Accucolor dichroic?

[Julian]

What is up with this dichro? As fara s I can tell, it is a weird filter not intended for the hot glass industry, but rather for lighting, but can be used with boro because the coating is put onto boro float glass, probably so it can take the heat of lights. Glark?
http://accucolor.net/
Mr. Brown?
Mr. Fred?
Has anyone else tried this stuff?

[kruger]

i have often thought the same thing, i am a dj and have abunch of lights with dichroic filters, suposedly dichroic creates more vibrant colors

[Julian]

I can see why it would be great for light filters. I'm sure its much more durable than the cheesy plastic, and look at all the colors they offer!
Apparently, people have already been using these in glass pieces successfully.

[jeffbuchs]

I had a chance to test some out, and it's interesting stuff.

The Dichro coating itself breaks up into larger sections when used(If that makes any sense)-- like Sanbergs coating breaks up smaller and tighter, and DA has the needles effect. - Accucolor breaks up a little chunkier.

The gold ,beetle,and taupe were my favorites.

I only used it for bracelets, where it worked fine and how the dichro broke up was pretty unusual and made for some good scaley type effects.

I don't know how well this stuff will work in every application(i.e stringers), some of the coatings seemed a little delicate, but it def. works and has some unique propeties. I'll try to get a few things done and get some pics up later this week- Jeff

[WORLD FAMOUS]

I've used it in several marbles, spun up and layed flat. I have used it in flat ribbon canes for attachments and in a few tube pulls. I also prefer to use it where it is magnified with the large chunks broken up (like stated in an above post) versus in tube pulls where it breaks up finer. I like that chunky look it has. I'm trying to get some cash for some custom patterns...Beetle was cool for sure too.

[somberbear]

yea fred slung me some samples of this...

i believe he said they mainly make it for lasers , and lighting.... then there secounds are use to sell to "artist grade". Its really sweet stuff though... i enjoyed it....

peace rob

[IrieGuy05]

I really only liked the beetle and it was more prone to greying out than cbs, it burned grey where some cbs next to it was fine. Its deffinitly a diffrent coating it looks like the coating "melts" when it has hot glass layed over it.

[chayes]

i heard to heat it up in the kiln first so that the dichro can adhere to the glass or something like that.

[WORLD FAMOUS]

Here is my experience with the beetle sample strip I received. I already talked to Fred w/ feedback about this, and he suggested kilning first to get the grey layer burned off. I'll have to try that, but I just used it unkilned anyways for this particular process - keep reading.

I hit a piece of the beetle test strip with the flame and it turned grey, so I got mad and cranked up the outerfire to like 90% raging and torched the holy-living-$&*# out of it. To the point where it dripped onto the bench. I paced over to my supply of dichro and pulled out a fresh piece of trusty DA. By the time I got back to the bench, I looked at the torched piece of Accucolor which had cooled by now. I noticed the side encased in clear was all shiny bling-bling still, but the other side was kinda grey and burned out. I was baffled since I held that piece in the flame and literally beat and boiled the sh*t out of it, and it was still a shiny green W/O a backing even. So I treked back over to the supply bin, broke off another piece of the beetle, and retraced my steps. I gently heated the dichro on a punty (W/O kilning first) and the same thing happened, the back turned all nasty grey again. So this time I went ahead and applied it the the clear patty I had made even though it looked like burned out CBS/DA at this stage. Then I coated the back with turbo and pulled it out like usual. When I looked at it in the halogens, I'll be damned if it wasn't the prettiest green dichro EVER. Brilliant big chunks of green mirror colored dichro that turned yellow and orange/gold in different angles. If I had given up at first, I wouldn't have touched it at again, but after seeing that tortured scrap, I was in total disbelief and had to try again. I'm glad I did. I'll try to get some pics of the piece, or just make some more and take pics. It's cool stuff.

Hey Fred, what is the plate glass they use? Schott? Simax? Kimble? It's works pretty nice whatever it is, it's not all shock-prone like alot of the stuff I've used previously.

[jeffbuchs]

Thanks Nate, for I thought I was going crazy. A few times while I was using it it looked like it was burning out, only to have it turn out fine-- strange-- but that gold/green tinged affect is dope.

