[Bunyip]

Roy, IIRC, the recommendations were the same as for chrome-based colors, do not garage at striking or annealing temperature, instead garage at 975, anneal as usual. My usual procedure is to eliminate as many variables as possible when I experience trouble, and then introduce them later experimentally once I was able to achieve a consistent result.

At a guess, a 1-hour striking segment prior to annealing probably won't cause checking in most sparkle glass provided they weren't reduced. I've not had problems doing this, but as always in the glass world, YMMV for a lot of reasons.