Fusing and Slumping Glass on a Budget
by Georgie
(Brighton, England)
Slumping Glass in Mould
I want to run a simple fusing and glass slumping project in the day centre of a charity for people with learning disabilities where I work. We are on a tight budget and have read about using bottle glass for fusing & slumping glass. You mention special fusing glass and problems with mixing glass, is it not possible to use old jars, bottles and sheet glass? Can you offer any advice on whether this is possible?
We have a ceramic kiln.
Milly's reply: Sounds great Georgie. You're right, you have to use glass that is compatible - meaning that it heats and cools at the same rate - otherwise it will crack or be unstable and dangerous.
To get around this you can use float (or window) glass - I'm assuming that's what you mean when you say 'sheet glass'? - as long as you fuse it to itself. So you could rescue some glass from a skip, cut it up and fuse it to itself. You could get fancy and add some wire in between the layers for visual interest.
Similarly with bottles - you could either just melt them and enjoy the shapes they make (I've seen people selling these!) or break them safely and fuse them together by making sure all the pieces are over-lapping before you put them in the kiln.
With regard to the glass slumping process. It's best to fuse flat first, and then shape the glass into a mold. This can be a stainless steel bowl, or a ceramic mold - as long as you've painted it with a separator, like batt wash, to stop the glass sticking to it.
A ceramic kiln is fine, just make sure the shelves are clay-free. There's a Kiln Firing Schedule here that might start you off.
Come back and post some photos on the site once you've had a go, I'd love to see them.
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