Hi Guys Im new to lamp working but not new to glass I am a designer maker in glass and have recently started lamp working and treated myself to some double helix from tuffnell glass.
I was playing with it tonight and found it really hard to strike i am using the pandora rod I tried reducing the flame and that didnt work i tried working with it hot and letting it cool then reheating but that only changes it to a darker colour.
I found when using the rod and putting it back onto the rod rest it changes from the transparent colour to the purple green colour which it strikes as. Please Help thank you in advance :)
Unique Glass Creations
Pandora is a kiln striking glass, it will strike when it is annealed :)
You should also know that it is a horribly tricky glass in general and a lot of us won't use it for that reason. It is supposed to kiln strike as Gemma says but often it doesn't, and if it does, but then you may find that you can never get it to do it again. It is really inconsistent. If you search the threads on here you can read about it and see how some people have got it to work for them in the past. Good luck!!
I've never used pandora before, but the general principle is that striking glass needs to be heated REALLY hot, so its really gloopy and runny-and this sort of 'activates' the pigment, I've heard it being called seeded. The colours come out after cooling and gently reheating but it may be that with Pandora the colours can then come out in the kiln. I don't know if this is relevant to Pandora but it may be worth giving a go. ??? Terra 2 is an easier one to start with, as is good old Triton. Good luck anyway and let us know if you suss it out.
Hi Thank you for the comments guys really helpful will try the other colours i have. :)
I've never tried Pandora, but have you looked at the info on the DH website? There is a lot of useful advice. eg http://www.doublehelixglassworks.com/pandora.aspx
Hi yeah I looked on there just wondered if there was any way in flame striking but im guessing its a kiln striking rod :( which is not good as my workshop is a few miles away from my kiln. never mind will try fusing it see what happens with that.
Thank you for the help guys :)
pandora is a weird one,
I had some sucess with it then tried pandora 2 and nothing, either deep purple or yucky brown.
As it was olive green in the rod I thought i would make acorns with it, dont ask me why it did this,
(http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8099/8480219166_a42c553de6.jpg) (http://www.flickr.com/photos/92473610@N04/8480219166/)
Esio 018 (http://www.flickr.com/photos/92473610@N04/8480219166/) by Flowerjasper2 (http://www.flickr.com/people/92473610@N04/), on Flickr
all the acorns around lentils are pandora2, all made at the same time,you can see all the different colours which came out before going in the kiln, non of them struck any other colours in the kiln,
The dots for the caps are added after and that is when the glass went from green to what ever it went!
good luck as you never know what you will get ;D
sandy
Hi
I had a nightmare with pandora when I upgraded my kiln. I'd had great results in the Sc2 but the Maxine didn't like it. Sally had the same problem but Dickie & Sarah sorted us out.
You won't get Pandora to strike in the flame. As others have said it's a kiln striker. My Maxine has a heat gradient - it's hotter on the left and cooler on the right. I only anneal striking glasses on the right hand side and have adjusted my striking schedule so that I get the right results (most of the time). My advice would be to work out what works best in your kiln. And I don't think that batch annealing should be a problem - although you may need a different schedule so might not want to anneal it with other things.
I haven't used Pandora2 So can't help with that.
Sarah
Xxx
Hi thank you all for your response your all so helpful, when i brought pandora I didn't realise i was a kiln striker i will use the other colours i brought and keep the pandora 2 for when i play about with my new hobby kiln for fusing see what happens with that.
As I am knew to this I may come back for more advise after i have been to the workshop and played with the other colours :)
Thank you for your knowledge
Kat
xxx