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Old 2006-08-08, 2:17pm
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JudithB JudithB is offline
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Join Date: Apr 20, 2006
Location: Ames Lake, Washington
Posts: 48
Question Newbie question - Bead Release cracking

Hi all,
I finally starting with my beadmaking - woot! Alas, when doing the first 6 beads, I experienced lots of problems with the bead release (airdried around 4 hours plus slowly heated mandrel in the flame).
- Release cracked on 2 mandrels already while wounding the initial round of glass on it
- Release cracked on further 2 mandrels while working on the beads (nothing too fancy and rather small beads)

I am using FosterFire bead release and mixed the release with water to a consistency similar to the one that we used during class: a bit runnier than yoghurt, more like a runny milk shake.

After the disappointing results I mixed a second batch, definitely not as runny as yesterday. More like yoghurt this time. I dipped the mandrels, and to my surprise the release starts already cracking on the mandrel while drying in the air!

What am I doing wrong? I am completely unsure what to do now. Sadly I can't remember the name of the bead release that we used in class, because this never happend during the course.
I searched here in the forum and the FosterFire brand seems to work fine for others. I am aware that depending on climate some releases are working better than others (I live close to Seattle and it's currently warm with low humidity).

Any recommendations? Thanks in advance!
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