Frit methodology, ok, it's late....

saraconklin · #1 2012-05-01, 10:51pm

can't sleep so here it goes. i just got some great looking frit blends and am now thinking, "now what?" If i can get the manufacturer to talk about striking or reducing each blend, that would be a good thing. My big problem is "on what base glass??" Does anyone have any procedures when testing out new frit blends?

I am thinking out loud here that i should probably test blends on an opaque AND a transparent base bead. Should it be the same color palette or not? I could move to a complimentary color for the base bead...... OR maybe all of you have some favorite base bead colors that do well with most frit. I found Mint to be a pretty neutral color. What do you do with new frit? Thanks and yes, i will go to bed now.

sangell · #2 2012-05-02, 7:14am

I always like to see it on clear, opaque white; then maybe a color of your choice that compliments the frit.

Hope it helps

alb6094 · #3 2012-05-02, 7:20am

Sorry to interrupt....

Sue, all I have is clear for a base right now and I want a white. Is opaque white a good white base for encased boro frit beads? Who makes it please? I'd like to find a white and a black for cores for now, until I get more funds for colors.

Sara, I'm with you. I just started with boro and I want more than clear to test beads on. I use 96 COE for production right now and for my frit testing on that glass (something I do daily) I use white, black, clear, and then some light pastels like mint, cream, pale yellow, and beige.

I only have like 4 boro frits right now but I'm hoping to get that Northstar mix (I think it's Northstar that sells that big sampler pack?) when I get some funds so I can get all mad scientist with it, lol.

MagpieGlass · #4 2012-05-02, 8:47am

Okay ... I'll bop in here. When I test I work on a base of clear, a base of white (careful some whites don't like to be next to the mandrel so you need to do a wrap with clear first) and a base of black.

I do an encased bead and an unencased bead (so six beads total) and then I make a small anenome implosion to see how the color implodes. (or for frit, a frit implosion)

I mostly use asian white but it hates being next to the mandrel and the beads crack. For an ivory I use Eqyptian White Sand (NS) and I also have Dwarf White (a thinnable white). The Asian white is extremely dense and does not thin for me.

I'm still newbish been torch three year but only part-time and I bounce between COE 90, COE 96, Silver 104s, and Boro.

I am a total 96 COE frit ho and am trying to be as big a boro frit ho.

After that the sky is the limit for bases. One of my favorite combos was Dragonfly Glassworx Sirius on NS Turquiose. Sadly Dragonfly is no more and my Sirius is almost all. I also use alot of NS Caramel. I'm more an "organic" girl and bright white just isn't normal in

My test beads go to BOC and my test implosions usually go up in my etsy in groups if they are anything interesting for other jewelry makers to bezel set. So no waste unless it is really ugggggly!

alb6094 · #5 2012-05-02, 10:56am

Quote:

Originally Posted by MagpieGlass

Okay ... I'll bop in here. When I test I work on a base of clear, a base of white (careful some whites don't like to be next to the mandrel so you need to do a wrap with clear first) and a base of black.

I do an encased bead and an unencased bead (so six beads total) and then I make a small anenome implosion to see how the color implodes. (or for frit, a frit implosion)

I mostly use asian white but it hates being next to the mandrel and the beads crack. For an ivory I use Eqyptian White Sand (NS) and I also have Dwarf White (a thinnable white). The Asian white is extremely dense and does not thin for me.

I'm still newbish been torch three year but only part-time and I bounce between COE 90, COE 96, Silver 104s, and Boro.

I am a total 96 COE frit ho and am trying to be as big a boro frit ho.

After that the sky is the limit for bases. One of my favorite combos was Dragonfly Glassworx Sirius on NS Turquiose. Sadly Dragonfly is no more and my Sirius is almost all. I also use alot of NS Caramel. I'm more an "organic" girl and bright white just isn't normal in

My test beads go to BOC and my test implosions usually go up in my etsy in groups if they are anything interesting for other jewelry makers to bezel set. So no waste unless it is really ugggggly!

