theglasszone
2009-06-18, 4:46pm
EASY "NO MOLD" STAR MURRINI TUTORIAL
By DeAnne Buchanan of The Glass Zone
http://i185.photobucket.com/albums/x280/theglasszone/Bead%20Photos/Star%20Murrini/StarMurrini2.jpg
Some of you have asked if I can share my “no mold” method of making star murrini with you, so here it is!!!
At this point, I do not have photos I can add to accompany each step, but that may be forthcoming when I get back to the torch, and I will update to let everyone know. I think the instructions are pretty easy to follow, but if you have any questions, just shoot me a PM and I’ll try to walk you through it!
Here’s a brief list of what you’ll need handy when you’re ready to give this a try. Keep in mind that for example purposes I’m using the pictured Black Stars in White Background as a reference. You may use any colors you’d like, being sure to use COE compatible glass, and remembering that transparent colors are a bit stiffer than opaque ones.
You’ll need:
* 1 Rod each of your intended STAR COLOR and BACKGROUND COLOR - I used 1 Rod of CIM Hades and 1 Rod Moretti White
* 2 Stainless Steel 5/32” Mandrels (clean and uncoated with release) – these will be your punties (If you don’t have this size mandrels, use at least a 1/8” or larger if possible)
* Pair of fairly broad nosed, un-serrated (smooth inside) Tweezers - mine are about ½” wide at the tips.
* Wheeled or other nippers of your choice
* Quench bowl
Let’s get started!
1. Using your STAR COLOR Rod, create a gather – directly on the end of one of the clean, uncoated mandrels - about 1/2" diameter and coming off the end of the mandrel. I usually add 3-4 wraps of glass to create this step, with a majority of the glass being off the end of the mandrel (ratio: ¼ attached to mandrel ¾ coming off the end.) Using your graphite marver, smooth this gather into a barrel shape. Make it about 2/3" long or slightly longer.
2. Encase it fairly thinly in the color you want the "background" to be. For example, the ones I made started with a base (core) of BLACK (3-4 wraps), encased in WHITE (1 full, end-to-end wrap).
3. Using your graphite marver again, smooth the encasing and reshape it into a barrel again. Look at it from the end and be sure the base glass is a nice round shape, and that the encasing is fairly even and smooth all around.
4. Next, heat a section of this barrel shaped creation (I guess it to be about 1/5th) and with non-serrated tweezers, pinch a small section – along the full length of the gather - which will be your first star "arm". Since I don’t have a photo of this step, it may help to say to hold your tweezers “parallel” with the punty/mandrel when doing the pinch step. It’s a good idea to check how this first “pinch” went by looking at the gather from the end again. If it seems too small, now is the time to reheat it and pinch it again to make it a bit bigger.
5. Moving in a direction that feels comfortable to you, continue to heat the gather at the next 1/5 ratio in the next adjacent "section" and pinch again, which will create the second star “arm”.
6. Continue in this fashion so you end up with 5 evenly spaced “pinched” sections as you work your way around. The secret is getting these pinches evenly spaced and evenly pinched!
7. Go back and reheat and re-pinch them, if necessary, which helps to define the "star" core.
8. Take the rod of the color you encased with, and where there are dips in your gather, lay down a stripe to fill it in. Do this in all 5 divots. If your first round of laid-down stripes didn’t completely fill in the divots, add glass where needed.
9. Gently melt these in and marver smooth.
10. With your second punty at the ready, heat the whole gather, punty the other end, reheat to a nice glow, remove from the flame, count to 5 and pull.
11. Do a fairly slow pull to start, then as the glass begins to cool, pull a bit faster to help in getting a fairly consistent sized murrini rod.
12. Allow the pulled rod to cool for a moment, then nip your pull from the punties. If using steel punties or mandrels as punties, quench them while they are still pretty hot to shock the glass off and leave the steel punty clean.
13. Once the rod has completely cooled, you can nip it up into slices to apply to your beads. I usually nip my slices about 1/8” thick, which gives them enough “heft” to be picked up in tweezers, but still having a little section sticking out of the tweezers to apply to the bead.
It may take a few tries, but once you get it, it's pretty easy!!!
Here are a few additional photos of what I did with these particular Black/White Murrini slices:
http://i185.photobucket.com/albums/x280/theglasszone/Bead%20Photos/LgClown1.jpg
http://i185.photobucket.com/albums/x280/theglasszone/Bead%20Photos/LgClown6.jpg
http://i185.photobucket.com/albums/x280/theglasszone/Bead%20Photos/LgClown7.jpg
Hope you find this interesting, fun and helpful!!!
