Aommaster's Progression

Nice strike on that marble Fai. I use first quality rod mostly and I use odd quality rod for stringers. I don't use seconds because I have found
rods with rocks and bubbles hard to work with. I would purchase single rods of different colors for practice. Maybe more than one rod in some colors
that I think I will use.
When you start make sure to be out towards the last 1/3 of your torch flame, at least until things get heated up enough to start a gather.
I prefer to coat my Cads with clear when striping to help keep it from boiling, makes it able to take more heat.

Fai, I will also recommend keeping with Odds for your first few months of learning.
Mice strike on that marble; it's half science, half art, half opinion. I just heard on the TV that the top chefs cook for THEIR taste and let the customers like it or not, sound advice in my opinion.

Attachment 92357

Now that I've had my fun with Amber Purple, I decided to go back and try some more flower marbles. This time, I wanted to try and get some multi-colored petals. I used TAG Red Elvis, Asian Purple, and Northstar Millenium Moss to get this.

Earlier (before this marble), I made a trial marble where I pulled stringers of various patterns to see how they would turn out once imploded. I got the design I liked and pulled a proper stringer from this marble.

I also learnt a little lesson: make sure you have enough stringer so you don't run out! :D Hence, the Asian Purple. I had enough for the inner layer of petals, not enough for the outer layer, so I just did it with another color.

Attachment 92449

So I decided to take another stab at vortex marbles today. This time, I used a different technique: one that I learned in The Flow Magazine. My other goal was to try and learn how to get dichro to:
a)Stick to the glass
b)Not burn when I put it back in the flame.

Overall, I'm quite happy with this piece. I used Asian Black and Asian Topaz (I realized this color is not fully opaque, so I can't use it for my flower marbles) and some scrap dichro I bought off eBay.

The piece is nowhere near perfect, but is a significant improvement over the monstrosity I created when I first tried to do a vortex marble. Here it is, in case you forgot:
Attachment 92450

I think that's a big difference. One thing that I didn't do was put a backing on the marble as was suggested on the tutorial in the magazine. However, I discovered something fairly interesting:
I stuck the dichro (coating side down) onto clear glass. Then I backed the dichro with Asian Black. Now that I used clear to back the marble and shape it correctly, I can see the "outside" of the vortex. For some reason, the dichro and the Asian Black have somewhat reacted together and created a somewhat metallic blue look. Not sure why that's happened. But I figured I'd just share it in case someone wants to experiment with it further.

Here's what it looks like:
Attachment 92451

make a cone of clear glass then stripe it, then twist it, melt it, tear some off, put a clear lens on one end, put a dark backing on the other?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by hashmasta-kut

make a cone of clear glass then stripe it, then twist it, melt it, tear some off, put a clear lens on one end, put a dark backing on the other?

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That was the way I was taught but for some reason, I always had trouble getting the depth illusion to work in the cone. The method I used for this one made the cone, then fed clear rod before adding the lens.

Any idea how the final marble differs between the two? Perhaps I wasn't doing my shaping correctly when adding the backing?

Trick is to maintain the cone shape while you add backing mass to fill out the sphere shape. Once you have the cone twisted and cone shaped let it cool a bit to stiffen up before adding the extra to fill up the ball shape on the back. After that you feed clear into the front lens to complete the marble shape.
Easier said than done but try to keep the cone shaped like a cone while adding hot glass all around it.

Hi everyone

It's been a while since I've posted on my progression because I have started working on something different - pendants. The techniques for making marbles can easily be applied to pendants. Additionally, marbles that don't turn out the way you want them to be can be made into pendants so I figured it'd be worth trying out.

Overall, it's been okay, but I've been having trouble making the bails for the pendants. So, here's what I have so far.

Attachment 92527

So, this is how I make my bails: I melt on a rod of 5mm glass where I want the bail to start. Then I burn off about 2cm of rod off. I then heat the bail up to a dim-orange glow, use my tungsten tweezers to pull the bail up, twist and stick to where the bail connects to the glass. After I'm done with the shaping, I use a Reamer to flare open the hole a bit.

However, I'm having a few problems.

Firstly, consistency. Bail #4 looks perfect, and is definitely what I'm going for. But sometimes, I end up with a mess (like bail #3).

