Help! I must make half a marble ...

[Art of Hand]

I have been approached by a local glass artist to make a lot (600 +) beads that will be part of a huge instellation art work for a huge building. They have accepted my sample beads ( range between 20 - 35 grams each), but would like to include some of my beads in their casting work. The problem is - I need to make half marbles ... Or find a way to cut them in half, without wasting too much time.

The guy loves this design and wants this done in a marble:
213701

The 'half a marble' must be horizontal, as per image. Initially I did suggest to just crack a bead along the mandrel hole, but it will not work.

Thanks for any help! (ps. I have never made a marble, lol)

[Shrimp]

Why not just make beads, and let them cool down without putting them in a kiln, annealing bubbles, fiber blanket or vermiculite? They generally crack right in half!

[Art of Hand]

Thanks Aleta, but the beads will crack in the wrong way - I need the marble/bead to be half at a 90 degree angle to the mandrel hole. And these beads will take about 2 1/2 to 3 rods of glass. They want the diameter of the marble to be about 3 cm.

[Beadanna]

I hope someone can come up with a solution for you Diana. It's beyond me!

[LynieG]

Can you do an off the mandral mable and just flatten one side?

[Kirima]

It might work with a Cabochon-Mandrel?

[Frit Diva]

Dee, do you mean you need for the "front" of your half marble to be a swirl/spiral of colors? If that is the case, you just need a good cab mandrel (hint. hint)! LOL

http://lampworketc.com/forums/showthread.php?p=3192962#post3192962

In all seriousness, the cab mandrel described in my tut would work, as would any other cab mandrel of a sufficent diameter.


Jo

[artwhim]

Assuming a mandrel hole is OK in each half, you could make them at the very tip of the mandrel, shape with a sphere mold (or gravity if you're good at that), but keep flattening the end that runs off the mandrel. Doing it this way, you would only make one half at a time. After you've made a couple to work out the kinks, I would think they would work up pretty fast.

If they don't want any mandrel hole, the same process could be used but made on the end of a glass rod. You'd have to eventually punty the flat end, cut the original rod off and polish that end. Doable, but not as easy in soft as boro unless you're comfortable with punties.

Hope that makes sense. Congrats on the huge order!!

BTW- is his casting work the same COE as your beads, or is he planning to cold attach them?

[Art of Hand]

Hi Cathy, He is going to supply me with BE, as he also works with BE. So all the combintion work will have the same COE, and he will slump the glass together. I got a lot of strips of clear from them yesterday to play with. The normal round beads will be 104, my fav COE, lol.

LOL Anna! It is boggling my mind too.

Lynie, I could, thing is, I need to make so many of these beads, and I would like to control the diameter, as I need to make 2 identical ones every time.

Kirima & Jo ... Lol. now why did I not think about that! Will need to convo Jo I guess ...

[Kirima]

Hi Diana

Good luck with the cabochon mandrel!

Martina

[nklt0]

So, they are going to fuse/slump the halves? If so it doesn't have to be perfectly round, right?

So, my cheater's way of going about it is:
1. get them to fuse bullseye strips into a bar approximately the thickness you need. This is your marble stock.
2. pre heat in the kiln and punty up to round off a bit and twist for the swirls.
3. finally cut the marble in half with a saw.

This is kinda off Drew Fritts' book if you need more information.

HTH

Cheers
Nancy

[Sue in Maine]

Do you have a glass grinder? If so, you can just grind down a marble. If you don't have a grinder, there may be a stained glass shop in your area that would let you use one of theirs.

Just a thought.

Sue

[patienthand]

Dee,
I would work without a mandrel. make a big fat mirrini of base color, then color stripes, silver stripes, encase it. make a twist on the end of the rod as you gather it( you will need to punty the end of the rod to get the twist. Take punty off and get the face of the half marble smooth and punty up again. pull it off the murrini, flatten the back. punty up on the back, remove front punty and smooth the mark made by the punt, let the glass set hard, hold with grabbers , crack off back punty, fire polish and into the kiln.

Candice

[Cosmo]

Do whole marbles and then cut them in half with a tile saw. That way you make two at once.

[yamaha200]

Do whole marbles and then cut them in half with a tile saw. That way you make two at once.

Ditto this! Works for either beads or marbles. For a small investment, places like hisglassworks will even have thin kerf blades like you might use for cutting murrini so you minimize the amount that gets wasted when cutting.

laura

[Frit Diva]

Hey Dee~ Once I read Candice's suggestion, I realized you are talking about fusing these half marbles onto a larger piece, so you definitely will want to work off mandrel to keep the back of the piece free of release. Sorry I didn't quite focus on that before!

Jo