De
Copyright DeAnne Buchanan, The Glass Zone, 2009, All Rights Reserved
By DeAnne Buchanan of The Glass Zone
http://i185.photobucket.com/albums/x280/theglasszone/Bead%20Photos/Star%20Murrini/StarMurrini2.jpg
Some of you have asked if I can share my “no mold” method of making star murrini with you, so here it is!!!
At this point, I do not have photos I can add to accompany each step, but that may be forthcoming when I get back to the torch, and I will update to let everyone know. I think the instructions are pretty easy to follow, but if you have any questions, just shoot me a PM and I’ll try to walk you through it!
Here’s a brief list of what you’ll need handy when you’re ready to give this a try. Keep in mind that for example purposes I’m using the pictured Black Stars in White Background as a reference. You may use any colors you’d like, being sure to use COE compatible glass, and remembering that transparent colors are a bit stiffer than opaque ones.
You’ll need:
* 1 Rod each of your intended STAR COLOR and BACKGROUND COLOR - I used 1 Rod of CIM Hades and 1 Rod Moretti White
* 2 Stainless Steel 5/32” Mandrels (clean and uncoated with release) – these will be your punties (If you don’t have this size mandrels, use at least a 1/8” or larger if possible)
* Pair of fairly broad nosed, un-serrated (smooth inside) Tweezers - mine are about ½” wide at the tips.
* Wheeled or other nippers of your choice
* Quench bowl
Let’s get started!
1. Using your STAR COLOR Rod, create a gather – directly on the end of one of the clean, uncoated mandrels - about 1/2" diameter and coming off the end of the mandrel. I usually add 3-4 wraps of glass to create this step, with a majority of the glass being off the end of the mandrel (ratio: ¼ attached to mandrel ¾ coming off the end.) Using your graphite marver, smooth this gather into a barrel shape. Make it about 2/3" long or slightly longer.
2. Encase it fairly thinly in the color you want the "background" to be. For example, the ones I made started with a base (core) of BLACK (3-4 wraps), encased in WHITE (1 full, end-to-end wrap).
3. Using your graphite marver again, smooth the encasing and reshape it into a barrel again. Look at it from the end and be sure the base glass is a nice round shape, and that the encasing is fairly even and smooth all around.
4. Next, heat a section of this barrel shaped creation (I guess it to be about 1/5th) and with non-serrated tweezers, pinch a small section – along the full length of the gather - which will be your first star "arm". Since I don’t have a photo of this step, it may help to say to hold your tweezers “parallel” with the punty/mandrel when doing the pinch step. It’s a good idea to check how this first “pinch” went by looking at the gather from the end again. If it seems too small, now is the time to reheat it and pinch it again to make it a bit bigger.
5. Moving in a direction that feels comfortable to you, continue to heat the gather at the next 1/5 ratio in the next adjacent "section" and pinch again, which will create the second star “arm”.
6. Continue in this fashion so you end up with 5 evenly spaced “pinched” sections as you work your way around. The secret is getting these pinches evenly spaced and evenly pinched!
7. Go back and reheat and re-pinch them, if necessary, which helps to define the "star" core.
8. Take the rod of the color you encased with, and where there are dips in your gather, lay down a stripe to fill it in. Do this in all 5 divots. If your first round of laid-down stripes didn’t completely fill in the divots, add glass where needed.
9. Gently melt these in and marver smooth.
10. With your second punty at the ready, heat the whole gather, punty the other end, reheat to a nice glow, remove from the flame, count to 5 and pull.
11. Do a fairly slow pull to start, then as the glass begins to cool, pull a bit faster to help in getting a fairly consistent sized murrini rod.
12. Allow the pulled rod to cool for a moment, then nip your pull from the punties. If using steel punties or mandrels as punties, quench them while they are still pretty hot to shock the glass off and leave the steel punty clean.
13. Once the rod has completely cooled, you can nip it up into slices to apply to your beads. I usually nip my slices about 1/8” thick, which gives them enough “heft” to be picked up in tweezers, but still having a little section sticking out of the tweezers to apply to the bead.
It may take a few tries, but once you get it, it's pretty easy!!!
Here are a few additional photos of what I did with these particular Black/White Murrini slices:
http://i185.photobucket.com/albums/x280/theglasszone/Bead%20Photos/LgClown1.jpg
http://i185.photobucket.com/albums/x280/theglasszone/Bead%20Photos/LgClown6.jpg
http://i185.photobucket.com/albums/x280/theglasszone/Bead%20Photos/LgClown7.jpg
Hope you find this interesting, fun and helpful!!!
De
Copyright DeAnne Buchanan, The Glass Zone, 2009, All Rights Reserved