Kiln Temperatures

I'm starting to feel more human and, this morning, was down in Godalming collecting something nice for Ms Katyboo's birthday when I noticed that the empty premises next door to the art supplies shop is being refurbished as The Wey Gallery.  The place is just being fitted out at present so I have no idea what kind of gallery it's going to be, but it got me pondering that I might just see if they'd be interested in looking at any of my fused glass items.

I've been contemplating whether or not to have a go at doing slumping.  This is not, as you might imagine, lolling on the sofa in front of the telly - that I'm a master at and don't need any practice at all.  Slumping glass involves putting something in the kiln that, effectively, the glass is, when heated enough, going to drape itself over and take the form of.  You can buy moulds in different shapes, you coat them with some kind of anti-sticking, releasing agent (probably a liquid in this case), balance your sheet of glass over the top and heat it up enough so that it, literally, slumps over/into the mould.

There are many shapes and you can improvise as well. 

 A couple of slumping moulds

The results can be amazing:

(www.treasuresbyteresa.net)

(http://www.prismcontemporary.com/Artists/KelmanJ/KelmanJinventory.htm)

Admittedly, those two examples above are just unbelievably accomplished, so I'll be going for something much simpler.  I'll keep you updated as to progress on this. 

But while I was having a look, I found this brilliant table which gives the kiln temperatures for different glass processes in both fahrenheit and centigrade, so for the sake of my readers who have been most interested in my 'how to fuse dichroic glass' post and have asked follow-up questions on temperatures, I would suggest printing out a copy and putting it either near your kiln or putting it in your firing logbook.