Using Val's frits with BE - advice?

[squid]

I love some of the frit blends that Val has and emailed her about using them with Bullseye, and she responded that yes, they can be used (in moderation of course) due to the lead based glass in many of them.

What I would like to know is if anyone here has used them with BE and how they worked? which ones have you tried, etc?

Any feedback appreciated.

Thanks!

Sigrid

[Karen Hardy]

Even though many people say it's ok to do this in small quantities (5%) the lab rat in me says it's not a good idea. First of all - how do you know for SURE that it's 5%? Guesstimate? Second, the glass is not compatable (moretti is 104, BE is 90 and frit is usually 96). I spoke to some friends of mine a while ago that are glass geeks and they told me that it's just generally not a good idea to mix COEs, even in small percentages if you can avoid it.

It (to me) doesn't make much sense to spend so much time making beads and making jewelry with them and taking a chance that the beads might break somewhere down the line. Especially since I can easily buy beautiful glass in the 96 COE range (gaffer, Reich, Uroboros) and use that exclusively for frit beads.
...and you don't really need a huge pallet, since the color and patterning comes from the frit - not so much the underlying glass, which is used more for contrast. If you stick to the basics - black, white, clear, almond, blue, green, red, yellow - then you should be covered.

Just my .02 - why take risks when they are easily avoidable.

[meadowesky]

I do it all of the time and it works fine for me.

[squid]

I may have to give it a whirl - Val has some super luscious frits and I want want want!

[Jenn L'Rhe]

Sigrid,
The only problem I have ever had is encasing a pink frit with bullseye clear...I used a bullseye clear base, a mixture of several pink frit blends (Val's Tutti Fruitti, Pewter Rose, Glass diversions ??? and purple reichenbach frit) melted and swirled then encased in clear. About 1/3 cracked. But worked well with Moretti.

No problem if I didn't encase though.
Kay
(Mom to Jenn, Lu and Rhe)

[MaryBeth]

I didn't have any problems until I started combining BE, silver foil, and the frits. I found that I really needed to soak at the higher side of the BE range (around 970 -980). I also slowed down my annealing schedule to about 1 degree per minute until about 700 degrees. This resolved my problems.

And this frit is much closer in COE to BE than it is to Moretti. Viscosity is also a factor in compatibility. BE has a good article on this somewhere on their site.

[Three Muses Glass]

I just did some the other day with BE, silver foil and Silver lake. Not encased though. They came through fine, it was just a bit on the surface. The beads went in hot and really cool looking, but they came out looking like beads that you'd WANT to have crack, but no they're fine.

[squid]

oink oink - based on the feedback, I just ordered a the glass hog mystery pack off of her site.....

Thanks everyone for your help!

[Karen Hardy]

Just another glass-is-half-empty message. I have some BEAUTIFUL beads in my collection from a VERY well known bead artist who used to mix COEs. I used a few in sold jewelry and some in my personal jewelry, and some were kept for the "fondle factor".

Four years after I bought them (4 YEARS), over 1/2 of them cracked. When I wrote her back about them, she told me that she has since switched to gaffer and Uroboros glass for her frit beads for just this reason. She replaced all of the cracked ones (and threw in some extras, bless her). She also mentioned in her email how she's giving herself an ulcer over the beads that are still "out there", since she relies heavily on her "name" as a bead artist (and that's what brings in astronomical prices for her beads), and she hates that people will think she makes defective beads.

It's all about thinking about the big picture - I don't want any beads out there that are in the least bit questionable. That's why I always make sure to anneal properly, use the right temperatures and NEVER mix my COEs.

