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Fundamentals of Glue Chipping IntroductionWhile there are several types of textures you can create from glue chipping glass, you will find that there are only two crucial variables involved in the creation of those textures. I have chosen two textures as the subject of this discussion in order to demonstrate how changing these two variables can cause a difference in the way the glue chips. The two styles we will investigate are the feather chip, and the snail chip, (so called because the patterns they create reflect their names). We hope to spark some creativity in your bones so you can go out and create some new styles of chip which we haven't dreamt up yet. Glue Preparation | Applying the Glue | The Feather Chip | The Snail Chip | Safety | Closing Remarks Preparing the Glass The first variable affects where the glue will chip. This variable is the surface of the glass itself. If the surface of the glass is smooth, the glue will not have the neccessary purchase it needs in order to chip the entire surface that it is applied to. Although putting glue on un-prepared glass can be an interesting experiment, I'll leave that for you to play with. I will, however, tell you that the results will be very unpredictibe, and sometimes extremely interesting if the glue does manage to purchase in some areas! For our purposes, we need to roughen up the surface of the glass. You can either acid etch the panel, or lightly frost (sand blast) it. The rough surface will give the glue a purchase on the glass as it dehumidifies and shrinks. When the glue shrinks enough, it will tear the surface of the glass off of the panel, leaving a textured appearance. After you have frosted the glass, you need to set it on a level surface. We find that we have to shim our glass to get it level, no matter how level we think our tables are. If the glass is not level, the glue will run to one side, leaving a thin area, which if it is too thin, will not chip. And the thick areas, where the glue ran to, will take a long time to dry. You remembered to put the frosted side up right? Preparing the Glue Now for the fun stuff. Making the glue! The glue we will use is often referred to as "glue chipping glue." Gee, I wonder where that term came from? The glue comes in a dry form, much like granulated brown sugar, but a little thicker. Depending on the retailer, you can get it in quantities of up to 50lb bags. To use the glue, you have to add water. We have found that as a general rule of thumb, a dependable mixture will consist of two parts water to one part glue (2/1). You can vary this a little by lessening the water to thicken the glue, or adding a little more water to thin the glue. I think you will find that two to one is a good place to start though. The container we use to put the glue in is a one gallon alhambra water jug, with a handle on the side. You can use any container you like, just as long as it doesn't leak ;) We normally put the water into the container first, that way when we funnel the glue into the container, it mixes with the water as it falls to the bottom of the container. You should mix it in either case, just to make sure none of the glue is clumped. Now you need to let the glue emulsify for about half an hour. The glue is pretty thirsty stuff, and it will suck up all that water you put in the container. The glue, when it has quenched its thirst, will be a rubbery mass sitting at the bottom of the container. When you can hold the container upside down without losing any water, you know its time for the next step. Heating it up! Heating up the glue, turns it into a liquid suitable for pouring onto the glass. It doesn't take much to heat it up, so don't go overboard with the range top. We use a double boiler at our studios to heat up the glue. This is simply a pot of warm to hot water which the container of glue will rest in. You should put pad at the bottom of the pot to keep the container of glue from resting directly on the heat from the range top. This will prevent you from melting a hole in your container. You can boil the water if you like, but keeping the temperature at about medium serves the purpose quite well. As the glue heats up, it will begin to liquify. Be sure to stir the glue every once in a while as it is "melting." This will help to speed up the glue, and prevent "lumpy soup." And now for the challenging part...The application. The Application We find that one of the greatest inventions on earth for applying the glue is a turkey baster. Or is it paster? I dunno, but someone deserves credit for this wonderful tool. It is long enough and narrow enough to reach into the container we have prepared the glue in. And, because the the container has a handle, we can take the container with us as we work. The glue will stay warm enough for quite a long time. You'll know it's time to put It back into warm water when the glue begins to get really thick. The actual application can be a little messy at first. But as you begin to learn the technique, your pets will have less and less floor droppings to investigate. I think our dog gained about ten pounds back when we first started. But I digress. A