View Full Interactive Version Of This Page : scum on murrini from cutting?
On the murrini I've bought and made, there's always some scumming where they were cut. How do you get rid of or prevent that?
tammydownunder
2010-08-03, 4:55pm
I apply a little heat, flatten it with my graphite marver and when it is cool enough, I dab it with a bit of clear.
I don't understand quite what you mean. Do you mean once you have the murrini on the bead?
btw, I'm talking about the scum from where the nippers contact.
I have the same problem - it's annoying as hell.
Bakerman44
2010-08-03, 5:18pm
sharper nippers might help...i just bought my first pair of wheeled nippers to cut slices. cant wait to make something to chop it up!
I have brand new disc nippers from Frantz - first time I used them they did this. Also have tile nippers that do the same.
Bakerman44
2010-08-03, 5:29pm
hmm...i wonder if bees wax would help any? or some other lubricant like WD40...I think it's water based so you could rinse off the glass after. or maybe a good brushing with a brass brush or stainless wire brush would knock off any thing on the tool...im kind of clueless about what it could be since i havn't tried anything myself. im just throwing random ideas out there.
tammydownunder
2010-08-03, 5:36pm
Okay, I guess my post was kind of vague. I apply the murrini onto the bead. Then, I just try to warm it on the top and then re-flatten it with my marver. Then I cap it with a dot of clear. By applying a bit of heat, you clean off any imperfections caused by the cutters. It also eliminates the bubbly looking surface if you were to apply the hot clear on a cold murrini.
If you are using transparent murrini on a transparent surface, you are never going to completely eliminate this ring around the murrini.
Mine was bubbling the second the flame hit it.
Dusty and Squid. I don't know if this will help but maybe you could try turning down your oxygen just a tad when heating the surface of your murrini. One of my blue and white murrini will scum up if I use to much oxygen, heat it up too much or marvering the whole bead to many times.
good idea - I will try that, thanks! :)
Mine didn't bubble, but I heated them on a plate w/ a handheld torch so I could heat them super slow, and far enough away that flame chemistry shouldn't matter, but after I'd heated them enough to smooth the edges there was still scum.
Just to be clear, the murrini I'm using are clear around the outside.
Mitzy B
2010-08-04, 5:43pm
Most professionals use a band saw or electric tile cutter to slice their murrini and then flat lap polish them before using them.
that's not practical for a 3mm murrine though :)
Figured that was the case.
Let's go minor league. Anyone have a rock tumbler?? :D
Somebody give me a high five!
lol
ChaseDesigns
2010-08-04, 11:20pm
I think encasing the outside of the murrine in an opaque is really helpful with the scum. However for things like butterlies, that wouldn't work to well. Using BE instead of moretti is helpful. Cleaner glass. I also agree, turning the oxy down and slowing heating helps.
But, I'll ask Greg his tricks and get back to you. He uses so much freakin' murrine it would kill him to polish them before using them.
ChaseDesigns
2010-08-04, 11:22pm
Figured that was the case.
Let's go minor league. Anyone have a rock tumbler?? :D
Somebody give me a high five!
lol
It's worth a shot! We've tumbled some. It def helps get out the scratches.
Sweet - hope you can score us some nice tips :).
ChaseDesigns
2010-08-05, 7:52am
Mine are Bullseye :lol:
Oh poor squid! lol Do you use schott clear? That is what we use. Even better than BE clear.
Greg said if it's moretti, he doesn't know how to help. He never had good success.
Though these are his tips. Less propane, more oxy. I had thought the other way around, but he said no, just heat very slowly. When applying murrine, gently heat it, set it, then gently heat it again, then get a glob of clear as hot as you can (super hot, drippy hot) to cover it. He says that is his single most important tip. It traps less air and is cleanest.
Then he said the dreaded words. ppp.
theglasszone
2010-08-05, 8:04am
...Then he said the dreaded words. ppp.
:lol: Ain't it so.............
Thanks for the great tips everyone!
ChaseDesigns
2010-08-05, 8:08am
Mine was bubbling the second the flame hit it.
I think your flame was just too hot if it was bubbling.
I thought that too, but it did it even cooler. And it's not the whole thing, it's like one little spot on the edge every time - it's like instant devit.
ChaseDesigns
2010-08-05, 8:14am
Yeah, that's frustrating. If you are careful, you could pick it off with another piece of glass.