Are you my twin?

Thank you so much for the info, that's a huge help! I mourn the demise of Dragonfly. She could've raked in the dough if she would have kept her business practices ethical. She was a major frit blend talent.

MagpieGlass · #6 2012-05-02, 1:19pm

ya just never know.

Quote:

Originally Posted by alb6094

Are you my twin?

Thank you so much for the info, that's a huge help! I mourn the demise of Dragonfly. She could've raked in the dough if she would have kept her business practices ethical. She was a major frit blend talent.

saraconklin · #7 2012-05-02, 3:16pm

Astrid, when i was shopping around recently Frantz had the NS sample pack for about 50. instead of the regular 70.

saraconklin · #8 2012-05-02, 3:23pm

So, i get that to test a frit a base bead of (1) clear (1) white to creamy and (1) black are the basic test. Then encase and don't encase the previous. ok, i will start with that. i also like knowing about:
"some light pastels like mint, cream, pale yellow, and beige." will check for the makers of these type of colors which i am assuming are opaque.
Got any light transparent color suggestions that make a nice base?
thanks to everyone!

alb6094 · #9 2012-05-02, 3:52pm

Quote:

Originally Posted by saraconklin

Astrid, when i was shopping around recently Frantz had the NS sample pack for about 50. instead of the regular 70.

OOOOOOooo, thanks for letting me know! Now all I need to do is get my paws on some more cash, lol. What can I pawn, hmmmmmm......

alb6094 · #10 2012-05-02, 3:55pm

Quote:

Originally Posted by saraconklin

So, i get that to test a frit a base bead of (1) clear (1) white to creamy and (1) black are the basic test. Then encase and don't encase the previous. ok, i will start with that. i also like knowing about:
"some light pastels like mint, cream, pale yellow, and beige." will check for the makers of these type of colors which i am assuming are opaque.
Got any light transparent color suggestions that make a nice base?
thanks to everyone!

I'm just starting to play with transparent bases in 96 and as you can see I'm still clueless on Boro transparents, are there such creatures other than clear?

I'm such a n00b.

ETA: Lemme go have a looksee in a coupla places here, now I'm curious....

OK, I can tell this is going to be pocketbook dangerous so I'm calling it window shopping so I don't cave. Found this at GA, it was a special request by Lewis Wilson. If I found this color in 96 I'd be all over it as a base for frit testing:

Peachy Keen: http://www.glassalchemy.com/cart/rev...achy-keen.html

Here's something else that looks promising as a base, bibidibobbityblue: http://www.glassalchemy.com/cart/rod...blue-5192.html

And looking at color characteristics I'm seeing translucents (ionic), some of which are strikers but I'm not seeing anything that I would think of as 'transparent' in the 104/96/90 sense.

Lemme go troll Momka and Northstar but I'm thinking from what I've seen in Brent's vids, Milo's vids and on youtube that boro doesn't go the transparent route? It explains, at least to me, the focus on clears.

In all honesty I'm an encasement and frit ho and that's why I want to head into boro. Along with the fact that the working properties are different and I'm hoping that will allow me to work a piece longer and experiment more with sculpture ideas I've had poor success with in 104.

OK, /book.

Back to your regularly scheduled thread.

saraconklin · #11 2012-05-02, 5:37pm

Astrid, don't pawn the dog...............you are the best to help with this quest. i think this will be a useful thread for the library. just did a clear, black and white bead with a frit blend and then made 3 more and encased the buggers. will post photos tomorrow or friday.

MagpieGlass · #12 2012-05-02, 8:46pm

There are transparents in boro. Cobalt, NS Pink, NS Peach, NS Violet. Probably more but that's what I have in my stash off the top of my head. These are transparents that are not silver rich or color changing. But the major fun of boro is the stuff that does change ... for me anyways.

