It's been awhile. For the benefit of those of you who don't blow glass.... a brief explanation. The glory hole (the round drum-looking thing that you reheat the piece you are working on) normally runs at about 2300 to 2500 degrees. When you get ready to blow glass you light it and turn it on. I goes from ambient temperature (whatever temperature it is outside) to the operating temperature. You blow glass for however long. (2 - 5 hours) You shut it down. It returns to ambient temperature. Those kinds of extreme fluctuations cause expansion and contraction. Over time, (in my case, about 2 years) the insulating material in the glory hole cracks and falls apart. That's what happened to me. I ordered another "liner" from Denver glass. Micah and I installed it. It was easier than I thought. After doing this, we were feeling so good about ourselves, we did something that was long over due. We got rid of a bunch of clutter and reorganized the glass studio. We outdid ourselves. It's still not perfect, but it's pretty good. I had a bunch of color that hadn't been organized and bottled and labeled. We did that. We installed shelving (that I had bought at an auction about 9 months ago and wondered if I would ever use it.) to hold all the glass color, in frit and rod form. I had more color than I thought I did. Here is a picture. Click on it to get the full import. We may start blowing tomorrow. Maybe not. We have been finishing creating Italian Jim's Website also. Next we are going to have a official website for Bella Forte Glass studio. Going to try to promote sales of lighting and art from there. I don't know exactly. Maybe not. We are going to try to showcase the different things we do.
Catch you later.
