punties and soft glass

[Beatrix92]

I have been watching videos for making marbles, and reading my cool tutorial on implosions. However, most of this information is for boro. Their punties just pop off like magic. When I am trying this, I end up with about a quarter inch of rod sticking to my marble. What am I doing wrong?
Is there a difference in soft glass vs boro and punty techniques?
Bea

[losthelm]

Try using a boro punty,
With marbles and other punty work your using a cool joint between the punty and the work.
Soft glass flows a lot more then boro so it can be tricky to avoid fuseing joint.
The technique is fairly close but soft glass flows a lot easier making things more difficult.

[Talonst]

Soft glass gets hot faster and stays hot longer than boro so you have to pause longer before you tack the punty if you're trying to make a cold seal. Also sounds like you may be getting just the tip of the punty rod hot very fast which is causing stress in the rod just beyond the tip. So when you go to tap of the punty it was hot enough it formed a seal and the break occurs on the rod where there's lots of stress.

For soft glass marbles I usually make all of my punties hot seals until the last one - the cold seals are risky. A larger rod gives more surface area for the cold seal, so you can hang a larger mass off of it, but it's also more prone to stressing and cracking in soft glass.

Hope this helps

[Beatrix92]

that does help! LOTS. lol. Would using a boro punty on soft glass help?

[speedingpullet]

Yes, using a boro punty with 104 works well, especially on the 'top' side of a marble where you can get inclusions and fogging from a steel punty.

Its been a while since I made marbles with soft glass, but I used to build up the main body with steel punties and then switch to boro ones as I neared completion, as once you've flamed off the join and gotten the boro residue off, they should leave no trace.

Next time you buy some glass, buy a couple of rods of clear boro. I wrap duct tape around the ends of mine so as I don't mistake them for 104! Just remember not to collect the shards when they pop with your 104 shards, or you will be sad.

[Beatrix92]

Thank you!!
I will do that!

[Mr.Smeeth]

What talonst said. I use 10mm soft glass clear rods for punties.

[RSimmons]

I would recommend doing a little exercise to improve your punty technique. Take 2 boro rods and make a little flat ends on them, then make a soft glass marble of just plain glass - white is good for practice because it's softer and in some ways is more difficult. Once you master that you are good to go with other glass. Take your marble and put it on punty, round it up and then transfer to the other punty. Practie making cold seals and releasing them by swapping the white marble back and forth for a while. Once you get a feel for the heat control and how the seals work you'll be ready to move on to complex marbles and you'll have the punty technique down pat.Practice, practice practice makes perfect!

Robert

[Beatrix92]

Great advice!!! I will try that tomorrow.
Thank you!!
Bea

[eregel]

There's some good information in the Marble forum on doing marbles in 104. This thread helped me a lot, especially the link to richsantaclaus's video in post 23

http://www.lampworketc.com/forums/sh...ght=soft+glass

[Beatrix92]

how did I miss that! I thought I looked at all the marble stuff. Thanks, Pat!