Colors that may Crack or check.. Complete List Boro

[SexualHarassmentPanda]

I am really looking to find a list off all potential trouble colors.... I will be making it very available for everyone. I used the search function unsucessfuly ...


Thank you... and to be clear im not really looking for theory, just basic info on colors that MAY crack even if used properly..

THANKS

[PyroChixRock]

Good idea for a list.

I can add a recent asshole color to this list: wisteria. Does not like to be worked very long!!

Also many greens. Don't use most of them under clear.

[Slow]

Is it green? Does it sparkle? Watch your ass.

Also, exotics.

and Teal.

[mer]

Chinese white has volatile batches as well as batches that stand up to simple applications. I've heard of trouble overworking the Chinese black too.

[LooseSeal Baller]

i'd say anything that pops or cracks into pieces when you put it in the flame. i've had pretty good luck with all the colors i've used, the only ones that have cracked into pieces when introduced to the flame were all boro bars and green i believe.

but for greens have had good luck with shamrock,treehugger, olive, chartreuse, paparazzi, mightymoss, millenium moss,

[Jiggy Boro]

Also, exotics.
.

I use exotics on the inside all the time they look great. Green exotic is my fav. It doesnt even boil on the outside either. Looks great either way

[2wheeler]

Buddy of mine has terrible stuff to say about pistachio. Says all the pistachio sections pop off the piece while in the kiln I used a tiny bit of the stick he gave me with no issue, scared to use the rest.

[SexualHarassmentPanda]

I have found that uranium glass works encased but i had some cracking issue... I am surprised more people dont have trouble with Uranium.

[MrNiceGuy]

Slyme.

I've seen some cracks pop up days or even weeks later while the piece has been on a shelf untouched.

[Wilbur]

Encased- heavy blue lep, unobtainium want to check.

[SexualHarassmentPanda]

Wisteria
Teal.
Pistachio
uranium glass
Slyme
Hvy blue lepracon
Unobtainium
All Spakle

China white sometimes

[mistahead]

i see the unobtainium on there...just wanted to throw in my .02...

i have a piece here that had unobtainium rod encased tube pull on it...it was fine for 3-4 years then one day it just started checking.

i wonder how many pieces show up that check years down the road, and how are we suppose to deal with this as artists/craftsmen?

[James Sowell]

ive noticed alot of colors i thought were horrible can be fine as long as they are never reduced.

mystery adventurine can check if reduced to much .

[gomilobster]

I too wonder how to deal with the potential cracks weeks or months later. Even with proper annealing I have had green exotic frit chillums pop in half like someone cut it with a laser. Granted the piece was rather thick and prob had way more frit in it than it needed. But it was fine for 2 or 3 weeks on the shelf then one morning, cya later. When dealing with what seems like already unstable colors, do you just do your best to anneal them correctly and say fuck it?

How might this effect your rep at stores you sell to if your pieces end up cracking after they are sitting on their shelves or shortly after people buy them? Do you warn shops about some colors in your pieces being known for instability, tell them to keep an eye on them and if any problems arise you will address it?

I bought an exotic green piece a few years back when I was between setups and pieces (I do love me some green exotic), and I was happy for a while until maybe a few weeks to a month later it started to have cracks. I knew what was up n all, but if I had been clueless I would have been pretty disappointed. I would also hate to be using some of my favorite colors on a bunch of stuff only to have a bunch of them crack up after I sell a case of them aieeeee.

[LooseSeal Baller]

i'm on the fence or whatever you call it...

I don't want to discredit anyones capabilities but personally when i hear things like this" my piece cracked for no reason after sitting on the shelf for "X" amount of time, but was fine before that. or " i had this piece crack for after it was annealled and seemed fine for weeks, it was frit".

I sell 90% of my stuff to one store and have never had any pieces returned for just cracking on there own.
twice they had stuff of mine break, but they admitted they had dropped it or banged it on something. idk
I'm lucky the shop i deal with is pretty honest.

so i'd say if your getting cracks then maybe you're not relieving all the stress in the glass...

