Source for thick Nichrome/Kanthal wire and rods?

[perkolator]

Wondering if anyone can please share their source for thicker nichrome or kanthal wire and rods?  Thick as in anywhere from say 8-16 gauge thickness (~3mm-1.5mm), not the thin stuff.

Want to make some custom kiln furniture such as stilts and bead racks, etc.  The nichrome at all the local places is too thin for our application, like 20ga or thinner.  They do carry the normal 1/8" bead rack rods, but they add up $ quickly when sold a la carte.

Some of the thicker rolls of wire I'm finding are about 12ga at about $1.75/ft

For something like 9ga I'm seeing  about $4/ft

 

Can anyone comment on using kanthal vs nichrome for suspending things in kilns?  I'm reading kanthal is slightly stronger, but can transfer iron to clay (I could just coat it with ITC-100 to resolve that?)

[neilestrick]

Any of the kiln manufacturers will sell you element wire. It probably won't be cheap, though.

[perkolator]

Correct.  This is why I'm looking for alternate sources

[neilestrick]

17 minutes ago, perkolator said:

Correct.  This is why I'm looking for alternate sources

I don't think you're going to find it very cheap anywhere. It's mostly sold to directly to manufacturers, so they jack up the price when selling to the public.

[Mark C.]

I had a large roll sent to Molokai of 15 gauge from Krueger ceramics to due my salt kiln button work. They sent it flat rate and was very fast which is never the case in Molokai. I cannot  seem to to find the paperwork but I thought it was good deal-but the quantity was over 50 feet.sorry about the underlining heavy thumb.I think they sold heavier stock as well.

Maybe its an Alibaba search and have it sent from abroad.