I have bibbobblue ... it's a nice medium blue opaque that is wysiwig. I'm wanting some GA Mint for a base ... really liking that color.

Since I'm an implo ho (as well as a frit ho) I use alot of Dark Cobalt and either Ninja or Jet black.

Best I can say is play, play, play. I buy alot of boro in single rods from either ABR or Rose Valley (usually when there is a sale). If I like the color I go back and buy more.

pierces*designs · #13 2012-05-03, 4:32am

Personally, for bases..pretty pastel, smooth non-bubbly bases you cannot go wrong with Parramore. http://www.mountainglass.com/Products/ROGER-PARRAMORE/

I use the parramore white almost exclusively.

This set was made with cool mint encased in Sublime (a pretty transparent lime green) and wraps of Pearl Green and English Ivy

For transparent there is:

Northstar Pink, Violet, Lavendar, Ice Blue, Glacier, Cobalt, Light Cobalt , Peach

I love to make up my own blends of frit, but that makes them hard to reproduce. LOL

alb6094 · #14 2012-05-03, 7:15am

Deb those are gorgeous! Those Parramore colors are TDF *and* there's a sample pack!

saraconklin · #15 2012-05-03, 8:26am

wow, the Parramore colors are just exactly what i was looking for. they are light pastels and should make a wonderful canvas for frit. putting frit on transparent glass base beads seems tricker since they would really have to be "faint" colors so that you could see the frit. my experiments survived the kiln and tomorrow i hope to get photo of my first experiments. i struck them all and figure i should do that with each blend.

mandoziller · #16 2012-05-03, 8:42am

NS 88-Pomegranate is a very friendly trans. red. It is one of the few reds I don't liver out.

alb6094 · #17 2012-05-03, 8:51am

Quote:

Originally Posted by mandoziller

NS 88-Pomegranate is a very friendly trans. red. It is one of the few reds I don't liver out.

http://rosevalleyglass.com/nspomegranaterod.aspx

I googled it and found some working notes at rose valley glass. This is beautiful! Thanks for the heads up. I'm a fiend for red.

saraconklin · #18 2012-05-03, 8:53am

have some of that Pomegranate and love it, thanks. will probably put it over white, over clear to lighten it up.

i also have the "shorts" variety pack from GA, NS and Momka. will play with them to see what looks good. i want to play with some of the crazy reactive rods too like, caramel, triple passion, blah blah blah, sooo much fun

MagpieGlass · #19 2012-05-03, 10:30am

Northstar has a pdf of working tips and annealing settings for their glasses, GA used to ... I have it but haven't been successful at finding an updated one. Momka has her notes right on her site and TAG has tips on their site as well though TAG sends along working tips with glass orders (when you buy directly from them).

If anyone wants my GA word document of unknown age ... PM me with your email address and I'll forward it along.

AuntD · #20 2012-05-03, 10:31am

IMHO, the best thing to do is to approach boro as though you're new to glass and have never done anything before. Don't assume that it will do anything that soft glass does, because chances are it won't. For instance, colors rarely if ever (I can't think of any but I could be wrong) react with one another the way soft glass does. It might react with the mandrel, or with the garaging temperature, or the striking temperature, or how long it was in the kiln, or whether it was encased, but you won't see reactions between the glass.

Boro colors react to the flame type, the humidity, the way you tilted your head, and if the neighbor's dog is in heat. Also, if you were biting your tongue and how much sleep you got two nights ago. I'm only exaggerating a little bit. You can make two implosions, one right after the other, and get different effects. There are people who can get exactly what they set out to get, but that takes lots and lots of practice. I've never done it (though I may be worse than normal). Part of the joy of boro is that it's a surprise when you open your kiln.

The only inexpensive boro is clear. Everything else is expensive. Things that are standards in soft glass are tricky in boro, and vice versa. Views on whites and reds are all over the spectrum. I can liver any red out there except Elvis Red from TAG, though as I said above, I may be worse than most.

