Lampwork Dont's
Thought it might be fun to have a thread listings what NOT to do. Sort of like the Stupid Newbies Mistakes for Laughs (http://lampworketc.com/forums/showth...stupid+mistake) but not exactly.
Please feel free to add your own!! Don't wipe frit off of your work surface with your bare hand. Don't try to catch the hot mandrel and bead as it slips from your hand. (or marble when it breaks off the punty) Don't put your silver or gold foil near your make-up air vent. Don't let your husband use your favorite pair of tweezers when he melts glass. To the tweezers. Don't set your double ended pick down with the hot end towards you. Don't put hot beads too close in the kiln (you think I'd learn after all this time!). |
Don't accidently brush your teeth with the burn ointment.
Don't sit on the very, very edge of your wheeled chair. Don't keep a little dish of M&M's next to the dish of 'Do This Color Next' filler beads. Don't keep glass full of picks and dental tools pointy side up. Don't turn on the kiln without looking inside first. Don't turn on the propane until you made damn sure the torch is turned OFF. |
Don't wear flammable pajamas when torching!
Don't forget POOP! (propane, oxygen then oxygen, propane) Don't touch the end of the mandrel you've just waved in the flame (duh)! Don't lean over the flame. |
Don't program your kiln in Fahrenheit when it's set for Celsius
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And I've done every damn one of those. Once.
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While in the middle of working on a bead, don't reach too far for a stringer or whatever with one hand, so that your body rotates and the hand holding the mandrel ends up in the torch flame. Yup, done it to both hands now. Freshly burned skin looks like seared chicken and hurts like a bitch.
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Don't put away that special special silver glass without clearly labelling it because you are SURE you could never mistake it for another color (like generic amber, for instance). NOT that I ever did anything like that.....
And, never reach through the flame for something on the back of your bench. Yep, did that, and I had been flameworking for over 15 years when I did it, so it wasn't a newbie mistake! |
When cleaning off you table of 104 glass so you can work boro don't reach under the torch that you just turned off for little fragments of glass and touch that HOT torch you just turned off! Worse burn I have EVER had!!!
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Don't lay your arm across the ceramic heater to get something behind it, crispy's up your arm nicely.
Don't listen to a book on tape with sound effects if it's going to have gunfights in it. Luckily when I jumped I didn't stick anything in the flame. Don't fall in love with colors in a bead or twistie, and then think "oh I don't need to write these down, I'll remember for sure!"... unless you don't really care if you ever get to repeat that success. |
Don't walk barefoot through the studio area and assume that what is stuck to the bottom of your foot is a piece of gravel tracked in by teenager.
Extra don't ... Try and wipe off assumed piece of stone by rubbing twisting foot on flooring. All you'll do is make the cut deeper from the piece of glass that's now embedded in your foot. |
Don't catch. Anything. (Hypothetically, this applied to a soldering iron at one point, and a wad of hot wanna-be-twisty at another point. The don't catch rule is now firmly in effect. Hypothetically.)
Cleavage is not a fashion asset in the studio, it's a popping glass bits catcher. Don't spin a bead to extend it when it's too hot... Unless you want part of the glass to land on your shoulder. |
Don't kiss HD while spinning a bead in the flame...things can get pretty hot
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At least you guys learn from your mistakes! :lol: |
Don't put your mandrel tray on top of the kiln to dry bead release....
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Don't forget to give that bead release lid an extra quarter turn when you put it back on. No matter the color, release does not look good on painted walls, glass rods, cd player, kiln, etc.
Always put frit back into labeled container. Copper ruby looks just like dark amber in average light. Don't prop your elbow on your work surface where you just had a rod pop off in the flame. Don't leave leaf on your work surface. Just 'cause it's not breezy now doesn't mean the breeze when you open the door won't send it aloft. |
Don't sweep your bench with your hand (not my hand)
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Geezuz, that made my butt pucker!
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When you use a long pair of tweezers to rest your mandrels on to keep them clean, DON'T move the tweezers with your hand!
Don't take your beads off the mandrels with the fan running, unless you want a layer of bead release on everything. |
Don't wash your beads in the kitchen sink without counting how many you are washing. Never know when one might decide to take up residency in the garbage disposal.
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Don't place your press under the flame unless you want to burn you hand when you try to use it!
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Don't start suddenly using mandrels dipped on the end after years of being used to mandrels dipped in the middle. I learned this the hard way the other day when I grabbed for the end of the mandrel and latched onto a flaming hot bead. :D
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Don't torch with your studio door open when you have curious skunks, or spastic squirrels in the area. (both in a one week span, the cool breeze is just not worth it)
Don't torch at night if you are too scared to walk back to the house in the dark. Don't start that special bead, with the expensive glass, if you haven't checked how much gas is left in your tank. =/ |
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My studio is about 200 yards from the house and there is a lot of wildlife out there. lol. I *thought* living in the middle of nowhere country would be fun. Yeah, totally a city girl.
Bea |
Ohhhhh, 200 yards! Do you keep a flashlight in your building? I used to have one that plugged in the wall to recharge, but it finally stopped charging. My shack is only about 80-90 feet from the back door I think, but I don't usually mind the dark once I get used to it. Just not fond of stepping out from a lighted space into dark for some reason.
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You don't need a flashlight Bea, you need a horse!
And mine? Do be sure to put out what you think you might need to making your creation. Hunting thru drawers while trying not to cook everything around you with 1500*F+ piece of semi molten glass onna metal rod is NOT recommended. And just because the torch is off, does not mean it's COOL. |
Beatrix, your post cracked me up. Spastic squirrels. Probably wouldn't be laughing if it happened to me, though.
If you're annealing short pieces of copper tubing, don't use your hand to put a cool piece of copper on the mandrel you just had in the flame. |
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