I'll sign this one
Her majesty - the queen of anal-retentiveness

[castaway]

Buying and using pre-mixed fritts is like buying a "pig in a poke" you have no idea what you are getting. It is just possible that the people who mix the fritt and sell it under fancy names are mixing, Kugler, Reichenbach, Zimmerman, Ornela, Gaffer, Lauscha and even the Bullseye and Spectrum fritt. all in one mixture. You have no way of knowing and all of these glasses have different COEs. Make and Mix your own fritt, only then will you know for certain what is in it.
B

[Karen Hardy]

I'm not sure where you're buying your mixes from, but all the vendors I deal with specifically state what the COEs are in their frit mixes - they don't mix COEs, and if you ask they'll tell you which MFG they use.
My favorite frit sources for 96 COE frit are:
www.spiraldancedesign.com , www.valcox.com, http://glassdiversions.com/

Originally Posted by castaway

Buying and using pre-mixed fritts is like buying a "pig in a poke" you have no idea what you are getting. It is just possible that the people who mix the fritt and sell it under fancy names are mixing, Kugler, Reichenbach, Zimmerman, Ornela, Gaffer, Lauscha and even the Bullseye and Spectrum fritt. all in one mixture. You have no way of knowing and all of these glasses have different COEs. Make and Mix your own fritt, only then will you know for certain what is in it.
B

[Stinky Jr]

Karen thank you. When I first started out lampworking I did use frit on a few sets of 104coe. Since reading about it and considering the consequences, I stopped. Temptation to mix coes is great with so many recommending it. I am glad you wrote about your experiences because I was beginning to think I was much to anal. Now once again I feel correct in my choice. Thanks again.

[Karen Hardy]

Exactly, Linda. It just doesn't make sense to not do this correctly.
I "invest" SO much time making a bead, advertising it, selling it (in its
raw form or making jewelry out of it).

I SEE the customers that bought jewelry and beads from me year after year, as they come back to my shows, or order from me online. They tell me how much they love their jewelry and how much they wear it. I mean - do YOU keep your jewelry for a year and then discard it? I make some pretty heavy duty stuff - designed to be handed down to the next generation (as I'm sure we all do). I would be devastated if someone's "favorite necklace for the last 5 years" suddenly developed cracks in the beads (and heaven forbid if those beads are made from an "Odd color" that's not being made anymore).

It's not like it's a big initial investment - 96 COE rods (Uroboros) are DIRT cheap and come in a vast array of colors. Even if you just invest in a pound of white and a pound of clear - that should serve 99% of your frit-bead making needs. Both the white and the clear are around $15 a pound - so for a $30 investment, you can sell your beads with a clear conscience, knowing you did everything in your power to make a quality product.

So knowing all that - why on earth would I purposely make beads that are flawed and have the potential to crack somewhere down the line. To me, mixing COEs when it's clearly not necessary, is as bad as not annealing your beads. It's bad-beadmaking.

(yeah, yeah..I know....stepping off my soapbox.... )

Originally Posted by Stinky Jr

Karen thank you. When I first started out lampworking I did use frit on a few sets of 104coe. Since reading about it and considering the consequences, I stopped. Temptation to mix coes is great with so many recommending it. I am glad you wrote about your experiences because I was beginning to think I was much to anal. Now once again I feel correct in my choice. Thanks again.

[Kalera]

In my experience, small amounts of heavily-leaded furnace frits used on the SURFACE ONLY of a glass with a COE that differs within 8 points is not likely to develop problems.

HOWEVER

We do not know the lead contents of most of the furnace frits. Some have none and even one piece on the surface of a glass of differing COE will crack... the little piece of frit will crack, not the base bead. I have a whole set of beads that I wear as a bracelet for me because I made the flower petals with a COE94 glass on a base of Bullseye, and the flower petals cracked.

Most of the time it's OK. Sometimes it's not. It's hard to know when it's OK and when it's not.

As Karen brought up, there are lots of COE 96 canes to choose from these days. There's Uroboros and Caliente and Reichenbach and Kugler and Gaffer.

There are also tons of Bullseye frit colors - more than there are rod colors (!) that you can buy very cheaply directly from Bullseye! Most of my frit work now is done with Bullseye frits. Several vendors also carry Moretti frits, which are very reasonably priced. I wish more colors were available more consistently, but then again, maybe if more folks were buying Moretti frit, they would be. Can you imagine Silver Plum frit? YUM.

[shawnette]

Originally Posted by Kalera

Several vendors also carry Moretti frits, which are very reasonably priced. I wish more colors were available more consistently, but then again, maybe if more folks were buying Moretti frit, they would be. Can you imagine Silver Plum frit? YUM.

Howaco Glass carries the complete Moretti line in frit. http://www.howacoglass.com/morettifrit2.html