(Actually, I've made Elvis look pretty bad too, even if I wouldn't strictly call it livered. Frightening red boro to an ugly death is apparently one of my superpowers). Most opaque WYSIWYG colors bubble like crazy if they heat too quickly; I think of them as advanced colors, because they're harder to use and less forgiving than most of the striking colors. If you want to shield something from the mandrel, you should use clear instead of white; whites are expensive.

Soft glass and boro aren't the same thing only one takes more heat, they're two entirely different animals. It's not a cat and a kitten, it's a cat and a platypus. If your goal with boro is to replicate what you can do with soft glass, I think you'll be missing the fun and just paying more for your glass. I'd recommend getting some striking colors and reading up on them and then just playing with them without attempting to do frit studies (yet). Get something like double amber purple (Northstar) or triple passion (Glass Alchemy), stick them in the flame, and see if you can burn off the haze that develops. Change the flame chemistry. Try to get it hot enough that it's clear. Let it cool. See if you can get it to strike with different flame chemistries, and note which ones give you the results you want. Do a quick implosion with a neutral flame and see what happens. Then do another quick implosion with an oxidizing flame and see if you like that better. Burn off the haze and then put a stripe of your glass on a rod of clear. Melt them together, and then see what happens to the color when you flash it in a reducing flame. Do you like that effect? Then put another stripe of clear on the other side of your color, play with the flame chemistry, and see if you like those effects. Once you know what the glass CAN do, you can see if you can replicate the effects when you want to. Then you can start throwing clear frit (the most useful boro frit is clear, which is a bonus because it's the least expensive) on things and seeing what happens. Really, if you're just trying to do what you do with soft glass, you're wasting your money, because you can do the same thing for less with soft glass. If you want to use boro, read all of the information on the manufacturer's websites, and play with it a while to see what you can make it do. You'll probably find that what you want to do with boro is entirely different from what you're used to with soft glass.

Feel free to ignore me, of course, everything I said could be all wrong for you. The fun of boro for me is that it does different things than soft glass does, and so those things are the ones I like to focus on. Most importantly, have fun.

alb6094 · #21 2012-05-03, 10:33am

Quote:

Originally Posted by MagpieGlass

Northstar has a pdf of working tips and annealing settings for their glasses, GA used to ... I have it but haven't been successful at finding an updated one. Momka has her notes right on her site and TAG has tips on their site as well though TAG sends along working tips with glass orders (when you buy directly from them).

If anyone wants my GA word document of unknown age ... PM me with your email address and I'll forward it along.

Thank you for the offer Laura! PM'd you.

alb6094 · #22 2012-05-03, 10:37am

Donna, what a lovely and informative (and funny! platypus LOL) post. Thank you so much for the tips!

MagpieGlass · #23 2012-05-03, 10:54am

Aunt D ... well said and all true.

My #1 rule of boro is ... if you want a set ... make all the beads at the same time at the torch because "to-date" nothing has been repeatable for me!!

But OMGosh is it fun and addictive.

saraconklin · #24 2012-05-03, 7:44pm

Dear Auntie Donna: i liked you from the "easily amused" line, one of my favorites. i love boro and love that it is a totally different beast than 104. quick question about triple passion. i burn the haze off the bottom of the rod when i am applying it to the mandrel or another color and then try hard not to cover up the hazed side too much to melt off the triple passion rod. my thought is that there is an unhazed side and then i go back and burn the haze off the top. does this make sense? thank you for your thoughtful answer to my earlier question.

Deb · #25 2012-05-03, 9:41pm

Quote:

Originally Posted by saraconklin

have some of that Pomegranate and love it, thanks. will probably put it over white, over clear to lighten it up.

I love pomegranate. Try it without a base underneath it, too. Here is Pomegranate with Indigo Luster Frit encased in Simax clear.

