How to make Tempered glass art

Oakwood (Butler,TX), TX(Zone 8b)

Ok First I want to say im not very good at this part of the doing . Im a hands on kind of gal ...Come on down & ill show you how I do it .
Next all kiln are different so this is not set in stone.
Have Fun Play with the Glass As thats what im doing .
Cheryl

Tempered glass Bowls & Plates.
First all the glass you use should be from the same window for each bowl etc.
You can do it 2 ways
first put the glass on your kiln shelf in a pile spread it a round to the size you want to use for your project .
put shelf in the kiln turn kiln on low 500. (lid open about 1")
Close lid turn kiln to med. to 1000 hold 30 mins. This should even out the heat.
turn kiln to hi to 1475 hold till you fuse the glass. yes you will have to peek
I flash my kiln a bit to about 1000. To anneal the glass hold temp at 900 for 1 hour. this is a pain but will stabilize your glass
I have found doing the glass this way I have to fire more then 1 time in the mold ..as the glass tends to split and I have had to fill in the gaps with more glass .


The 2nd way it to stack the glass in the mold and then fire try to have each piece of glass touch at least 3 sides. the glass shrinks a bit but I didn't get any splits in the bowls.
If after you take your bowl out of the kiln it breaks around the edges you didn't fire it long enough. You can keep it the way it is and just not handle it much or refire .
Ok I hope this is understandable this is all really new to me IM just learning to use my kiln so IM making this all up as I go along
Some of my tempered glass pieces have been fired 3 to 5 times ... because I didn't like the way they came out the first time ...
There isnt much out there in the way of tempered glass and thoses that are using don't want to share what works for them.


This message was edited Nov 6, 2007 3:04 PM

This message was edited Dec 2, 2007 2:36 PM

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