Textures....

[joan goodyear]

I am copying the texture of an old hammered sheet glass (peices 5x7)by using diatomaceous earth. It is a dry mold technic. I want to get more of the delicate texture and less of the orginal texture of the sheet I'm starting with.
Would you say soak it longer than 5 minutes at 1350 or raise the temperature? I have only got enough glass left for on more go. The pieces I did already at this were okay but I see they could be better. The ones I did at 1400 were not as good; they didn't pick up the texture as well.

[rodney]

are you using frit, how do you keep the d-earth in place, without changing its shape

thanks

rodney

[joan goodyear]

When I use frit I use the finest frit powder. I only make thin glass things like leaves. Otherwise I use this as an easy wasy to make one off things . You can slump things easily like this without waiting for a mold to dry.
However I am having a problem getting this one delicate texture on this bulleye glass and I only have one peice that matches left. I was hoping someone would be kind enough to give me a clue as to how to achieve a better quality but as you can see from the number of people who have read this that I may as well go ahead and fire it and take a chance.

The D'earth doesn't go anywhere that I've noticed but that's just me. I am not a scienticfic glass worker. I just pile it up and mash it down with a peice of 3/4" plate glass. Then press in the pattern to make a mold.

[charlie holden]

I couldn't understand from your first posting what you were asking. I think I understand now. You have made a mold in a flat bed of diatomacious earth with a piece of antique glass. You want to copy the surface of the antique glass onto a piece of Bullseye. You tried firing some Bullseye to 1400 and didn't get a strong impression. Then you fired to 1350 for five minutes and got a better impression but didn't get rid of the original pattern on the Bullseye sheet. Is that right?

If that's the case, then it seems like your only choice is to soak longer. You might try soaking longer at 1400. I would be careful about which side I placed down. I would place the smoother side down if you're firing single rolled BE. Double rolled wouldn't seem to offer any choice. I kiln with only lid elements would be a better kiln for this so that the glass got even exposure to the infrared radiation.

[Bert Weiss]

When I use frit I use the finest frit powder. I only make thin glass things like leaves. Otherwise I use this as an easy wasy to make one off things . You can slump things easily like this without waiting for a mold to dry.
However I am having a problem getting this one delicate texture on this bulleye glass and I only have one peice that matches left. I was hoping someone would be kind enough to give me a clue as to how to achieve a better quality but as you can see from the number of people who have read this that I may as well go ahead and fire it and take a chance.

The D'earth doesn't go anywhere that I've noticed but that's just me. I am not a scienticfic glass worker. I just pile it up and mash it down with a peice of 3/4" plate glass. Then press in the pattern to make a mold.

Joan

I have been using D earth for a long time now. I like it mixed with alumina hydrate and plaster. I don't know proportions and I don't think they are critical. The deal is that if you use a variety of particle sizes, the matrix has more body.

I am thinking about starting to mess around with some larger particles in the matrix in order to get more interesting patterns in my castings.

The one thing I have discovered is to not use kiln wash because of the kaolin in it. Since I removed the kaolin from my powder mix, I can use it over and over.