Textures Hand Crafted Silver Jewelry by Hadar Jacobson 918 Ventura Ave., Berkeley, CA 94707-2123, (510) 528-4193 hadar@pacbell.net - www.artinsilver.com

How to make your own syringe for PMC tube maker for less than $5

Click on the photos to enlarge.

This PMC tube maker is made mostly of plumbing fittings, available at a local hardware store, on the same lane. I got mine at Ace Hardware. All the parts are available online. If you want them all from one source, check www.amazon.com. It fits Textures Tube Maker, available on this website: http://store.artinsilver.com/tubeextruder.html, as well as most cake decorating tips.

Plastic grey threaded pipe, 3" x ½"

½" fitting threaded cap

½" (standard) plastic coupler for cake decorating. Available at Michaels' and every cooking supply store.

Drip stopper. It comes with 3 tips. One of them will fit perfectly into the pipe. Screw it onto the bottom of the thread.

Make a hole at the top of the cap. You can use a drill bit or a diamond-plated but mounted on a rotary tool. The hole should be just big enough or the thread (without the tip).

Insert one or two rubber washers inside the cup (depending on its depth).

To prevent clay from sticking to the tip cover it with a plastic  or rubber disk. I filled it with polymer clay, baked it and glued it on with Epoxy.

Insert the drip stopper in the pipe. Remove the handle and insert the top through the hole in the cup.

Screw the cup to the top of the pipe. Put the handle back. Screw the coupler to the bottom of the pipe. Now it's all assembled. The handle may tend to fall out. To prevent it you can either hammer flat the ends, glue it to the hole, make polymer clay stoppers to glue on the ends, or replace it with a metal or wooden  rod or metal tube that fits more snuggly.

To make a PMC tube insert the tube maker in the coupler. Turn the handle counter clockwise to make room for the clay. Fill the pipe with PMC from the bottom of the pipe and screw the coupler back on.

Turning the handle clockwise will make a long seamless tube.

The advantages of this self- made clay press is first of all the low cost. Also, each part is easily and cheaply replaceable. anything that touches the clay is made out of plastic so there will be no unwanted chemical reaction with the clay. And last, since a coupler is used, all icing tips can be also used, which opens up a whole range of decorating possibilities.