Glass Ear Plugs

[themoch]

So i know this has been discussed here before, but i can't seem to find it in the search.

if anybody can find it please post the link.

Anyhow, I've been asked to make some ear plugs. size 0 (which some research shows to be 8.4mm).

i don't have a lot of time to figure this out so I was wondering how you've gone about making them?

they want something black/red spiral in a curved horn shape. so what i'll probably do is make a twisted cane and try my best to stretch the thickets part to be ~8.5mm (that's going to be the fun part)

taper off one side and make a patty on the other. then bend to curve them out.

so yeah... any hints or tricks would be appreciated.

[Swampy]

Posting on the run so;

Stripe your rod

melt in

twist or wigwag

pull out parallell 8.4mm dia

gather one end, decorate that.

leave a ball or mash a maria, punty up to it.

swap hands, pull out your tapered shape

get the curl bits at a time by (start at sharp end first) heat > push and shape into a marble mold.

keep heating > curling till you get what you want.

hold the curl in your tweezers, crack off punty, flame polish the scar.

done :-)


not saying it's right, just how I do it.

[themoch]

fancy,

last time i tried i had about a year on the torch... it was such a pain in the ass i vowed to never make them again...

but i'm hoping rounding year 6 i'll have some better luck.

[Sometime79]

I always stripe or color rod into a consistent thickness loaf. The end of your loaf should be a slightly larger diameter than you actually want, as the gauge is usually the desired ear hole size so the ends need to be sligthly larger to allow for stretching and pulling. So you have about a 10 mil loaf around three inches long. from the center start heating and pull slowly to your desired thickness and length. so now make a Y bridge the length of the loaf you pulled and punty up your thick sides to the Y. with a bushy heat the middle of you loaf and pull slightly away from the Y. This begins your curl for you horns, and because you are only pulling at the same time the length and thickness should be equal. now form the center separate the horns by cutting or pulling a termination with a rod. So now the spiral is already begun and both pieces are still puntied up across eachother. keep curling the horns as desired, but make sure you curl each one evenly. I hope this explanation is clear enough to understand. Plugs are one of my biggest sellers, and mine are not cheap. What sets mine apart from other glass plugs I have seen is consistency of both pieces. That is why I only use the same pull for both pieces and make them both at the same time with the same movement for each curl. For the type you are trying to make I make around $60 with a little sculpting, or dot work around the thick part. Hope this helps.

[glassdocnc]

Pictures?

[themoch]

http://www.google.com/products?q=glass+spiral+ear+plugs&btnG=Search+Products&show=dd

this is what i'm looking to do...

but something with a flat end like this:

http://marketplaceadvisor.channeladvisor.com/storefrontprofiles/processfeed.aspx?sfid=178332&i=246638439&mpid=12023&dfid=1

[Cosmo]

I've been making them for quite a while in pretty much the same method Swampy described. I haven't made any recently because like everything else there are imports out there that sell for less than I can buy the glass to make them, so I can't sell mine. But, back when they were selling, they sold consistently for $20 a pair. On a lot of them, I made little tiny marbles (usually dichro) to put at the fat end. People seemed to really dig them.

[Swampy]

Hey Sometime79 that is an excellent suggestion for getting two pieces the same style, size, taper. Have to rep you for that...


Yeah for me Cosmo I can't compete with the shite stuff called 'Murano' on the shelves here, it's a shame that the public are being duped with duff stuff. I can't compete because (a case of glass (frinstance) is $100 + $50 freight) x 45% import duty = a lot.

My selling point is that it's made in Belize, they can see it being done. Also the designs are better than the imported shite.

I send speciality items to several places including the US, just because it is a specialised product for animal husbandry. No, not doggy dillys.

[Swampy]

fancy,

last time i tried i had about a year on the torch... it was such a pain in the ass i vowed to never make them again...

but i'm hoping rounding year 6 i'll have some better luck.

