Nichrome wire

Acquisition

Nichrome wire is easily obtained from appliances you have in your house, appliances from thrift stores, and online. Appliances can contain multiple gauges and may have something less like a wire and more like a ribbon (perhaps more appropriately termed heat tape, but usage is really the same and both will be addressed as wire). Online stores usually offer spools of a single gauge of wire and may mark it as foam cutting wire. You could also buy heat tape and take it apart, but this is more expensive.

Hair Driers

A $3.25 hair drier from GoodWill	Looking down the end of it, you can see the Nichrome wire before you even take it apart	It comes with a free fan and switches!
Those Nichrome coils, as viewed from the other end	The complete innards of your average hair drier	Random: looks like this one has a hot limit switch
I uncoiled one segment to show about how much Nichrome comes out of there (lots)	This is what I kept. Your tastes may vary.

Toasters

A toaster from GoodWill	And it only cost $2.00	Looking in the top, you can already see the objective
The electronics that drive the toaster. You might find a use for the relay or rotary switch...maybe not.	After some disassembly, we have the three heating vanes. One of them is double sided, since it was in the middle.	I wrapped the wire around the guts of a shaker-flashlight because it was handy. There was about 18 feet of the stuff in the toaster.
This is what I kept. Your tastes may vary.

Buying Online

A number of hobby stores sell Nichrome wire. It is often sold as foam cutting wire.

• Pitsco 32 gauge
• Pitsco 18 gauge