RyanTheNumberImp
2010-08-05, 8:37am
What generally happens is when murrini are handled they pick up some dust and fingerprints. You can make a pretty big difference by washing them with distilled water and/or alcohol right before you use them and only touching them with clean tweezers.
The cleaner they are the less scum you get.
Yeah, that's frustrating. If you are careful, you could pick it off with another piece of glass.
That's what I have been doing. Some of them are murrine I bought direct from BE. The one I made the other day had Aurora on the outside. I do use schott, but have heard that have stopped making 90 COE, so I have been stingy with it.
Given the state of my table, that is certainly a possibility - the dust and dirt!
I'm going to try the rock polisher.
Another idea... I remember reading that the scum on the outside of Effetre clear is from metal scraping against it (not sure how they manage to scrape every single rod w/ metal, but whatever). I heard that some people have better luck w/ it after running it through the dishwasher. This was in addition to cleaning it w/ alcohol.
Guess I'll put some in an organza bag and try this first, since I don't have a rock polisher yet.
RyanTheNumberImp
2010-08-05, 12:03pm
I've tumbled murrini before and can tell you don't bother, especially if you don't already have a rock polisher.
You literally need several thousand slices, at least 3000 to properly fill even the smallest tumbler (And if the tumber is underfilled the slices wont fall over eachother so they dont polish properly).
On top of that, you are going to need to start with a fine grit to take off the edges, rinse them all and then cerium polish everything. If any of the grit is left with the slices it will wreak havoc while you are trying to polish.
Even then, polished slices don't make a huge difference - if they are nipped properly the surface will be glossy anyways.
Ofilia
2010-08-05, 12:14pm
As someone mentioned, having very clean glass is a good start.
I recommend to buy cane (millefiori) rather than sliced, murrine (when it's small). This way, you keep your image as clean as possible until the day you use it. Handle with tweezers and yea BE is the bestest:grin:!
My schott I hoard for eye lenses of my fish. It's melting properties are not as similar to BE clear, and that is why they say that they stopped selling it (plus I'm sure because then they sell more of their own formulated clear).
Even then, polished slices don't make a huge difference - if they are nipped properly the surface will be glossy anyways.
Not sure what you mean here, Ryan - neither by "properly nipped", nor by "not that much difference." The second half is particularly confusing because it's like you're saying there's not that much difference because the murrini are fine anyway - mine aren't fine - so I'm not sure if you mean that they're perfect after tumbling, or decent, or what.
RyanTheNumberImp
2010-08-05, 1:47pm
Normally you would polish slices cut on a saw, where the surface has been ground and is very rough.
Nippers don't grind against the glass and just snap it off so you already have a polished surface. If the slices have gotten scratched after cutting polishing might help a bit but its a lot of work.
When I tumbled slices there was basically no difference between the polished and unpolished slices. Cleaning the glass will have a far greater impact than tumbling and is way easier.
Must be the kind of glass are you using?
I clean my murrini, but where the nippers contact and for just a few hairs inside of that there is always scum, and it's very noticeable, especially on transparent stuff. This is 104 COE stuff, btw.
GlassyEyedGirl
2010-08-05, 2:00pm
This may be a stoopid noob question, but if you heated the murrini in the kiln to just barely a tack fuse type temperature, couldn't you get the edges and top to smooth out a bit?
It would probably be difficult not to melt them to blobs, now that I think about it. Oh well.
Yeah, you can, but I don't think it'd prevent the scum, since I heated mine on a plate w/ a Smith little torch w/ the flame far enough away that it didn't even touch, to achieve the same effect as kiln-slumping (or whatever), and it didn't help.
ChaseDesigns
2010-08-05, 2:42pm
We've successfully tumbled slices. You need to fill your tumbler with some sort of media in addition to the grit. Old glass beads, frit, heck I have plastic beds in mine and the last time we tumbled some murrine there were some regular glass beads in there too. Only six or seven slices were in there, but it did help with scratches, which were from the diamond saw.
RyanTheNumberImp
2010-08-05, 3:18pm
We've successfully tumbled slices. Only six or seven slices were in there, but it did help with scratches, which were from the diamond saw.
This is the difference though, if you are cutting with a saw polishing is a requirement. If you are nipping you shouldn't be leaving a rough finish.
ChaseDesigns
2010-08-05, 3:23pm
This is the difference though, if you are cutting with a saw polishing is a requirement. If you are nipping you shouldn't be leaving a rough finish.
