Two different questions! Dichroic needles and annealing silver glass

Kimster · September 23, 2012, 02:43:59 PM

Rainy Sunday afternoon here, so just about to have a play with the dichroic noodles, and I need your help...I have no idea how to use them! How can I tell which is the coated, & which is the 'glass' side? Does the whole noodle have to stay out of the flame, or just the coated side? Also, is there particular glass that would be good to try them on, or glass to avoid? Do they have to be encased? Sorry for so many questions $:-\$

Also - totally unrelated - I've been having some success with my encased silver glass attempts, but the un encased beads have been losing some colour in the kiln . I've been using my normal garaging prog which soaks at 520c for one and a half hours...is this too hot?

Would appreciate some advce, all you glass oracles out there!

Kalorlo · September 23, 2012, 03:13:42 PM

Yeah, a lot of people use lower temps for silver glass. I think the usual advice is to drop it 10 degrees and try again, and keep doing that until you get the results you put in.

Dichro: if you touch something pointy to the surface and look at the reflection, if the reflection meets the tool that's the coated side. If there's a gap, that's the clear side.

helbels · September 23, 2012, 05:09:57 PM

Using the tip above, locate the dichroic coated side of your noodle. Wrap it around your base bead - I'd suggest a black base for your first go, and then encase with clear. You will need to garage rather than batch anneal.

Kimster · September 23, 2012, 06:31:14 PM

Thanks so much for the tip! Found it easily...also it seems it's very flat compared with glass side. Do I wrap it round coated side up, or clear side up? $:-\$

helbels · September 23, 2012, 06:36:21 PM

You want the coated side facing your base bead..... so clear side up. If you get the dichro in the flame it will burn out or go all scummy, so focus the heat on melting the clear just enough to make the noodle pliable and keep up a steady winding action. Once you have the dichro on, you can get a bit hotter with your flame, but generally try to get the encasing layer on reasonably quickly to avoid too much scumming.

Kimster · September 23, 2012, 06:39:30 PM

Thanks again Helbels...I'll give it a go now!

julieHB · September 24, 2012, 08:06:17 AM

You might find this blog post interesting:

http://envisionsf.blogspot.co.uk/2009/04/silver-glass-101-annealing-temperature.html

Kimster · September 24, 2012, 10:16:53 AM

Thanks Julie - will give that a try