Quick Tips: Making Fused Glass Pebbles

We manufacture glass pebbles-- our Colorado River Rock-- every day here at Handworks Studio. If you have time, making your own is easy, albeit tedious. Here's that recipe!

Pebbles do not need to be annealed. 

Ingredients:

Fusing glass cut into a six by six inch square (or scrap if you'd prefer)

Directions:

Score your glass into even squares. Here is a picture of my set up. I use a Morton Portable Glass Shop to which I've added rulers from an office supply store. 

• 1/4" square yields a gem just under 1/4"
• 1/2" square yields a gem just under 1/2"
• 1" square yields a gem measuring about 8/10"

Place your squares on a kiln shelf that's been fitted with Papyros or Thinfire shelf paper (The strange shapes are puddles. I fill up every inch of space every day!)

Pro tips: Once you have scored your glass sheets, you'll want to have squares that break off nice and evenly. 

• Run your scored glass under hot water until the glass is very warm to the touch. (I wash my glass at this stage using dish soap.)
  
  
  
  
• Break these off in strips of about three rows. Grasp your glass using a thumb and finger to squeeze the glass on the score line. This adds stability and keeps the glass from running off the score.

Firing instructions: In my big kiln. I do AFAP to 1480; hold 5 minutes (for 1/4 squares, longer for larger squares up to 20 minutes); afap to 600; hold 5 minutes; afap to 200; shut off. I used to just turn it crash cooling your kiln can be hard on the elements.

In my little kiln (manual control) high 38 minutes or until it reaches 1490. Turn it down to maintain 1490 and run another 7 minutes. Then I just turn it off.

Items used in the demo (Just click to go):
Choice Running Pliers

Thinfire