Ordinary powder in place of enamel powder?

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Drewcilla
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Ordinary powder in place of enamel powder?

Post by Drewcilla »

I was wondering if you can use regular powder (Bullseye or Uroborus) with Silk Screen Medium or A-14 to create an enamel? I did this once because I wanted that color and all was well, but someone asked me if it's okay. I thought I'd ask the experts.

Thanks in advance.

Drewcilla,
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williamslaybaugh
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Re: Ordinary powder in place of enamel powder?

Post by williamslaybaugh »

Sure you can, the color won't be as dense as an oxide type enamel. I also believe that some of the commercially available enamels are finely ground glass power. The grit size for Bulleye or Uroborus are bigger so the screen mesh needs to be larger resulting in less detail. Depending on what you're doing the screen print medium is not even necessary and might impede building up layers of powder for a thicker denser print. There are several recent post on this and Bullseye has a good introductory lesson on powder printing.
Barry Kaiser
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Re: Ordinary powder in place of enamel powder?

Post by Barry Kaiser »

Powder frit does not have near the pigment to create decent color unless layered quite thick.....Much much thicker that a standard screen print can place. Enamels are made to be used in relatively thin layers.
DonMcClennen
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Re: Ordinary powder in place of enamel powder?

Post by DonMcClennen »

I suggest if your going to try this to use opal powder. Cathedral will almost disappear at that thickness.
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Morganica
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Re: Ordinary powder in place of enamel powder?

Post by Morganica »

Or, if you just need the transparent color, sift down and pre fire a layer of white first. The color will show up that way.

I've no luck at all with enamels (despite many good friends who are wizards at it), so I use powder instead, and accept its limitations. If you think about how a glass color gets lighter and lighter when you have a thinner and thinner piece, well, a grain of glass powder is REALLY thin. And it rolls, so it can only be piled so high (without dams) before it starts sliding.

Frequently, the color you want is rich enough that you can't pile enough grains on one tiny spot to get there in a single firing--gravity just won't let you. So you lay it down in successive firings. It's rather like the old egg tempera--layer after layer of color can give you some beautiful, dimensional effects. (An artist named Linda Humphrey does this beautifully--her powder pieces are a single 3mm thick and VERY dimensional. I have one, and it just blows me away every time I look at it.)

The problem with that approach, of course, is that it takes a number of firings to get there, and you might wind up putting more effort and time into the piece than it's worth. Enamels are intended to go down in thin, rich layers, so if you need to achieve an effect in fewer (i.e., one) firings, that's the way to go.
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Drewcilla
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Re: Ordinary powder in place of enamel powder?

Post by Drewcilla »

Thanks, all. I really appreciate it.
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