That's what works for me Andrew, I return to something after a time and it's like a helix, next time round the experience kicks in and it's better than the last try. You know how it goes.

[Meerkat]

I send speciality items to several places including the US, just because it is a specialised product for animal husbandry. No, not doggy dillys.

Well that got me curious, what on earth do you make out of glass that is used for animal husbandry ?

[Swampy]

Not fucking telling you.

Okay then, glass ear plugs for dogs.

There, I said it was a specialised product.

[Johan]

Lawless...great explanation. I'm def gonna give that a try. I never thought about makin them at the same time with a Y bridge. Thanks.

[richsantaclaus]

lol, and here I thought you needed them for the firing range...lol - silly me!

[Icarus]

lol, and here I thought you needed them for the firing range...lol - silly me!

When I saw the title, I actually thought the same thing, and imagined how uncomfortable they would be.

[Jimi The Don]

i concur with the loaf meth, but i go for a pigskin shape, then i slowly pull it out using mostly gravity to do the stretching so it stretches evenly. hold it down one way and pull slightly, then the other way, pull it up and get it straight and so on, important to make sure it's evenly heated so spin both ways and brush the heat back and forth, then i pull that in half to make my terminations, next heat near the other end and let gravity do most of the curling (or horning) as you heat further down the taper, then when they are both equal i flame cut them off the rod and flatten the end while holding with tweezers but that can be done first as i believe crip mentioned, then i strike them, then i give them to my girlfriend, then i get sexy time..

[CripSkillz]

lol hehe firing range, i have made a few sets too , geting them the same is the bitch ...

[misticglass]

make one nice twisted came that is even diameter and cut it in half with diamond shears and finish it up. bam!

-m

[amanofmusic]

I met someone the other day with gauges and i asked if they were glass. he said no, they're plastic and hes waiting to find a blower he can "trust". he made a comment about something in a kiln leaving chemicals on the glass that are bad for your skin... and then explained something that sounded kind of like flame annealing.

Personally I've never heard of anything like this, I imagine glass is good because it is so nonpourous, i bought my girl some last summer at Camp Bisco.

Plus, rings, bracelete, pendants, etc. I've never heard a complaint

I'm curious if any of you know anything about this, or if this kid just had no idea what he was talking about ( I didnt tell him I knew anything about glass)

[themoch]

The Corning Glass Company of New York was established in 1868. Among their first products were colored lenses for railroads and the earliest light bulbs. Much later they formulated Pyrex® brand glass, one of the most significant developments in glass technology this century. Pyrex glass a.k.a. "Corning 7740" set the worldwide standard for scientific and medical glasses. Its resistance to large temperature shifts and chemical reactions have made it a laboratory mainstay.

found this on a glass jewelry site... i trust it over metals, plastics, or wood any day.

[KahunaGlassArt]

are there any videos out there showing what you guys are talkin about.
I sort of get what SOmetime is saying, but not completely.

[ALIEN!]

OOOOOOHHHHH, all this time I was thinking "hearing protection" lol. :o:

[KahunaGlassArt]

is the Y thing you guys are talkin about the same type of thing as the the way this guys shapes his rings?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PxAU-CsO02k

[themoch]

no. the Y that they're talking about is literally making a Y holding rod


so you would have an rod that looks like this ---------<

and the < section would have a span of about 4 inches

[KahunaGlassArt]

o nice thanks

[themoch]

excuse the picture quality... taken on the quick side for reference. will take much better ones of the finished products.

so here's some that have been on the successful side:

[KahunaGlassArt]

really nice man!!!!! do these sell well?

[Swampy]

So which technique did you end up trying in the end then Andrew?

