kaliha | More adventures in glass fusing

So I got the kiln back out again today.

I decided to start off with something a little more adventurous in my glass making today. I took my bloody ages to cut all the glass only to discover that the green glass isn't compatible with the microwave kiln.

How did I find this out? By nearly blowing up my microwave. Oops. I left it for a bit and it seems to be working okay again now.

My second attempt, black, blue dichroic and clear with a channel filled with fibre blanket to make a stringing hole.

Can you believe that I used to ruler to measure these out "to the same size" :( I need a Morton Portable Glass Studio I think.

The paler bit of orange is the molten glass

You can see it a bit better there.

I think some nasty fumes come out of it judging by the dirty marks. Eugh.

If you look through the hole you can see the pendant annealing (this is a slow cooling process that strengthens the glass.

And there it is. However, the layers haven't fused together as much as I wanted.

you can still tell that it's three seperate bits of glass. So back in the microwave it goes.

After the second firing it looks a bit like this. The bottom two laters are more fused but the clear layer is still a bit bobbly and I want a nice seal all the way round.

You can tell better from this angle.

So I put it in for a third firing and although it still isn't quite how I wanted it I'm still quite pleased with the result. I think the trick is to make the top bit of glass about a mm wider than the bottom layer. Maybe also use 2mm glass instead of three as it's melt quicker.

But it's still all a learning process.