- 1). Leave 6 inches of copper wire hanging from the bottom of your iron bar. Hold it in place with your hand while you begin wrapping the remaining wire up the length of the rod.
- 2). Wrap the wire around the circumference of the iron bar and continue to do so up the entire length of the rod. Making sure to push each layer of wire down so that it touches the layer before it. Try to make the coils so tight that you can't see the iron bar below it. Once at the top, stop, but don't cut the wire. Simply hold it firmly in place for a moment.
- 3). Wrap a layer of electrical tape around the outside of the coiled wire. Make a clean wrapping with not very much overlapping and minimal folds. Cover the entire layer of wire so that you can only see the 6 inches of wire hanging off at the bottom of the rod, and the wire sticking out at the top.
- 4). Use the wire sticking out at the top of the rod to begin a second layer of wiring. Wrap it downward, covering the electrical tape, creating a second layer of wire. The only difference is that this layer will have been wound from top to bottom as opposed to bottom to top.
- 5). Leave six inches of wire at the end of this layer of wiring to stick out at the bottom of the rod. This 6 inch piece should hang next to the other 6 inch piece from step 1. Tape the wires into place so that the second layer doesn't unravel.
- 6). Strip the insulation off of the ends of the two 6 inch lengths of wire with your wire strippers. Make sure not to cut the wires below the insulation.
- 7). Place one stripped wire end on the positive terminal of a D-cell battery and tape it into place with electrical tape.
- 8). Place the opposite length of wire onto the negative terminal of your battery. This will complete the circuit and cause electrical current to course through the wires. Every electrical current creates a magnetic field, and you have just created a pretty good electromagnet.
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