Making frit help

mary1_$ · #1 2010-03-02, 10:14am

I know to ndrop hot glass in cold water. But can I heat the glass in my oven? How long and what tempiture to I set my oven for. I hate heating it at the torch. Thanks for help. Lovies Mary

Ofilia · #2 2010-03-02, 11:48am

Hi Mary, I take the soopy hot glass straight from the torch to a stainless steel bowl of ice water! It's fine! Lots of snap-crackle-and-pop! A trick Loren Stump teaches, if you want nice small fairly even frit, is to mash your hot gather with parallel mashers, get again soopy hot, and plunge in that water. It's awesome! What kind of glass are you melting, rods or big fat canes like furnace cane?

mary1_$ · #3 2010-03-02, 1:21pm

Guess I will have to keep using my kiln. Oh well.

mary1_$ · #4 2010-03-02, 1:26pm

I do use my torch and kiln both. I do it this way. But thought I would like to try to do it in my oven. Dont think the oven will be hot enough.Just thought I would ask.I do make it like you do. Just have a bunch of shorts I thought I would tey in my oven. Dont think it will get hot enough.Thanks so much. Lovies Mary

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ofilia

Hi Mary, I take the soopy hot glass straight from the torch to a stainless steel bowl of ice water! It's fine! Lots of snap-crackle-and-pop! A trick Loren Stump teaches, if you want nice small fairly even frit, is to mash your hot gather with parallel mashers, get again soopy hot, and plunge in that water. It's awesome! What kind of glass are you melting, rods or big fat canes like furnace cane?

CO_Phantom · #5 2010-03-02, 4:40pm

Your oven could possibly get hot enough. You could try it at least. Set it to its highest setting and put in a few rods on an old crappy cookie sheet just to see what happens. Let 'em "soak" in there for half an hour or so, and then plunge them into a metal pan with ice water in it.

The soda lime glass isn't going to be as resistant to thermal gradients (like pouring hot water into a freezing cold glass will make it shatter). Hopefully the difference in temperature between the hot oven and the ice water will fracture it.

Not sure how uniform or even how fine you will get when you do it this way though.

Another way to make frit is toss it in a coffee grinder dedicated to glass. I made some frit this way a while back. My suggestion for that would be to moisten a coffee filter and put it across the top of the grinder before putting on the lid to lessen the dust that's formed. It's a horrible racket, but it works. I filter it through some screens I found while wandering through WalMart's kitchen aisle and managed to separate it out to 4 sizes.

Or you could sell the shorts in the garage sale for people who like melting shorts. =) I know that's not what you were looking for, though.

-Amy

SunDoorBeads · #6 2010-03-02, 4:55pm

there is also a frit crusher that is being sold- Delphi Glass has one but there were also instructions a while back on how to make your own. ( I will search this out for you if you would like) I know that some people swear by this method. The only thing you have to do is run a magnet over the frit once it is sorted to remove any metal particles that were left behind from crushing the glass. I wonder if anyone else knows the ins and outs of this method??? like how big the glass pieces need for this to be successful?? Anyway hope this helps.
Michelle

mary1_$ · #7 2010-03-03, 5:07am

I would love to make on. If you find info I would love the info. I have use a coffee grinder and I have to ware a mash as the dust is really bad. Glass dust isnt healthy mat all.LOL. It works great but I dont like doing it that way.I only have very short glass. I fuse my shorts most of the time to another rod and use them. If it burns my finger its in the frit pile.Thanks for the advice. Lovies Mary

Sue in Maine · #8 2010-03-03, 5:31am

Mary,

I put shorts in the kiln while I'm torching. When I'm done, I pick the shorts out one by one with long tweezers and drop them, one by one, into a metal bowl of water that I've had freezing in the freezer while I torched so it's really cold.

And there was a cracked marble craft I did when I was a kid in which I heated up marbles in a frying pan and dumped them into ice water. I think you could put shorts in a cast iron frying pan, heat them up and dump them in ice water with the same affect.

Sue

Edited to add: It was a group craft project when I was a kid. The adults did the heating... but I remember the process well as it struck me as so fantastic.

pittypat · #9 2010-03-03, 11:15pm

Hi, Mary...someone made a frit masher for me by directions that were on LE somewhere!!
I bought all the parts in the plumbing department at Home Depot for not much at all.
Basically a large tube with a bottom screwed on and a smaller piece that will fit inside the bigger one with a bottom screwed on that...and just mash! Does that make any sense at all??? I will try to find the directions...pat

queenofswords · #10 2010-03-06, 11:36pm

Here is a link from the boro room http://www.lampworketc.com/forums/sh...d.php?t=155402 go about 3/4 of the way down and there is an explanation on making your own frit maker. If the link doesn't work. It is the Boro room and I had asked the question Favorite Frit. You should find it in there.

mary1_$ · #11 2010-03-24, 7:30am

Thanks guy's for help.Guess I just wanted to make frit without my coffee grinder. I will get my brother to make me one. Thanks again. Lovies Mary