Aurae this is driving me mental

[turquoise]

Hi there, I need some more help on this one.
I have wasted 2 rods of Aurae so far and I really love the glass.

Right I think I have just got the idea that you need the flame really low when melting this glass as before as soon as I put the rod in the flame it went silvery.
So I turned the gas right down and that seemed to do the trick. I now have 2 lovely silver badly shaped beads.

But what do you do if you have made a lovely shaped bead and then want to decorate it with aurae but need to keep such a low flame that your bead cracks???

Also I had a go at encasing aurae after I had reduced it and I must have got it all too hot as it rose to the top of the clear and went a really yucky colour.

Any helpful hints.

Vicky 

[Amber]

Well I'm not an expert, but I can tell you what I do...

I'm on a Hothead and I don't turn the flame down at all. If the glass goes silvery before I'm ready for it, I just carry on as normal - as you work in a normal flame the reducing effect tends to disappear anyway. Then just reduce again when you're ready. I'm not sure it matters if it reduces straightaway anyway, I haven't noticed any of my beads looking worse for it. I guess it depends what you're doing, though.

As for the mucky colours...I think with Aurae (and any of the silver colours) it's not a matter of doing anything 'wrong' as such...it actually has more to do with the phases of the moon, the colour of your pants and what you had for breakfast  Mine has turned some horrible colours a couple of times and I've no idea why, I didn't do anything different to normal. With silver glasses, you just have to accept that half the time it's going to do it's own thing whatever you do! 

Have fun playing 

[Hayley]

What kind of set up do you have? Are you on an oxycon? It sounds like your oxygen purity level is fairly low, thus your neutral flame is slightly reducing. Try upping your oxygen and set your flame to be what you may think is slightly oxydising.

You do not need to use a small flame to work Aurae. I have a Barracuda and never have a problem with Aurae turning silver-y until I reduce it.

Hope this helps.

[turquoise]

Thanks for the top tips, I have got it all sorted now. had a great time on Sunday making beads.

Good job I have some large bundles of the glass to play with.

Vic

[Hayley]

Good to hear, Vic. Sorry I didn't see your question earlier, I really need to pop in this forum more often!