Clarify Your Bead Cores

[CelticGlass]

Incase you've ever made a clear glass bead and felt the reaming leaves that ugly column of scoured glass running the length of the bead ??  Well there's a way of camouflaging it... Hmm disguise it then, if you've not been in the army.

Take a strand of soft cord and pass it thru the core. If its a tight fit then all the better and run it back and forth with water only first and to get the centre of long beads clear of the release you missed. Dry the bead core as best you can and then run another cord thru it, but with a little mineral oil. As in vegetable based cooking oil or olive oil. Sometimes best to push the cord in dry and add a small dab of oil on the cord and drag thru.

The oil will fill the minute serations scarred into the glass and make the core look glazed and shiny. All those tiny scratches from diamond reaming magically disappear.

Hope you find this useful - Ray  

[Billie]

Oooh, get you!!  Not just a pretty voice on the other end of Skype 

[CelticGlass]

Oooh, get you!!  Not just a pretty voice on the other end of Skype 

Pretty.... moi pretty.... Though art not just a pretty voice.... nae even a Welsh speaker..

One has a universal voice of intergalactic charm.    "Doesn't I"

[Bumpy Beads]

What a perfectly timed top tip that is! I've literally just finished cleaning a large clear bead and was wondering if there was a trick to getting the inside clear... thanks Ray!

[Funky Cow]

See?? You always have an answer to my beady problems

[Diane]

Great tip - thanks Ray.  I also use a little oil on the outside of an etched bead - gives it a more 'translucent' look - make sure to wipe well off.  This was a tip given to me by Diana East several years ago and I always do my etched beads this way. Once worn the natural oil from the skin keeps the bead 'conditioned'.

[Caroline]

i use a pipe cleaner and vasaline, i might do a compair test and see if ones better than the other

[CelticGlass]

Starting to sound like a cross over of medical procedures into bead technology.

Diane - The Diana East oil your beads thing was gifted to me by said person also.

She showed me a few years ago how she blasted and etched her beads and then the mineral oil thing to stop, as you say, the natural skin oils from making them patchy looking.

We owe so much to Diana me thinks...   

[Vicki]

First oiling our beads...next we'll be photographing them on the bonnets of our cars

[*Nicky*]

First oiling our beads...next we'll be photographing them on the bonnets of our cars

Hehehe just reinforces the fact that they are Pr0n !

[Buzzybead]

What a great tip Ray - looks ugly with a dirty great streak of white through my otherwise perfect creation...

[Bluebottle]

with a little mineral oil. As in vegetable based cooking oil or olive oil.
Hope you find this useful - Ray  

I'm a little confused here Ray Mineral oil is derived from crude oil and cooking oil or olive oil is made from plant material, which do you mean???

Mike   

[beadysam]

I would imagine the cooking or olive oil could become sticky or rancid - I don't know much about oil so correct me if I'm wrong.  Isn't mineral oil stuff like baby oil, or some of the carrier oils for aromatherapy?

[Dragonfire Glass]

great tip - will try that one!

[Mary]

You're right about the baby oil being mineral, Sam, but aromatherapy oils are plant based. I'd say you are right about vegetable oils being more inclined to go "off." Treat your beads like babies! Lol!