Tiger tail wire (also called tiger tail or tiger-tail) is a thin

wire Overhead power cabling. The conductor consists of seven strands of steel (centre, high tensile strength), surrounded by four outer layers of aluminium (high conductivity). Sample diameter 40 mm A wire is a flexible strand of metal. Wire is c ...

encased in

nylon Nylon is a generic designation for a family of synthetic polymers composed of polyamides ( repeating units linked by amide links).The polyamides may be aliphatic or semi-aromatic. Nylon is a silk-like thermoplastic, generally made from pe ...

often used in

bead A bead is a small, decorative object that is formed in a variety of shapes and sizes of a material such as stone, bone, shell, glass, plastic, wood, or pearl and with a small hole for threading or stringing. Beads range in size from under ...

jewellery Jewellery ( UK) or jewelry (U.S.) consists of decorative items worn for personal adornment, such as brooches, rings, necklaces, earrings, pendants, bracelets, and cufflinks. Jewellery may be attached to the body or the clothes. From a wester ...

, and particularly suited to stringing heavy beads and sharp beads, which tend to fray other kinds of thread. For this reason, tiger tail is the thread of choice for gemstones. Some tiger tail has multiple intertwined wire threads under the nylon coating. The wire threads are made of stainless steel. Tiger tail cannot be fashioned into a

knot A knot is an intentional complication in cordage which may be practical or decorative, or both. Practical knots are classified by function, including hitches, bends, loop knots, and splices: a ''hitch'' fastens a rope to another object; a ' ...

in order to end a sequence of beads as other kinds of thread can, therefore crimp beads are often used for this purpose instead. Crimp beads are also used as spacers between other beads strung on tiger tail. Among the types of wire used for

bead stringing Bead stringing is the putting of beads on string. It can range from simply sliding a single bead onto any thread-like medium (string, silk thread, leather thong, thin wire, multi-stranded beading wire, or a soft, flexible wire) to complex creati ...

, tiger tail is the most common. Tiger tail is easier to use than many other kinds of thread, and it does not require the use of a

sewing needle A sewing needle, used for hand-sewing, is a long slender tool with a pointed tip at one end and a hole (or ''eye'') to hold the sewing thread. The earliest needles were made of bone or wood; modern needles are manufactured from high carbon steel ...

. Tiger tail has high

ultimate tensile strength Ultimate tensile strength (UTS), often shortened to tensile strength (TS), ultimate strength, or F_\text within equations, is the maximum stress that a material can withstand while being stretched or pulled before breaking. In brittle materials t ...

and is therefore extremely difficult to tear, but if it is creased or twisted, tiger tail has a tendency to kink and then become

brittle A material is brittle if, when subjected to stress, it fractures with little elastic deformation and without significant plastic deformation. Brittle materials absorb relatively little energy prior to fracture, even those of high strength. Br ...

in the kinked area.

References

Bibliography

* {{Beadwork Wire Beadwork Steel