I'd really love to try the Parramore colors, but they are kind of pricey and I've never seen them go on sale. They sure are beautiful, though.

Juln · #26 2012-05-04, 12:06pm

Indeed, here's the NS one:
http://northstarglass.com/tipstricks.asp

Quote:

Originally Posted by MagpieGlass

Northstar has a pdf of working tips and annealing settings for their glasses, GA used to ... I have it but haven't been successful at finding an updated one. Momka has her notes right on her site and TAG has tips on their site as well though TAG sends along working tips with glass orders (when you buy directly from them).

If anyone wants my GA word document of unknown age ... PM me with your email address and I'll forward it along.

saraconklin · #27 2012-05-09, 8:59pm

i have the Northstar product info. but can't find any "working directions" for the Parramore glass from New Color Company 33.

MagpieGlass · #28 2012-05-10, 6:02am

Sara ... if all else fails PM ABR Dave here on LE. He works alot of boro and may be able to provide some info. I just ordered (about a week ago) 5 rods of parramore. I'm hoping they are wysiwig. I got peach, pink, a couple yellows, et al. Looking for a nice implodable yellow that holds up it's color in the tint I want. Still haven't found my nirvana yellow.

AuntD · #29 2012-05-10, 9:38am

Quote:

Originally Posted by saraconklin

i have the Northstar product info. but can't find any "working directions" for the Parramore glass from New Color Company 33.

As a rule of thumb that is at least 50% useful (remember, this is boro; there are no absolutes except a COE of 33): opaque non-striking colors require slow and soft heating because otherwise they will bubble, burn, or lose their color. Generally, once they're up to temp you can stop worrying, but don't forget that the piece of glass just below the part that's up to temp on the rod is NOT yet up to temp. You can't go wrong being gentle on opaque non-striking colors.

Ironically for someone who is used to soft glass, the striking colors are the ones you can beat up -- heat up hot and fast and re-heat and smush around.

AuntD · #30 2012-05-10, 9:59am

Quote:

Originally Posted by saraconklin

Dear Auntie Donna: i liked you from the "easily amused" line, one of my favorites. i love boro and love that it is a totally different beast than 104. quick question about triple passion. i burn the haze off the bottom of the rod when i am applying it to the mandrel or another color and then try hard not to cover up the hazed side too much to melt off the triple passion rod. my thought is that there is an unhazed side and then i go back and burn the haze off the top. does this make sense? thank you for your thoughtful answer to my earlier question.

Burn the haze off the whole thing. It's fast and easy, and that way you don't have to worry about the top of the rod and the bottom of the rod. If you're having trouble burning off the haze and THAT'S why you're only doing one side of the rod then you should turn up your oxygen.

You can always get more haze if you WANT haze; you don't have to worry about that. After the first time you burn it off you can make it come back by either cooling it and then heating it enough for the haze to form but not enough to burn it off OR by turning up your propane. FYI, you can do more without haze than you can with it. If you don't burn off the haze you generally end up with what lots of people call some variation of "poop" -- a sad off-color opaque version of what you thought you were going for.

Since there's always an exception -- with some colors (like the GA Silver Strike colors or NS Butterscotch) if you heat them up and burn off the haze and then bathe them in a reducing flame you'll get a silvery coating. Remember that those are the exceptions. I don't remember what happens with the amber purples, but with GA Tequila Sunrise if you burn off the haze and keep it burned off and strike it correctly and the moon is right, you get deep reds and purples and magentas. If you don't burn off the haze you get a sickly looking salmon... like a salmon that took its own life because it could no longer stand the pain. I personally am an expert in turning Tequila Sunrise to poop.

FYI, test this on your own because I rarely encase things (can't make a bead to save my life), but I think it's pretty near impossible to encase the silver you get on one of the colors I mentioned above and keep it silver. Just one of the random things that makes boro so much fun!

I hope I answered the question you actually asked...