Is it possible to fuse a wine/drinking glass?

[Flowers]

Hi I am totally stumped and I think all you clever glass fuse re can help me with this question.
The other day my friend came over she recently became engaged asked me if she could give me the wine glass/drinking glass that she and her hubby had toasted their engagement with to make into something pretty she said she did not kind if I wanted to break the glass into smaller pieces etc to make something else with it.
I was totally flummoxed as I am still learning what glass can do and I know glass needs to be COE compatible and I have no idea what a drinking/wine glass COE would be.  I also don't know if I would be able to mix Bullseye with it to add colour.
Is it possible to recycled a wine glass/glass ? (I know it can be done with bottles)  How do I go about this and what sort of kiln schedule would be required? (I have a Hobbyfuser 3)
Can I add colour or mix with Bullseye glass?
I really want to have a crack at this (excuse the pun) I know it would make my friend so happy.
Thank you for your advice and kind help.

[Zeldazog]

I have no idea what wine glasses would be made of, but it almost certainly will *not* be compatible with Bullseye.

As the COE/compatibility would be unknown, testing would be essential if you wanted to mix them with other glass, although, like bottle or window glass, it should be okay to fuse to itself.

- although again, theoretically there is no guarantee that even the two wine glasses could be mixed together as they might not be from the same batch of glass, unless you know for sure they were made at the same time; the trouble with all but fusing glass is that there is no requirement for different batches of the same glass to be compatible as they've never been designed to be melted together.  That said, chances are they are from the same factory, same recipe so *should* be compatible.


There are plenty of ways of adding colour; enamels, decals, mica, bubble paints, copper inclusions, etc. 

There's a website called Glass With A Past (or similar) that might be worth checking out.

[flame n fuse]

I agree with Dawn!

[ARBeads]

Ok I've never tried this but it sort of popped in my head! I'd try a cheap wine glass first to see if it works.

Slump them like bottles keeping the glass shape. You could include copper heart cut outs within the bowls. Then mount them crossed over in a picture frame held together by a ring.

Ruth

[Flowers]

I love that idea Ruth it is beautiful thank you I definitely will try it on a regular glass first and see what happens. And thank you Zeldazog and Flamenfuse I shall read up on inclusions had not heard of Glass with a past will check it out 

[Flyingcheesetoastie]

Dawn, I love that Glass with A Past site and it's various ideas with molds!  I dunno why, when I think slumped bottles on their own are possibly the ugliest things in the world but I really like all her ingenious ideas to use the glass.  Quite labour intensive, but I would probably want to enamel little symbols onto the pieces afterwards too, so I'm no better!

[Zeldazog]

Dawn, I love that Glass with A Past site and it's various ideas with molds! 

I need to go over to it and have a good poke round - I get given random glass objects, interesting coloured bottles, etc, all the time - something I am sure lots of glass artists get!

Whilst I don't think slumped bottles are ugly, per se, they don't do anything for me apart from functionally (baby Baileys bottles, excellent teaspoon rest next to the kettle!) - but I've got a nice stash of Harveys Bristol cream blue now, to do something with :-)

[Flyingcheesetoastie]

No-one gives me bottles.... 
I think what has always been a sticking point for me is the hypercritical nature of it, in that yes it should be a great gesture to the environment to recycle this material but in fact when you look at the working temperatures involved they are much higher than using new glass to slump or cast with.

I think what has me intrigued though is the potential to twin slicing and dicing bottles with screen-printing my own decals, so the actual firings wouldn't be going that high...

Oh and if you wanna throw some of those Bristol Cream bottles my way to have a play with?   

[Zeldazog]

No-one gives me bottles....  

Since being at the studio (so the last five or so years) there's been - 8 or so Harvey's bottles in one go, plus I tend to get one every year or so.  Two veg boxes worth of some small green bottles, a dozen blue water bottles plus a random assortment of wine bottles and any 'funny shaped' ones usually come my way.  I have a growing collection of interesting shaped blue bottles that I usually add to a display.  The Baileys are usually my own  


I've found the odd random ornament on my workbench and people handing me things made of glass, with the question "can you do anything with this".  I don't help myself with my call outs for glass jars I guess, which I use for decorating workshops with children and community groups.  And I acquired some giant 500w factory light bulbs when we were allowed to look around the derelict tooling workshops of a nearby defunct steel works when I was doing the Metal Ages project.