[themoch]

okay,

so the ones on top are not 0 guage... but they're like size 2 or something... they're 6.46 mm.. so yeah, ~ 2guage.

those i made buy just pulling some twisted cane, and following a pre-made one (somebody needed a fix for 1 broken one, so i made 2 to match it). if i say so myself they're damn close, like +/- 0.15mm on some of the curves.


the horn ones i did the red by bulling 2 equal length spirals

flattening 1 end.

pointe up

then doing the bend in a large marble mold

pulled to the side so they were 3d curves


the blue ones i made buy:


pulling cane

flatten one side of each

then put them on the end of the Y

then heated both at the same time and used a paddle to put them in place

pulled them "3d" while i could line both of them up.


so the blue ones are the most "similar"

i'm happy with them and would use this tech again should i need to make more... they are fun to make in a weird tedious way... they take about 40 min a pair.... but for some reason find them fascinating to make... makes me wish i had some large holes in my ears... although i'm sure i wouldn't be able to pull it off.

[KahunaGlassArt]

i made myself some thinner diameter plugs, same shape as your blue ones. theyre probably like 4mm with the cap on the end. didnt want to stretch my ears too much.

is anyone able to take pictures or a video of the "Y" technique? still a bit confused but really want to make some sweet plugs and whatnot.

[The Cheese]

These are pretty cool. I'll have to put some sets together. Good way to work on that whole cane thing that I haven't practiced too much.

[Greymatter Glass]

suggestion:
...make 40, pick out 18 sets, throw the odds/seconds away.

I can make them in under 5 minutes a set (not counting cane prep) that way, as long as I am not trying to match one to the one before it, and just going to a certain size range and look, I find I can make many more in an hour, and pick sets from those.

[KahunaGlassArt]

yeah but that way you wont have selection, just one colour (that is if i'm understanding what your saying)

[Greymatter Glass]

so make 40 pairs each in 5 colors in a day....

[CripSkillz]

sounds like a good idea if you can sell that many..

those are nice andrew, , i made some like the first set for my niece she loves em, orange n black tho..

[KahunaGlassArt]

do you guys use rubber stopper type things to hold them in place?

[amanofmusic]

The Corning Glass Company of New York was established in 1868. Among their first products were colored lenses for railroads and the earliest light bulbs. Much later they formulated Pyrex® brand glass, one of the most significant developments in glass technology this century. Pyrex glass a.k.a. "Corning 7740" set the worldwide standard for scientific and medical glasses. Its resistance to large temperature shifts and chemical reactions have made it a laboratory mainstay.

found this on a glass jewelry site... i trust it over metals, plastics, or wood any day.



yea me too

[KahunaGlassArt]

had to bump this.
Still not geting the whole "Y-tech."
cant get them uniformly shaped. and still not geting the whole marble mold thing either. :) help anyone?

[themoch]

yes,

sorry, i meant to make some pictures for you.

in the mean time maybe my explanation might help.


you take a 10in rod (8mm in my case) and attach a V to the end of it. so it looks like a Y

the V should also be made out of 8mm rod drawn to points.

i then take the twisted cane and gather/flatten one end so that they look like 2 equal length nails (the kind you use with a hammer)

i then attach the nails to the Y by the heads at 90 degrees. so that if i were to pretend they were opera glasses i would be looking down the length of the nail.

this way it's like you have one puntied up and ready to make a smooth curve in, but you can heat/shape both of them at the same time.

for this you don't need to use a large marble mold, just a paddle that can make the span between the 2 points on the Y.

heating very slowly/evenly is going to be the hardest part here.

will draw pictures if i get a chance tomorrow.

[KahunaGlassArt]

yeah pictures would be sweet.
its a bit clearer but not entirely.
thanks man

does this technique work for like tusks, spirals, omegas, plugs, etc?

[Swampy]

yeah pictures would be sweet.
its a bit clearer but not entirely.
thanks man

does this technique work for like tusks, spirals, omegas, plugs, etc?


So you got this down the Chris? How did it work out?

[eugenesketchypanda]

I know this is an old thread I couldn't find anything newer after attempting quite a few searches. Has anyone made any great developments in creating this product? Any opinions on how this could be more easily done? I'm thinking with 3D printing being more accessible that it could be more feasible to create a mold for various plug styles and sizes?