Secondly, I'm having a little trouble getting the bail to be perfectly aligned on the axis so it doesn't seem to be teetering off the one side.

So I guess my question is: Does anyone have any tips on how to get the bails right? Is there any other technique I could try that you'd recommend?

Lastly, I did a little looking around and people seem to be recommending Handy Andy's. How are these used? Do you have any experience with them? What are your thoughts on them?

Thanks!

I'd say more heat. You are almost there. If you practice just making bales, you have more chances to get it down. Hope that helps!

Fai there are quite a few ways to make bails. If you go to this web site they talk about some of them.

http://lampworketc.com/forums/showth...highlight=bail

By the way your second attachment point on all of those needs to be melted in more to where the glass is smooth. Otherwise
those connections are prone to cracking.
Keep it up and have fun.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by aommaster

Lastly, I did a little looking around and people seem to be recommending Handy Andy's. How are these used? Do you have any experience with them? What are your thoughts on them?

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Handy Andys are freaking amazing. You just gather up your bail as a solid ball and pinch down and rotate and you get identical bails every time. They are my go to on all production work because they are fast and very consistent. They are tungsten so you can get the occasional bail with tungsten scuzz inside the bail but very rarely.

If you like the tungsten pierced loop tech you should also check out Jaws donut tool.

Another method is the "bead loop" - Create a small bead on a mandrel and attach it as a loop.

Or use glass from the pendant itself to form a loop - Heat one side of the pendant, attach a punty, stretch the hot glass and form a loop.

Thank you all for your replies! How do the Handy Andy's actually pierce the glass? Won't it leave a very thin "film" of glass at the contact point between the tweezers?

You pierce the hot glass, the tips cool the glass somewhat and you'll feel a small crunch. A little "wiggle" should clean the hole of any remnant glass. You don't want to get the glass white hot for that I think.
I never used the Handy Andy's but I think they should function similar than the Jaws donut tool.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by valinski

You pierce the hot glass, the tips cool the glass somewhat and you'll feel a small crunch. A little "wiggle" should clean the hole of any remnant glass. You don't want to get the glass white hot for that I think.
I never used the Handy Andy's but I think they should function similar than the Jaws donut tool.

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Yeah............................ ...... ............... .. ............or any sharp tool you stab in there............................................. ...........................just sayin'............................................ ...

Has anyone used the handy andys and the jaws donut tool? I wonder how they would compare. Fai, if i came across this "film" situation as you describe i would finish the hole using my tungsten pick. Thats the classic way to puncture the glass but its easier said then done. I wouldn't just crunch the cold film, when it melts back in it will probably be bubbles or those pieces may end up on your piece.

**I would get a hand torch. Place #3 pendant into the kiln for 10 minutes. When you remove it from the kiln heat the entire thing up just before it starts to want to move. Then, dail in a tiny flame and use it to melt in those connections.

It can be hard to get heat that accurately into a small piece like that with just the bravo if your new. Keep your screw ups so you can fix them once you know how for practice. You dont need a hand torch but it would make it alot easier.

Fai, the two pendant books by Cosmo are fantastic resources. Definitely worth the money (to me), book two has instructions for a few different types of bails, not sure if book one does also.
https://shop.cosmoglassworks.com/col...-volume-2-book

Attachment 92561

Still working on my bails, but in the meanwhile, here's another flower marble I made with Asian Pink and Red Elvis. I think it's okay... but I do have a few questions I was hoping someone could help me with.

How do I get the flower to implode deeper into the piece? I can only seem to get it to reach the mid-point before it starts to open up.

Is this what Red Elvis is supposed to look like? It seems a little too maroon to me. What is causing it and how do I fix it?

If you push the maria too hard or too often your flower will be squished flat. I am still learning how to get the desired effect more regularly but it really comes down to how often and how hard you push. Ron Bearers "Boro Implosion Designs" helped me a lot especially his tips on color combinations and stringer work are great. You can e-mail him to get a pdf-copy.

"Livering" (i.e. brown haze) is a common problem with copper based rubies if you overheat the glass, what type of flame did you use? There is a video on working with this color on TAGs website.

I wouldn't recommend pushing much at all. just let the weight of it, and gravity do the compression. Maybe a tiny push more.