FULL FUSE SMALL ASHTRAY

Small, perhaps 3 1/2 inch square dish of red streaked clear glass over clear glass full fused and then slumped over this subtle pretty mold.   For this small piece I used the following schedule which was successful, schedule from Bullseye Glass: Firing: Basic Applications: Slump firings:

200dph..........................................................1200 degrees.............................Hold 10 mins
Full.................................................................900 degrees.............................Hold 1 hour
100 dph...........................................................700 degrees.............................Hold 1 min
Full....................................................................70 degrees.............................Hold 1 min
off

2nd experiment in full fusing and slumping:

Next, I am full fusing a 9 1/2 inch triangle of clear glass covered by white.  On the white glass I placed transparent blue streamers only on the outside for a slight subtle design.  After the fusing I hope to slump this on a basic triangular drop mold.  I am using the following schedule:
400dph...............................1250 degrees....................hold 30 mins
600dph................................1465degrees....................hold 10 mins
full........................................900degrees....................hold 30 mins
150dph..................................700degrees........................0
full............................................70degrees.....................off

The full fusing came out well.  The sides of the clear blank on the bottom were not completely straight, so the fused bottom looks a little weird.  I am currently slumping that triangular piece of glass into a a triangular mold which I have elevated on two inch kiln posts: 

Now I am just hoping that I coated the inside of the mold with kiln shelf release, otherwise it will stick to it as it drips through.  I used the following firing schedule to slump the piece:

200 dph...................................................1200 degrees.......................................hold 45 min.
Full ...........................................................900 degrees.......................................hold 1 1/2 hours
100 dph......................................................700 degrees......................................-0-
Full..............................................................70 degrees.......................................off

SUNCATCHERS

They are great and maybe I can make a few which will be beautiful in glass.  I have begun with two round disks of clear 3mm glass.  That is a real advance since prior to this I found it so difficult to cut circles.  But success and on the top of one I but brown and green pieces of glass to emulate the look of a tree.  Forgot to take a before picture but popped it in the kiln and fired it with the following schedule:

300 dph......................................1150 degrees..................................hold 30 mins
600 dph......................................1430 degrees..................................hold 12 mins
Full...............................................900 degrees..................................hold 1 hour
100 dph........................................ 700 degrees..................................hold 2 mins
Off.


Results to come:  Out of the kiln and I immediately see a small hairline crack in the glass.  After a little research I found the following:

• Small, interconnected cracks (like a spider web).

These cracks generally extend from a single spot on the underside of the glass. They aren't usually severe enough to cause the item to split into pieces. Sometimes shelf primer will also be stuck to the underside of the glass. Most likely, this kind of crack is caused by glass sticking to the kiln shelf. A close examination of the shelf may even reveal small pieces of glass that are stuck to the shelf. The obvious solution is to scrap the shelf clean and apply fresh kiln wash.

This makes sense and appears to be the problem.  I did notice a small tiny, piece of glass on shelf which I did not think much of, no more of that from now on.  I will be using thinline paper until I put fresh kiln wash on shelf.

EXPERIMENTS WITH FLOW FUSING

I basically put 5 or 6 clear pieces of glass, most which were 3mm, and added stringers to one of them in the middle.  On top of that I placed two or three more layers of clear glass.  The sides were uneven and they were in pieces.  I placed them on fiber paper and dammed them are three sides with kiln furniture.  I placed fiber paper between the glass and the dams and elevated one of the sides so that the glass would flow towards the other side.  Then I fired it with the following schedule:

100 dph..................................300 degrees..........................................hold 15 mins
200 dph..................................600 degrees..........................................hold 15 mins
300 dph..................................1050 degrees........................................hold 15 mins
450 dph...................................1490 degrees........................................hold 15mins
 Full............................................900 degrees.......................................hold 2 hours
300 dph........................................700 degrees......................................hold 10 mins
off

Don't have any idea how it will all come out.  Really that is quite a few levels of glass, although not very big piece of glass, it might still take a long to melt it all.  I also don't know how the flow issue will work.  Bullseye has a tip sheet on working deep which I will take a closer look at.  We shall see what happens

So what I got was an uneven thick block where the stringer moved deep within.  I think I will look at Bullseye which seems to have a video on flow fusing and also a tip sheet on "working Deep"

Experiment 3

I am currently fusing a piece of glass onto this carved piece of fiber board.  The glass is made up of two pieces.  see example below.  I created this piece by placing 2 pieces of blue on either side of the red piece and firing it shelf down and placing a white piece of glass as a base beneath it.  The design came out well, straighter than usual, so now I placed this piece on top of the carved fiber board 

300 dph..................................................1360 degrees..............................hold 20 mins
300 dph...................................................1465 degrees.............................hold 5 mins
Full............................................................900 degrees.............................hold 1 hour
100 dph......................................................700 degrees.............................hold 1 min
Off

So here is what I am considering, the circle around the celtic design is thin as are most of the other lines in the design.  Additionally the design where I carved them is uneven in the bottom.  I am wondering how this will effect the glass that is melting.