Saturday, February 2, 2013

Manufacturer's Lie


Very pleased with today's fusing:

The first blank I fired, and immediately slumped into a bowl, picture here for sake of a complete record:

I didn't think to measure the finished blank to see how much the size changed. With the second one I did measure it, and found out it actually shrank slightly!

My understanding from a Bullseye Technote (I think) is that warm glass wants to be 6mm thick, and it should contract or expand to try and reach that level. The glass base I'm using is 3mm, and the colored glasses are 3mm. I expected no change.

M. Sigulf suggested that the rolling process actually makes the sheets a little thinner than the official spec, and as a result it contracted a bit. Fortunately, with 6" disks and a 13" kiln shelf, I can actually get two blanks fused at once and save some firings. Unfortunately the plate mold we are using is 7"; It will be back to single firings for that, unless I want to make 6" plates instead.

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