Goldstone ?

[Corey]

I know this is stupid but where can you buy goldstone? Does it come as frit?

[Carolyn M]

You can usually get goldstone as frit or chunks from most glass suppliers. Where do you usually purchase your glass?

[Feldt's Glass]

You can get it from frantz art glass. It comes in chuncks, a smaller frit size around 1-2 or powder. You can also get premade stringer. I happen to like stringer made with the chunks.

[RyanTheNumberImp]

Effetre goldstone in rods, stringer or filligrana is extremely watered down. You can buy slabs of it which you can smash into chunks and pull into stringer, or buy pieces in chunk form from a glass supplier.

They have green goldstone as well, just keep in mind that its COE is closer to 96, and that you have to really, really mix it to smooth it out as the metal is in big chunks.

[DesertDreamer]

If you want to pull stringer, buy chunks. Frit is pretty, but painfully easy to burn up. (It goes icky brown-black when that happens.)

Green goldstone is lumpy and mean. Walk away, seriously. But the copper (red) and blue are lovely. Whatever you do, DO NOT buy the filigrana or regular rods. You'll end up with more on your bench than in your beads. It's evil.

How do you make your own stringer??? Good question!

Take either a LARGE clear rod of Moretti or a boro rod. Heat up the end and squoosh it to flatten. Apply a pad of clear Moretti. (This is all assuming you're going to use the stringer on Moretti beads. If you're going to use COE 90 or 96, make your pad and use the rods in the next step accordingly. It all depends on the COE of your target beads.)

Heat your goldstone chunk. If you have a kiln, preheating it inside is excellent. If you have a graphite marver with a shelf over your torch, this is good too. If you don't have either, grab your chunk with tweezers and slowly flash it in your flame. Some bits may pop off the edges. It's just future frit, honest. ;)

Be mindful of your heat and don't let your chunk overheat so it sticks to your tweezers. At the same time you're flash-heating your goldstone, heat your rod so the end is sticky-hot. Attach your goldstone chunk to the sticky part of glass rod. Next, take a clear rod (COE of your choice) and heat a good-size gather. Apply it THINLY to your goldstone in a push-pull way so you avoid air bubbles. Air will kill your stringer surer than thermal shock. A bubble now turns into a thin tube later. Very, very bad.

Repeat the heat glass/apply to goldstone steps as needed to coat the entire chunk in clear. Attach another rod to the opposite end from your handle. Heat the entire goldstone/clear mass evenly until the goldstone is glowing dark red-orange. Now slowly pull your handles apart and make stringer. The speed at which you pull directly relates to how thin your stringer will be. Start with relatively small chunks (size of a pea or less) until you get the hang of it, then you can move up to larger chunks. The only limit is the span of your arms!

For fun variations, you can case goldstone with different transparents. Pale amber is lovely, as is lavender-blue. I've used red and green for holidays, but the red is finicky to strike. CIM Bordello is excellent and consistent, though.

[rainygrrl]

Wow, Karen--great information!!!
Thanks!

[Jenfire]

Gee Karen -- Might one assume that is all from first hand experience?! I am reading it and having played with gold-stone ALOT I heartily agree with you. The best cheat I have ever found is to buy a cab from some where like firemountain gems and use that. Mind you not a bead -- a cab. Start with ssmmmaaalll cabs
Green goldstone is not worth the explosions - I agree- walk away!
http://www.firemountaingems.com/details.asp?PN=H207398NB
http://www.firemountaingems.com/details.asp?PN=H207397NB
Jen

[ginger2]

Thanks so much for posting this great info!:biggrin: I have gold adventurine chunks & tried pulling stringer from the end of a mandrel. It seems that I burned the sparkle right out of it, because the stringers look sparkly, but when I apply them to a bead, they look dead brown. Ugh.:( Not nice like goldstone at all. I think you've explained my problem! I'm going to try what you've suggested! Thanks!
ginger

[Emily]

Goldstone cased in rubino is pretty, too.

[Corey]

Wow great information! Thanks for all the great replys.

[mary davis]

I buy my goldstone at a rock shop in town. It seem a bit cheaper from them.

[Bubbyanne]

Wow Karen great info! I am going to have to try it again with the tips you posted. I have had some trouble keeping sparkle with my stringer so I've gone another direction. Frit! :lol:

I bought the goldstone (red, green and blue) in rough form and broke it up by heating in my kiln and quenching in water, then hit it with my hammer in a brown paper bag. I sifted out the really small stuff from the chunks for frit and have ground some into frit too, I like it small, like a 0.
Here's the site I bought mine from. http://www.greatrough.com/index.shtml#goldstone

The green goldstone doesn't pull into stringer well at all as others said but does make a wonderful sparkly frit, great for floral bases.
Like this bead, wish you could see the sparkle better.
86818


I use my frit with silver foil and get neat results.
This bead has black base with goldstone frit (gold, green, and blue) and was rolled in silver foil and cooked until well done. Lol.
Sorry about the cruddy picture, I just took a quickie by the window to show you.
86819

[Steph'sBeadCorner]

[QUOTE=Bubbyanne;1392572]. http://www.greatrough.com/index.shtml#goldstone

I like the goldstone from here too... and buy the rough chunks...not the slabs. Slabs have been cut and it dulls the surface of the goldstone..

Bubbyanne...love your beads that you have!

[DesertDreamer]

One more tip...if you buy slabs or big chunks. What we do is load them in the cold kiln and ramp up for a normal session (it's fast). When the kiln is ramped, I take a metal bucket filled with water, and drop the chunks into it. It will hiss and bubble and the chunks will break apart into smaller chunks. Sometimes they don't fall apart but you can see the cracks. DH uses heavy pliers and just squeezes them apart, or whacks the stubborn ones with a hammer. Voila! Smaller, easy-to-use chunks!

[neagle]

I have bought goldstone, blue aventurine and green aventurine from greatrough.com. Good company. I bought slabs and pulled stringers myself. Although the green can be lumpy, it does fabulous things on beads. I love working with the green because I can heat it really well and it will not burn out, but break down into beautiful green crystals! I do encase all three colors before pulling. I really enjoy working with all of them.

[Elegance_1]

I never heard of that company before. Thanks! It's always good to have other avenues to buy from.

I have the gold, blue and green chunks. The red looks interesting also.

[Bubbyanne]

Just so you know the red and the gold are the same. Wouldn't wantcha to make a purchase of something you already have. :wink: I never heard of that company before. Thanks! It's always good to have other avenues to buy from.

I have the gold, blue and green chunks. The red looks interesting also.

Hey Steph,
Thanks for the complimrnts on my beads. It's nice to hear. :)

[Listenup]

Bubby's correct (hi sweetie!) You should also know that the blue can sometimes be referred to as purple.

Have fun!

[RyanTheNumberImp]

I find that when I encase the green stringer sometimes the clear will "peel" off the outside of the stringer when it cools.
And I have noticed that occasionally a blue or gold stringer (encased in clear) will just crumble while I hold it, so I have taken to annealing the stringers.