extruding glass strands from pot (photo)

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roykirk
Posts: 18
Joined: Tue May 12, 2015 9:54 am

extruding glass strands from pot (photo)

Post by roykirk »

I asked about attempting this technique in a recent thread, but only last night was finally able to give it a shot. What I started out with was a ceramic pot, about 3" x 3". In to this pot I had melted about a quarter of a pound of pulverized glass, all of the same COE. The ceramic pot and glass cooled perfectly without any cracks.

So last night I took the same pot of glass and reheated it to about 1950 F. I opened my front load kiln and then used a steel rod to attempt to extract glass strands from the molten pot. As you can see in the photo, I was successful with just a couple of strands. I wasn't prepared for how quickly the glass was going to cool below extrusion temperature. By the time I got the second strand pulled out, it had solidified. One bad thing was that half of the ceramic pot cracked and fell apart sometime during the night as I let it cool in the kiln. I assume this happened due to the rapid cooling that occurred while I had the kiln door open.

Anyway, a cool test run that was partially successful. Here's a link to the photo:

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B0Maa ... G00NGp3MzA
Marty
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Re: extruding glass strands from pot (photo)

Post by Marty »

The main point is that you're having fun with this, right?
roykirk
Posts: 18
Joined: Tue May 12, 2015 9:54 am

Re: extruding glass strands from pot (photo)

Post by roykirk »

Marty wrote:The main point is that you're having fun with this, right?
Precisely. Also trying to figure out how to do it right! :D
Judd
Posts: 295
Joined: Mon Sep 01, 2003 9:45 am
Location: Arkansas

Re: extruding glass strands from pot (photo)

Post by Judd »

Maybe look into doing a vitrograph pull with the glass? If you're wanting a large quantity of glass stringer, that method would work better.
Search the archives here for how to do that.
Greg Vriethoff
Posts: 4
Joined: Sun Jul 01, 2007 8:03 pm
Location: Charlotte, NC

Re: extruding glass strands from pot (photo)

Post by Greg Vriethoff »

roykirk wrote:The ceramic pot and glass cooled perfectly without any cracks.

So last night I took the same pot of glass and reheated it to about 1950 F.
Actually, this is why your crucible failed. Glass and crucible are never going to expand and contract at the same rate. I know plenty of people that do this, so I'm guessing I'll have plenty that disagree with me. Bringing a crucible up to temp, and back down, puts a lot of stress on it, and shortens its life. Doing it with glass still in it shortens its life even more even if it doesn't outright fail. It's always better to empty the pot first if you must shut it off.

Just my two cents.
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