Making cabochons

[Ness]

I'd love to make my own cabochons, and bought a cab mandrel at the Flame Off - trouble is, I'm not totally sure how to use it!!
Can anyone help, please...

[saffie]

Ok Martin explained it like this!
Melt a really big gather on what ever colour rod you want. Almond shaped he called it! bead release the top of the cab mandrel (obviously) dob your gather onto the heated through mandrel and then heat and shape and apply dots stringer frit etc as you would a conventional bead.

Keep it warm tho cos if it gets cold it drops off the mandrel.
HTH
xx

Oh to get it off just slide a knife of something under it and it flips off easy!

[Nolana]

And you need to keep the flame on the flat part of the mandrel so that it stays really hot - otherwise you will lose it!