What is the most acute angle you can cut for full fusing?

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BillsBayou
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Joined: Wed Oct 29, 2014 1:08 pm

What is the most acute angle you can cut for full fusing?

Post by BillsBayou »

It's snowflake season!

I want to know how shallow I can cut an angle for full fusing with respect to the 6mm rule. I want to make a six-sided snowflake. Right away, this means I'm leaving comfortable square 90° angles for the more shallow 60° angles. I want to push it further. Skipping right past 45° I want to know if I can make 30° cuts and how distorted the rounded points of my snowflakes will be after a full fuse.

Yes, I could do this myself, but if someone has already done this, I can know the answer without picking up my glass cutter.
SnowflakeAngles.jpg
Morganica
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Re: What is the most acute angle you can cut for full fusing

Post by Morganica »

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 angles with one layer (3mm) of glass, the glass will most likely pull away toward the joints and you'll get some distortion.

One option, if you've got a glass saw that can handle it (such as a Taurus ring saw): Assemble your pieces on a circle of thin clear, then fire until they're fully fused...but stop before the clear glass thins too much and develops holes. Then cut out the shapes with the ring saw and firepolish.

If that's too much work (and it is a lot of work), just leave the circle of clear thin glass as-is. (But if you're going to do that, try a rainbow irid, irid-side down, looks cool).
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