Get it hotter!!!

i mostly do thin hollow work, i'm sure that working 2-3" marbles is different idk...

if it was my fault i'd repair or replace the item, but glass remembers stuff. if you drop it, the glass remembers, everytime you tap it on something, it remembers. until one day you cross the line and it breaks. just sayin:)

I mean its whole glass before you melt it or shape it whatever you wanna call it. if the glass was all checked in rod form from the get go then i'd say that glass was incompatible.

other than that i'd say compression issues

mostly user error imo :o:

[B-Rye-oNeR]

As much as I like Parramore color
sometimes it has air in the rods (hand pulled) ... can kill a SS pretty damn quick
usually works great for coil/ outside patterns.

[Maijah]

I've heard people say you can't deep encase forest green, but Ive never had it check. The only two kinds of glass that have given me issues is Chinese black tubing with line work patched on encalmo style. The other color I forgot the name but it is a really nice bright light green, no matter what kind of flame its exposed to it just boils like crazy, the only thing its good for is stick stack. Other than that I guess I've had pretty good luck

[Bo Diddles]

Holy crap there are colours that don't crack and check?

[Grizzle Mcthickets]

GA sparkle colors are buttery...
all north star sparkle has cracked on me...
If im going to spend 70-80$ on a lb id go with the new alchemy colors...
alientechy but stable!
loch ness is terrible
china black
noticing a lot of teals are cracking on the inside of large marbles
china white sucks...

[SexualHarassmentPanda]

Wisteria
Teal.
Pistachio
uranium glass
Slyme
Hvy blue lepracon
Unobtainium
All Spakle
China white sometyimes black

Turbo thick

NS black lightning and silver sea weed frit iso
Lobster
china amber, pink, purple or yellow
Borostiks
Exotic Green and Exotic Blue
Mighty Moss

[LooseSeal Baller]

i'm in the mood to argue...

lochness is dope, one of my favorites never had any issues

china white is my favorite white. never had issues.

unobtanium another one of the best colors.

[coloringdan]

I think the word you're looking for is debate, but we can argue about that one. It seems like this thread has a lot of opinions rather than facts. Was that turbo cobalt on the list? cmon who has problems with that? I'd hate to steer away some noobs from awesome colors because somebody had it crack, which could have been for many reasons. Bad batches happen, unless you have tried multiple batches it is hard to give an accurate review.

[Slow]

Oh, me too. And greens and sparkles. But there is certainly potential for cracking, which is what I thought he was asking about.

[Mecha]

I think pretty much every color will check or crack if it is used outside of it's acceptable working parameters. Chrome sparkles will crack if worked too long or garaged at too high a temp for extended periods, and some colors just won't work for inside out or deep encasement. This makes a lot of the mentions in this thread questionable, since the majority of issues can be chalked up to user error. Some colors are just more fickle than others and are a lot less forgiving. I would say that this doesn't really mean that they are "prone to cracking/checking", just that you need to understand their limits when you use them.

Now Chinese color on the other hand, that's a different story. Since QC seems to be non existent, any of them can behave wildly different from batch to batch. After hearing the rave reviews on Chinese white, I picked some up. The shit cracks in EVERY application I have tried. This might be my fault, and I just haven't figured out what I am doing wrong, or it could be a bad batch, which is entirely possible. I use the black tubing quite a bit, and every once in a while, I will get some that just won't play nice, despite using the same exact working methods that have yielded successful results in the past.

This isn't saying that a bad batch from a domestic color company can't happen, just that it seems like their QC is much tighter, and the likelihood is far less.

[Jiggy Boro]

Every bright crayon color ive touched tends to boil if i don't really baby it allot. Ive never had problems with china white on the outside. But it 5 times out of 10 it will crack on the inside. Its a great color, just on the outside. Glass alchemy snow white is another color that boils horribly. I got it once awhile ago and never used it again because of how much time you have to spend making sure it doesn't boil. China white is almost boil proof in my opinion.

[Slow]

I agree, Mecha.

Either you include colors that have some sort of limit on working conditions (in which case the list could include almost anything), or you only include colors that crack no matter what you do (in which case the list would be practically empty).

Hell, I've deep encased (old) Jade frit in a marble with no problems; on the other hand, I'm sure I've cracked Butterscotch at some point because of something foolish I did.

[PyroChixRock]

Well, to include more detail with my list...wisteria has a working limit. You can actually see the compatibility change in the glass and it starts separating from whatever it's next to. I have tried multiple batches and multiple colors next to it to see if it was being picky about what it was next to. It doesn't matter. You cannot work it very long, especially in hallow form.

