Quote:
Originally Posted by Mr. Smiley
It's not for fusing... fusing boro is a beast... I would guess it was made for the lighting industry if it wasn't intended for melting... if it's 33 COE boro and the coating is good, melt it.  |
That's what I've always heard about boro too, but people have been having some good luck fusing it in microwave kilns.
Check out this thread on the melting pot.
http://www.talkglass.com/forum/showthread.php?t=34430
All of that work was done with just a microwave kiln and borostix.
I'm new here, so I'm not sure if you work boro or not CarolS, but you could run some rudimentary compatibility tests pretty easily.
Just take a small chunk of the glass, and heat it in a propane only flame. If it melts into a gather(not just softens the sharp edges), chances are it's not boro. If it does melt, hit it with a propane/oxy flame and melt it into a small gather, and then attach that gather to another small gather of boro (so you've got them sandwiched together). Heat them up being careful not to twist, then pull a very fine stringer so both gathers are being pulled out parallel to each other. Let it air cool and observe what happens. If it stays straight, it's probably boro. If it bends, chances are it's not boro (since the different COE's are going to cause it to expnad and contract at a different rate).
If it doesn't work with boro, try it with a few other COE's. It may not work with any of them if it's not intended for melting, but at the same time, ya never know.