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Thinfire works just fine, but sometimes increases the tendency of the opaques to devit. Happens to some people, doesn't to others. I think the really big deal, though, is overfiring, because that's when the glass really settles in and embeds the shelf residue. Once it's embedded, as CC is noticing, ...

It is more difficult, certainly, to get the opaque colors to ball up without sticking to the kilnwash, but it shouldn't be THAT hard. I think you're overfiring--schedules are kiln-dependent so just because Bullseye suggests it, doesn't mean it's going to work in all kilns (I think they usually say t...

When I use GlasTac or any CMC/gum arabic-type product for "gluing," the less the better. These are water-based products, and they're mostly covered (with glass) so they're going to be very slow to evaporate. Drying out will take a loooong time. That means that a lot of what everyone learne...

Well, I can't take credit for it--my mom's a ceramic artist, and she occasionally does that when she grinds off glaze spatters. But thanks.

Get a bar of soap (I prefer Ivory, because it washes out well and doesn't have a lot of lotions/oils that might leave a residue), and rub it over the piece to stop up the crevices. Make sure they're completely stopped up and the soap has packed in. Then do your coldworking. The soap prevents swarf/c...

Well, if thinfire is all you're using, it'll take a lot of it--it's too thin for a single piece to flatten much. Might be interesting to stack graduated circles of it, though....

You may also be having a problem with overfiring on fiber paper. Overfiring makes the glass flow too much, so it's more likely to needlepoint, and it'll tend to drag more over the rougher fiberpaper surface than it would over kilnwash. You don't really have to buy a lot of tools to deal with needles...

My favorite spots are store fixture resellers--they buy up the displays that stores discard when they're remodeling or going out of business and resell them at really great prices. They usually have a lot of chipped or broken glass shelves and doors that they'll give you just to avoid having to cart...

Three choices: --Grind the bottom so it sits flat (which by definition is going to give you a thin spot on the bottom, so your design needs to account for it) --Fill the bottom with something to level the glass when it slumps. I use dry kilnwash, sifted and packed into the bottom, then smoothed and ...

A long time ago I did a blogpost on kiln carving portraits with ThinFire, moved it over to the new blog a few weeks ago: http://www.morganica.com/glass/fusing/kilncarving-with-thinfire/ A friend (Carol Carson) was teaching a kiln carving class last week and used the test samples from that post so I ...

Like Ms. Alexis, I've certainly used float less than 6mm successfully (microscope slide covers are cheap and they make very nice casings for precious metal foil in pendants), so it's not so much will it work as it is how you make it work. The chief difficulty with float glasses is that they're made ...

It's different glass, different fusing characteristics, and not necessarily consistent from manufacturer to manufacturer, so there are a lot of "it depends" in the responses.. Most likely, though, the schedule will be 50-100 degrees hotter, it will be more prone to devitrification, and it'...

Repeating what others have said, mostly, but the vast majority of fusing kilns top out at 1800F (or even 1700F), so 1830 would be a stretch. And that is a bisque fire, most likely, so the second firing, where you glaze the bisque and fully sinter the ceramic, would need to be even hotter. It's diffi...

They'll pull back and be fairly rounded with a full fuse...but you don't have to do a full, flat fuse. A solid tack-fuse would let your pieces keep their shape but still attach. Another question, though: Are you doing this with 3mm or 6mm of glass thickness? If you're trying to flat-fuse these angle...

It's no dumber on Facebook than anywhere else, it's just that Facebook has 1.2 billion users. That's quite a few more than your average glass store, so the scenario that plays out in every glass store, class, bulletin board and guild meeting I've ever been to is simply magnified a gazillion times. M...

Yep, that's about it--I think I was one of the first signups, and they weren't recording last names or something. Turned out Bullseye had actually fixed it before I reported it, and was about to contact me. My renewal attempts were apparently going through even though the website was reporting that ...

I think it depends on your definition of "important." And FB's certainly not the only place it happens. ;-) My personal taste says that a texture mold/potmelt/glassboil/stripplate/vitrograph cane/whatever is merely a component that I might incorporate into my work, not a finished work itse...

They're exceptionally well-done (and I'm on a web marketing team, working alongside a video production crew, so I do have a good basis for comparison--Bullseye's got some talented people working on this stuff), and they can be very informative. I was in on their informal user testing when they start...

Haven't tried it yet, but I have a couple of billets sitting in my studio. Got them for a goblet I'm experimenting with--sort of a riff on Memphis architecture. Need to run some compatibility tests to see if they really will work with 96--I want to add some frit wafers to the sides. Also have billet...

I think what you just discovered is that different glasses firepolish differently, and the combination of glass and coldworking make a difference. So it's hard to say what you should do with your schedule--it depends on what you're firing and how you've coldworked. Harder glasses (whites, for exampl...