Fused Glass Learning Experience: Thermal Shock?

Remember back when the only decision was which side should be the inside of the bowl? 

Just a matter of days ago, we were debating which side would be best for slumping into the inside of the bowl.

Scott did a bit of coldworking on it with loose silicon carbide grits to make it smoother and remove any devitrification, and then it was time to put it back in for a fire polish.

No big deal, right?

Heartbreaking, isn't it?

The piece shattered with enough force that it pushed the smaller piece off the ThinFire paper the piece sat on.

Unlike the last time this happened, this piece broke while the kiln was heating up. The edges where it broke are smoothly rounded over, so it doesn't even fit together cleanly anymore. (The purple and green piece you can see in that link broke after it came out of the kiln, so the edges were sharp and it was fairly easy to push together and fuse

Close, but no cigar.

The good folks at the Bullseye Glass resource center say it's likely that although the kiln fired on a fairly conservative tack fuse schedule (the initial heating was 300 degrees per hour to 1200 degrees), the thick glass (about 9mm, or three layers of glass thick) really needed an even slower heating schedule, somewhere between 100 degrees and 200 degrees. Sigh.

Although I wish it hadn't broken, it's kind of neat to be able to see the layers of colors in the glass.

The Bullseye techs offered several suggestions, ranging from intentionally highlighting the break (which is apparently a popular style in Japan) to fusing it with a solid circle of thin clear glass enough to let it flow a little, and see if it comes together in a way we like. Scott is leaning toward the latter, and we'll see how it comes out.

But the glass has already been through the kiln five times in its various stages, which is the limit of what Bullseye tests its glass to be able to do, so it's possible that the glass won't really be salvageable. That's what learning experiences are all about, right?

Works In Progress & Happy June!

I didn't even know we had clematis growing in our yard anymore!

I can't believe it's already June! We're in the countdown to the end of the school year, followed the next day by the start of the Northwest Regional Rollerskating Competition.

Needless to say, it's crazy here at Foster's Beauties headquarters (aka our home)!

Scott's incredibly ambitious first glass project is coming along and turning out quite well.

Scott used stencils and frit (glass that was ground to a powder) to do the design.

Meanwhile, as usual, I prefer to work on small canvases.

Check out my first glass magnets:

Can you tell I love magnets? Both making them and buying them!

I've also made five 3.5-inch squares that I'm planning to slump into small bowls/dishes:

Clockwise from the top left, the glass is lacy white, neon green, streaky blue & white, yellow decorated with marine blue stringer, and streaky pink & white. They're all on a black opal base glass.

Meanwhile, Scott's other intricate project, involving squares and lattices, has come along well too, awaiting its slump:

This side will be the bottom once it's slumped.

And flipped over:

I like the way Scott used a pair of clear squares (lined up so it's clear all the way through) and flipped the white and red square for a bit of added interest. This side will be the inside after he slumps it.

Meanwhile, I've been experimenting making some potential cabochons for flower centers. Or maybe they'll be smaller magnets ...

I like the way some of them turned out better than the others. But it's all learning at this point!

Oh, and we can't forget our youngest artist! Ellie says she was inspired by her research project on leopards when she made this:

I can kind of see the leopard influence. Can you?

Hope you have a great weekend!

Woohoo -- We Have A Glass Work Area!

It's handy having a woodworking in the family!

Our first glass-working area and storage came together far faster than I expected.

Scott built the glass storage area so it would hold full sheets of glass as well as our molds and frit.

But we hit Ikea to buy a table and rolling tool cabinet to work on since those are much easier to find ready-made.

The table legs are adjustable for height so it was easy to create a cutting table that won't hurt our backs to work on.

An alternate view:

The silver in the left foreground is the kiln! :)

The long view:

Meanwhile, Scott is already making use of the work space and has two project underway!

This is Scott's lattice work piece.

For more photos of Scott's works in progress, be sure to follow us on Facebook, where I frequently post photos as I take them.

Glass Storage In Progress

Scott is busy building a glass storage unit for our studio (aka the garage). It seems huge right now -- about six feet long and roughly seven feet tall. But I have no doubt it won't take long for us to feel like there's not enough storage!

The bottom area will have 20 sections for storing sheet glass on edge. On top of that will be a shelf roughly six inches tall for storing slumping molds. Above that will be two more shelves, roughly 10 inches tall.

Tomorrow, we're heading to Ikea to see if they have something we can adapt to use as a workbench. I'm thinking that something they have for their kitchen furniture might be perfect since we want it to be roughly kitchen counter height for cutting glass without hurting our backs by making us bend over too much.

If all goes well, we may be playing with glass later in the week!!