The glass cooking is progressing well. A few pieces are turning what should have been lovely colors into black, but I'm told that's a hazard of the art. Many many more are turning out splendiferous. (Hey, it's a real word. Google it.) The new batches are mostly much easier to drill. Unfortunately the dremel decided to go on vacation. A new power cord to replace the one that heated up enough to melt its rubberized covering is in the process of being ordered. Luckily for me, the pieces I have already drilled should be enough for 5 or 6 chimes sets that I plan to put together on my own vacation. Apparently I just may have over-used it. Most people in the club just sit at its table and make one hole for one project at a time. It may not be made for steadier use.
Note to self: next fall just drill a few pieces of glass each day: really, a few, like 3 or 4. Each day. If I'm there when other members are working, they'll always be interrupting me for stuff anyway. How do I...? Where is ...? Can you...? What's the policy on...? When is the next...? It's why previous presidents slip in after hours in order to get something done, like I do now with the glass, or do lots of things at home like most of my wire work. My predecessor is currently into lost wax casting for sterling, and both shuts that room door shut with a "Do Not disturb" sign that you DO NOT IGNORE unless the building is burning, and comes in after hours with another member doing the same thing. That process is much more dangerous than what I'm doing and you have to have two there. Perhaps three. More is too crowded for safety again.
I talked to the RIGHT PERSON finally in the club, a fellow officer who does lots of fused glass work herself. She imparted two very valuable pieces of information. First, how easy it actually is to run a second small kiln the club has, so twice as much cut glass gets cooked at a time. When it was first explained, the workshop instructor went into so much detail about what other buttons are for which you don't use for what we do, that I got totally lost. Turns out what is involved after loading and locking it is... pushing one button. Many times, since each push gives a new readout. If you pay attention, it tells you this is in Program 4, used for fusion, how high it heats in its next step and how long it stays there before heading higher again. Fine if you need to know. Or, just keep pushing that button until it reads "ready" and push one more time till it says Go. Or something. But it starts humming so you know it's cooking. Make sure the fan is on to vent fumes, not from the glass but the kiln paper under it. Turn out the lights, shut the door, and walk away.
For how long? That was the second valuable piece of information I got. Usually we start it any time one day, return to the club the next and empty it. What we can actually do is start it at, say, 8 AM, then empty and reload it at 8 PM. When you first open those kiln doors it's likely to still be warm, but it will tell you how much. When I got there this morning both were registering around the one hundred teens. AKA summer outside in Phoenix. I just opened them first thing, went to cut glass for my next two loads, and returned in about 15 minutes, pulling out the slabs holding my newest glass pieces comfortably with bare hands before sliding the new slabs in and pushing buttons again. Now instead of one load, perhaps a dozen pieces per day, I can do four times as much. I should be through all I own in time to store away for fall. These pieces will get drilled just a few at a time in the fall until there are enough for more chimes before the holidays for those who won't get theirs during a personal summer visit. After that I'll be making my own.
The wire and accessories for summer are all packed already, drilled chimes bagged by color, so the only thing left is what they will hang from. It will be unique. The class instructor provided each of us an old wooden spoon to hang ours from. Hmmmmmmm. Ri-i-i-ight. I had a different idea.
When we bought this house, back in a fence corner, prevented from our access by an overgrown ocotillo and a clump of overgrown yuccas, all very spiny and ornery, was about a 3' skeleton from a saguaro cactus. You know, the ones that live a hundred hears before they send up their first arm from their trunk, grow maybe 40 feet tall, and are the icon of the Sonoran Desert? The ones everybody dug out of the desert for their home yards before they became protected? We had a piece of a trunk from one of those. Long since defleshed, it was stood upright in that back fence corner where only the neighbors could see it through the fence. Until last winter.
Having grown used to ignoring it, I was prowling the yard one day last winter when I noticed it lying on the ground. What the? One of the neighbors was doing yard work and knocked it over. One of his tools went through the chain link and unbalanced it. He apologized, but I thanked him for tipping it. I had Rich go fetch Steve's long handled grab stick and drag it out. In the process it broke into three vertical sections, each combined of multiple ribs. It sat out in our yard waiting for... something. A purchaser? An idea? He placed an ad, but nobody seemed to want a broken up, bug-holed, who knows how many years old one. An idea then was needed.
Life continued on, until wind chime workshop day. And a puny wooden spoon. I had something better. Or at least hoped I had. Time to go check how intact it remained. Lots of it looked pretty rough, but the main bits of ribs were solid and lightweight, an almost contradictory combination. I suddenly didn't want them stolen so I loaded them in the only secure place where I wouldn't be making (another) mess inside the house: my car trunk. They were so light I could carry the whole of them through the back yard into the carport. Setting them down so I could access the hatch door was more of a drop, and suddenly I had many more than three sections. Those ragged parts looked even more so. But there was still promise, or so I hoped.
Today was time to finally face facts. I reached in and after much thought pulled out a 3-rib section. I noted in places it was a 2 rib section. Rich provided a bucket and a hand saw, but not the labor. He was pulling weeds, and besides, this is my project. A half hour's work removed one third of the length, proving that despite its lack of heft it has plenty of strength. Sure, smaller loose pieces fell off into the bucket, some even onto the concrete where I sat working, but I continued taking off the other third of its length. In the process, several individual ribs fell away.
Finished sawing I examined them again. They were dirty. Part brown desert dust, part blackened wood, dirty. Rich brought me an old old old brass bristle brush, most of which's bristles from long hard use were curved over on top of themselves. My work turned the black to grey, the brown dirt to tan wood with a very unique grain pattern to it. The brass didn't scratch the grain like a steel one would have. Once all the easily removed bits still clinging were removed, what was left retained both beauty and strength. These will be excellent tops from which the chimes will hang.
Tonight, after cycling glass in the kilns again, when the sun has set and the air begins to cool back into the 90s, they will get spar/acrylic varnish brushed over them, then set to dry. I'll be working outside under the front door light, and have already set up a spot for them to dry. Seems I was a bit lax in clearing out the old small chicken wire cages from the front yard I'd had set around some new plantings to keep the rabbits from their preferred feast - anything brand new from the nursery which had been well fertilized (yummy) and watered (tender!). It never matters if they will ignore the same plant after a couple years adjusting to AZ climate cruelty. The new ones are irresistible. Last summer they managed to push up all the cages I set out and eat the plants down below dirt level.
The cages themselves are about perfectly sized to surround a 2 liter bottle. Old tent stakes crisscrossed through the mesh hold any two together, and five in a row with an old cardboard box beneath should be the perfect drying rack for them, laid across the tops. It's not pool walking night so I should have enough energy to get at least some of them done. Then we can pack them up in a few days, hopefully without them stinking up the car.
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