ive been doing torchwork for about a year now. check out thegldg.com its a great glass working forum if your really interested in getting into it.
you can get a super bare bones set up for making soft glass beads for under 100 bucks. check out a hothead torch. it runs on plain mapp gas from the store. will let you get a feel for it without blowing loads of cash.
to answer some of the other questions... pipes are made out of borosilicate (pyrex) glass which requires a higher working temp. you will need a fuel/oxy torch to melt it, not just a brazing type torch.
if you do melt it back smooth, you will need to anneal it after. which is the process of 'baking' the glass to allow the thermal stresses built up from having some parts molton and some not to flow out of the pipe. if you do not do this, someday down the road the glass will end up cracking by itself.

Blowing glass
Started By
psybercillin
, Jan 08 2004 08:26 PM
22 replies to this topic