Well, yes, but I know what Dusty is talking about. Nippers can and do leave a little bit of a rough edge sometimes. It happens, especially with 104.
Thanks for the info, Deanna.
... I'm wondering what you use to nip yours with, Ryan, since I see you make 104COE stuff.
As I said, I've tried 2 different kinds of nippers (well-used tile nippers & brand new disc), cleaned the chips will, and been very careful w/ the flame, but haven't been able to get away from this problem.
I think I know what you mean and I think any scratch on the clear glass will always result in some scum. Better quality of the clear can help reduce the problem and keeping your component meticulously clean will help as well.
My suggestion is not to "cut" your murrini, keep them as cane and apply using the snap off method. I'm still practice this technique so have no real trick to share. The basic is to well heat the spot on your bead, warm up your murrini cane and push it on to the bead. Let it cool and snap off the cane and leave a "slice" behind. When it works, you can get a thin slice on your bead surface.
HTH
Cheers
Nancy
Lynn Burgess
2010-08-05, 9:20pm
Any murrini I have made or used with clear around it unfortunately does this.
The only way I am able to get rid of it is by heating around the murrini and pulling it off with either tweezers or a clear rod. When I make my murrini that requires clear around it, I try to make sure there is enough clear to be able to pull away without distorting the design. Making sure the murrini is clean also helps. I would love to find out an easier way to do this.
theglasszone
2010-08-05, 10:20pm
Hi All...
I've been watching this thread from the wings... :) I've experienced this scumming myself but am wondering if Dusty will post a photo of an example - so we can see what you're seeing?
I've done a couple of transparent beads lately that had clear surround (I use Lauscha 104 Soft Clear exclusively for murrini encasing as well as my bead encasing); I do see a wee bit of haze/scum but frankly it doesn't bother me too much. Here's an example - a marble I threw together right before I ran outta gas and wanted to just use up the tank. I should be more discriminating...I know!!! Maybe it's because I love this particular murrini so much and because I'm keeping this one due to a little kiln "bruise" (shrug!):
http://i185.photobucket.com/albums/x280/theglasszone/Bead%20Photos/Vamp%20Fangs/FangMarble2.jpg
http://i185.photobucket.com/albums/x280/theglasszone/Bead%20Photos/Vamp%20Fangs/FangMarble7.jpg
http://i185.photobucket.com/albums/x280/theglasszone/Bead%20Photos/Vamp%20Fangs/FangMarble5.jpg
http://i185.photobucket.com/albums/x280/theglasszone/Bead%20Photos/Vamp%20Fangs/FangMarble6.jpg
Is this what you're talkin' about?
Jody Lee
2010-08-08, 4:24am
I was just going to suggest this - I saw Lynn do this at the Gathering with one of her murrini (a gorgeous butterfly) - makes sense to me!
If it's with clear around the edges, it would help to make sure that the clear you apply is not scummy either. Peel it before you add it to the murrini you are building.
You can flame polish boro murrini. :D
Any murrini I have made or used with clear around it unfortunately does this.
The only way I am able to get rid of it is by heating around the murrini and pulling it off with either tweezers or a clear rod. When I make my murrini that requires clear around it, I try to make sure there is enough clear to be able to pull away without distorting the design. Making sure the murrini is clean also helps. I would love to find out an easier way to do this.
fcfmountain
2010-08-08, 4:53am
I was told by an old time scientific glassworker that anytime glass is mechanically cut that the molecules are 'broken' but anytime that it is snapped (like Nancy is talking about), that the glass molecules will seperate from each other. Sounds like a small difference but I've noticed if I melt in a glass rod that has 'heat cracked on the rod' that it melts in smoothly but any factory cut or nipper cut must be pulled away and discarded due to foam. Ryans online tut on placing his murrine in a soft base glass, hitting the top edge of the murrine with a light flame and pressing it lightly with a paddle may be pushing the cut edge into the other glass of the murrine. If those molecules that are 'broken' are not exposed to air and flame they can't fizz. Is this worth pursuing? TIM
That's almost the stuff, De, but mine doesn't bubble - is more of just a white haze - because of how I treat it, I figure.
Lol, I pick out the tiniest bubble from opaque glass, if I can w/o disturbing the design - visible "imperfections" bother me so much more.
vBulletin® v3.7.5, Copyright ©2000-2012, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.