Barrel beads cracking
 

Hi everyone,

Does anyone have the problem of barrel beads cracking on the ends after tumbling them?

This started fairly recently - I have been tumbling almost all of my beads for some time and tend to put 60 or 70 beads of all shapes and sizes in the tumbler at the same time.

A barrel is a pretty stable shape. I think I'd try more insurance heat on the ends of the beads first.

I picture might help too, sometimes there is a visual clue.

That's usually a thermal-shock problem, where the ends cooled faster than the middle. I had a lot of trouble with that, particularly on bicone beads before I learned to make extra sure that I'd heated the whole bead evenly before putting it in the annealer. It's very easy to forget the ends, particularly if you've spent a lot of time on decorating the middle.

Lets start calling this what it is. Its a failure in annealing. Of course if you dont box the piece with even heat throughout, it is much harder to reduce the stress overall. Lots of factrs can lead to this mode. This is why in the furnace glassblowing world we take great pains to flash the whole finished piece to equalize the heat before boxing.

Which way is it cracking? Through the middle or lengthwise?

Sue