new bead styles to share. But first, you need to break down the aluminum cans and flatten the metal into aluminum sheets.

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Here are the four templates I will be using: the quarter-inch cone, the half-inch coil, the quarter-inch coil, and the small round bead. You can find the FREE templates at the bottom of this post in PDF format for hand cutting and SVG format for cutting on a Cricut cutting machine.

I usually cut my beads on my cutting machine, but they are also easy to cut by hand. Watch this for more information on how to cut aluminum sheets on a Cricut cutting machine.

To make these rolled beads, you need this Green Creativity Bead Roller. I found mine on Amazon for under 15.00 dollars.

You also need some metal tape. Nashua is my favorite brand. It seems a little expensive, but the roll lasts a long time, and I use it on all kinds of aluminum can projects. The tape is used to attach the strips to one another and to hold the beads together.

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To start the beads, I roll the end on a small wooden skewer and then tighten the coil with my fingers. This allows the bead roller to grab the metal and roll the bead.

Next, I slide the coil between the barrels of the bead roller and roll the bead.

To finish and secure the bead, metal tape is placed at the tip and rolled around to hold it. The bead can then be removed from the roller.

This is an example of the half-inch coil bead when rolled with three metal strips, two metal strips, and one metal strip.

To finish and seal the beads, I like to use Mod Podge High Gloss. It is thicker than regular Mod Podge and doesn’t drip during application.

To apply the sealer, I use toothpicks, a small paintbrush brush, and a piece of foam for drying.

I like to leave my beads in this semi-finished state until I know what I am going to make with them, and then I use alcohol inks to color them and add another coat of sealer to seal the ink. For more details and to see more bead styles, you can watch my first bead tutorial.

For detailed instructions for rolling these beads watch this video.

Happy Upcycling,

Cindy

SVG Files

PDF’s