[Chris Carlson]

i've used a bun ch of it. some of it is sweet if you learn how to use the chunks. i mixed between cbs rainbow and it looked awesome!! i dont think fred works for them anymore though. no more dichro for us, i also think thats why he hasnt posted about this.(or the aure lens test).

[Chris Carlson]

i dont think they particularily made the dicro for boro workers. i think that was freds deal, i had a tour of the factory and i think it was mostly for reflective purposes. they were makin all kinds of cool stuff that i would have never thought of. but it wasnt a glass shop.

[Julian]

Wow, thanks everyone.
I didn't realize so many people have tested this stuff out.
Where the heck have I been??? Galrk-ra glakka, etc
Sounds like dichro connoisseurs across the world will soon be seeking this out to give it a try.

[T Lewis Glass]

Yep , I like it to.And I am NOT a big fan of dicro. If thats the case and Fred does not work for them anymore ,that would be too bad .....

Fred was great at customer service . And sending things out promptly . I wonder if they are still going to offer this stuff to the public . Getting rid of a glassblower in charge of glassblowing products is a bad move if you ask me ...



~T

[andrew brown]

Hey... I used a bunch of this a few months back....at first it was hit or miss, most of the different pieces i got had the signature "foil crinkle" look to it.. i was diong straight pickup marbles and was preheating the square ( 1-2") in the kiln.. i had a lot of problems with certian colors not sticking to the glass no matter how hot the piece was.. also there seemed to be bubbles " gassing out" of the dichro... i would get a perfect mash and then a couple of seconds later, depending on the sheet, there would be either millions of small bubbles or big masses of bubbles coming up from the dichro... also a few of these first ones totally split in half on the dichro about 2 days later.... after having a bunch of problems, bubbles, splitting, not sticking, i got to thinking that this stuff must be coated with something.. the answer i got when i asked was that to help flameworkers not burn the dichro off it has been cased with a quartz substrate... now it all made sense... so now before picking up the pieces i started preheating them with a hand torch.... when i did this i actally watched a yelowish film burn off of the piece... not just preheating i was burning on it with a 3a for a while..i was told that only certain colors were cased like this, and i did have success without burning off the film on a few others. but it seems that if your doing a straight pickup you need to preheat and take a torch to it to get the film off.. or if you are using it in the flame you should cook on the dichro side for a little bit to burn off the film... i did have problems casing the dichro in the flame untill i took the time to cook on it, the film didnt seem to want to stick right away to the glass.... so all in all after i had a major learning curve this stuff can be awesome.. the way it flakes or foils up is definately unlike any other dichro out there.... the beetle and beetle hex were nice and every color seems to have different unusual properties.... some colors were harder to use but, all in all this is a great product with great potential.... i wish there was no "quartz substrate", but maybe if they start selling more to the art market they will find out that we dont really need it... i think its there for scratch resistance more than flame profing dichro.... just my experience and 2c.....
andrew
i have a bunch of pieces on ga that have accucolor in them, check em out for reference....

[FredLight]

Sorry I didn't tell you guys sooner, but I'm no longer working for Accucolor Dichroics. My sales were dismal to say the least and, frankly, my heart wasn't in it.
I'm glad to have some time to brush up on my skills now, with something other than dichro.

As far as the Aura Lens VS Boroscopes test graphs, I no longer have access to that information. Bottom line: Aura Lens products did what they claimed and are a better product than the Phillips Boroscopes Shade 5 that I tested.
Accucolor Dichroics can still be bought direct from them, don't expect them to know what will work for flameworking now. I used to take a strip of each piece over to the torch and try to burn it before selling it. Now, I wish them luck. <Turn the Propane on first guys!>
I'm happy to give you their number, just don't be a vigilante about me not working there.You CAN say I sent you though, and ask for Denise or Lydia, although everyone that works there is cool with me. Their number is:714)557-2299 ext 117 or 123?
Thanks to everyone who helped get the word out by plugging their name in your posts on Gp.org and GA.org.
My stuff can be viewed here:
http://www.glassartists.org/Gal7351_Fred_Rossi.asp

I hijacked this thread, didn't I?
Peace and many thanks,
Fred