Have had zero problems with it in marbles. But when making a marble vs a pipe the working time is drastically different. On a marble when I put dots down and work them in for example it's pretty much done with working the wisteria at that point. But in a pipe it gets reshaped as you add sections and assemble the pieces.

My comment about encasing greens. It's hit or miss. Forest will crack under even thin amounts of clear in marbles and be fine in stick stacks for pipes. Exp green will sometimes crack in marbles and most the time it comes out ok so I keep using it. Green money is much safer in marbles.

Glasstronics green is the best one I've found for encasing/implosions in marbles. Forest is the best I've found for pipes but will still cause problems.

As for shelf checking down the road...I guarantee all my glass for life. I have had greens come back years later with incompatibility cracking but nothing else.

On another note don't be scared of sparkles. Garage at 975, anneal at 1050, do not bring them above 1080 in the kiln if possible. Plan your pieces as efficiently as possible to avoid long working times.

Never had a problem with most ga's sparkles. Can deep encase, use on the surface, anything - if you stick to the numbers above.

[SexualHarassmentPanda]

the list is not finished things will be added and removed ... until there is a general consensus

[Bruce Dille]

GA,s Neptune Sparkle has cracked every tube ive applied it too,I most be doing it wrong,
I must be getting it to hot for to long in the kiln then,Thx Pyrochixrock for the working tip

[LooseSeal Baller]

GA,s Neptune Sparkle has cracked every tube ive applied it too,I most be doing it wrong,
I must be getting it to hot for to long in the kiln then,Thx Pyrochixrock for the working tip

i've used several batches of neptune from different distributors, never any problems, its one of my go to colors

[Lmwfy]

...until there is a general consensus

http://www.genmay.com/images/smilies/lol.gif

[Bruce Dille]

i've used several batches of neptune from different distributors, never any problems, its one of my go to colors

I didnt mention it was frit,Its not available anymore from GA,Do you want this extint orphaned frit I have sitting around Barry?Im not Going to be using it anytime soon.

[SexualHarassmentPanda]

http://www.genmay.com/images/smilies/lol.gif
lol

[D. dino i ninjah]

As a general practice .. I remix almost all my color .. before I use it .. unless Im doing pulls ...
China white.. from abr .. 8mm or what ever.. sucks boily ass .. cracks in iso application .. cracks sometimes on outside application.. I bouhght it because people on the internet said it was better.. still sucks .. unless you want to use it to make snowmen . or possibly in marbles .. It implodes well. . or with china black

China black.. woks with white .. ok.. surfacee.. work umm some times .. cracks .. 2 pieces so far.. both also having the white?

heavy .. anything sparkle from tag.. .. lepracon .. stardust .. all of them will check on you if over worked or annealed. or encased too deeply in heavy concentration..

Teal.. can and will crack only when you think its bomb proof and use it .. counting on the fact that .. Its not going to crack.

I have had good luck with greens ..

I can work black lightning .. and the multis .. but I remix all of them .. or drop them in a tube ..

[IsthmusColor]

China white io stringers will check around edges if not worked in.
Aurora frit will shelf check.
Lazuli frit will kiln check.
Spring purple frit will kiln check.
Loch Ness, forest and unobtainium will check in vacstacks.
I'd say most 2nds will not work for stringer stacking milli.

[Maijah]

Jiggy you can coilpot and do unencased blowouts with crayons, just heat them up easy in an oxy rich flame. I love all the crayon colors, also I have never had any issues with turbo cobalt. It was one of the first colors I was introduced to and I still have it in my palate today. I've used it six ways from Sunday and never had it crack or check. When I was a noob sometimes it would reduce but it would always be my own fault, other than that in my experience its bulletproof. It was already said but I would hate to see a noob not try a color they liked because he/she heard it sucked or didn't work right. Every color has its place, you have to try them all and see what works for you.

[mango51]

Cadillac pink likes to be babied, don't stress it, and try to have under clear. I've had success with it over, but it checked many times before fixed it all the way, only to have jenny from tag say not to use it on surface hollow work.

Wysteria is also similar workability, becomes almost brittle if overworked, better under clear for hollow

[Simian]

Keep in mind that glass that is cracky in murrini might be fine for sculpting or some other application. I know Stephen Boehme hates parramore colors for murrini but I LOVE the white for making eyeballs and that application is mostly encased. I don't have to snap or sawcut my finished product.