WarmGlass.com

Hand polishing is massively satisfying, both to the practitioner and to the collector (or whoever is petting the glass after you're done). ;-) But it does take time and it's not for people who don't want to end up with arthritis in the hands or whatnot. Paul Tarlow's coldworking book explains it ver...

Yes, you have devit on the glass, and I'm willing to bet that the problem starts before the glass ever goes into the kiln. What you think is partially melted glass is actually crystallized material from the glass (AKA devitrification). Devit isn't quite as cut and dried as most people think--it's us...

The reds are going to be a problem unless formulated for the prolonged firing of most casting. They tend to opacify (and can sometimes turn brownish). I've tried casting with Bullseye's standard transparent reds and had them go opaque. Typically I'll use Burnt Scarlet Striker or Ruby Red Tint, both ...

The governor, Kate Brown, was appointed when the last governor (Kitzhaber) resigned (rule in Oregon is that if the governor's gone, the secretary of state takes his place). She's facing a fall election to get in for real, has no real challengers, but several supporters (such as Precision Castparts) ...

Maggie, you should be able to use whatever red lead crystal that manufacturer makes. Gaffer, for example, makes Orange Red. Which crystal are you using?

Well, if the glass gets so thin on the side that it splits open, you have at least one of three issues: Too much heat, too fast heat, or too little glass. Fortunately, it's pretty easy to figure out: Go look to see where the glass went. If it's that thin all over, you simply don't have enough glass ...

One suggestion, whatever you use: Remember that it can be very dark inside a kiln. ;-) Only half joking. I have a nice big quartz window in my new fiber kiln and I love it...as long as the kiln is actively firing. That way the elements illuminate the interior. When the kiln has gone into the downra...

Yup. From what I'm reading in the local forums, the lawyers are promising that neighbors will at the very least get their yards completely replaced, medical care for the family for years, etc., etc., and some cash. I kinda wonder where they think the money's gonna come from, after the lawyers get pa...

One suggestion, whatever you use: Remember that it can be very dark inside a kiln. ;-) Only half joking. I have a nice big quartz window in my new fiber kiln and I love it...as long as the kiln is actively firing. That way the elements illuminate the interior. When the kiln has gone into the downram...

Cynthia, there is nothing wrong with speculating... at least I said that was what I was doing. And being from the local area and having gone to a lot of their winter and summer sales, I know that they produce a lot of glass both before and after each sale. If their scrubbers are not functioning to ...

I'm just speculating, but I wonder if the elevated levels of arsenic and cadmium in the air that was detected and started all of this was related to the Feb winter sale that Bullseye has each year. I would suspect that since they sell so much glass during this that they had been producing more to g...

This is hearsay, but what I heard was that Bullseye was quite a bit behind schedule in regard to air quality testing. This plus them maintaining their manufacturing facility in a residential area and not changing their formulations to minimize the amounts of cadmium and arsenic are going to present...

Beam deflection increases as a cube of the beam length, so it's important to place the supports (fire bricks) as close to the glass as possible. In the image above, there's probably 25% of the length that does nothing to support the glass, but it increases deflection by about 2.4 times. Tony True. ...

Stainless has a higher coefficient of thermal expansion than glass, yes, so it'll get bigger with heat, and shrink more rapidly when cooled. If glass gets in the way in either direction (so that the metal encloses the glass and it can't escape), there can be enough force to crack the glass. I've use...

Coldworking will take down the edges, definitely. The problem with any kind of coldworking is that once you start, you pretty much have to coldwork the rest of that area to match because otherwise it will always look different. Touchup with varnish or something similar will probably always show a bi...

Don, is it occurring on one face or both faces? That would be the first clue. I use a lot of salvage plate and float, and the older, thinner glasses (i.e,. 4mm or less), especially the older ones, will exhibit this fairly often. When it occurs for me it's spread evenly but not perfectly across the f...

I think you're mixing up a couple of processes. When I've heard the term "boiling the glass" it's meant deliberate overfiring, i.e., using an extremely hot or prolonged processing schedule that makes the glass very liquid/soft/loose/runny. Liquidish, runny glass will seek its own level in ...

The problem with chads is that they change the volume of the glass at that point in the piece. If you're capping a 3mm sheet of cobalt blue with a 3mm sheet of clear, you've got a 1:1 ratio of blue:clear. If you add a chad, you no longer have that 1:1 ratio. If the chad is cobalt, it'll be darker bl...

So I've been doing my first fusing and I'm getting some devitrification on only some colors. What am I doing wrong? I'm doing some 5-6 layer stacking and some double sheet fusing at the same time. When you reach full fuse temp and it is cooling down do you open the door to force cool or just let th...