A week ago I received an e-mail from a customer. She asked questions about how to figure costs when you are only using a portion of a strand of beads or ounce of wire. Below is my response, as reported in the “Beads & Beading” Blog.

“Her second question pertained to calculating precious metal wire costs when she measures by the foot and buys her wire by the ounce or gram. My response was, she should estimate the percentage of the ounce, or gram, used, and include a “fudge factor”. Also, you can divide the ounce (or gram) price by the number of feet in an ounce (or gram), and multiply by the number of feet used. There are charts that will tell you how many feet of wire there are in each ounce or gram. You need a different chart for each type of precious metal. I will try to publish some of these charts in an upcoming Houseofgems.com newsletter.”

Below are my Precious metal, length/weight charts. I put them together from other charts, plus interpolation. Ounces/Foot & Feet/Ounce are approximate (same with grams), but they are very close. All weights are in troy ounces and metric grams. Lengths are in English in feet. Diameters are in English inches and Metric millimeters.

STERLING SILVER ROUND WIRE INFORMATION