tip for you: Your clothes, your glass and those around you will thank you if you remember to put the baster back into the bottle as you finish squirting out the glue. DON'T try to stop the flow by pointing the tip in the air. The air bubble on the inside will send a good sized squirt of glue in whatever random direction it happens to be pointing. The mixture I recommended should give you the proper application thickness. Just make sure that if you see the glue making its way to one side of the glass, you shim it. If you find that the glue has dried unevenly, perhaps so much that it is very obvious, don't panic by removing the glue. Just add another layer of glue directly onto the thin areas. Everything will be just fine... If you used a masking tape when you frosted the glass, don't remove it until the glue has become gelatin like, and you can run a knife blade or a pin along the tape line to release the glue's hold on the tape. Once you have "cut" the glue from the tape, then remove the tape. Tip. You should always remove the tape before allowing the glue to chip And now let's take a look at variable number two: How you dry the glue. This variable, interestingly enough, controls how the glue will chip. Creating a Feather Chip Before the glue can chip, it must first dehydrate. This dehydration process causes the glue to become very hard. As it drys out, it shrinks. As it shrinks, it takes glass with it. We use two primary methods for drying the glue. These methods strangely enough, cause the glue to act in different ways. The first way creates a feather type chip, and the second way creates a snail pattern chip. To create the feather chip, direct a fan towards the panels of glass and "blow dry" the panels until you can touch them without tearing the glue. If you have any masking tape on the the panels of glass, be sure to remove it before the glue gets too hard, as mentioned previously. When the panels of glass are dry to the touch, it's time to place them into a heated room for the final stage. This room should have one or two fans inside of it blowing towards the glass. You should heat the room to about 80-85 degrees Fahrenheight to speed the chip along, but it is not necessary to get it this warm. If you are hurting for space because your panels are too large, you can stand them on end. This won't affect the glue chip at all. Just make sure the glue is dry. This is a good place to point out that if the panels are not dry enough, the heat of the room may cause the glue on the panels to re-emulsify. If this happens, you need to turn off the heat, put the panels back down flat so the glue doesn't run, and keep the fans on the panels until they are dry. The panels should chip in a day. If they don't, one of two things probably happened. The glue wasn't dry yet, or the application of the glue was too thin, rendering the glue too weak to pull up the glass. Creating a Snail Chip To create a Snail chip, you need only change one aspect; the drying method. Instead of directing a fan on the panels, allow them to dry overnight on their own. You can leave them on the table you used to glue them on, or if you need the space, you can stand them up on end after about an hour of drying time. This time may vary depending on the humidity in the air, so before you stand them up, make sure the glue doesn't move when you touch it. It should have a pretty solid consistency to it. Alas, we have covered the finer details of glue chipping. and now we're ready for the clean up. You'll note that this glue was primed with water to get it ready. In the same way, you can re-emulsify it with water, making cleanup fairly simple. All you need is a bucket of warm water, perhaps some wet towels you can drape over the panels to soak the unchipped glue, and a little bit of elbow juice. Safety Encouraged This may seem a little bit odd, but glue chipping can be a little bit dangerous if you don't wear safety glasses. When the glue is drying, it comes under some very intense stress. I recall watching a large panel of 1/4" plate bow it's ends off of the table. This stress can break thin glass, sending fragments airborn. In fact, when glue chips, it does exactly that. Pieces curl up, and some areas explode off the face of the glass. The glue chips that do come off the glass, contain very sharp shards of glass, so you should always wear safety glasses when you are inspecting glass that has not fully chipped yet. Wearing gloves is always encouraged too. Closing Thoughts Sunny days are perfect for glue chipping. Don't think that you need a warm room in order to glue chip glass. We have chipped plenty of jobs outside in direct sunlight with great success. And the best part about this method is that solar heat is clean and cheap! I mentioned earlier that you can purchase glue chipping glue in some glass retail stores, but I didn't list any. The reason for this is that I only know of retailers local to my place of business, namely the San Francisco Bay Area. If you know of some retailers around your neck of the woods, please send me their address and phone number, and I will be glad to post it in one of the many resource loaded, upcoming sections of this web site. In fact, I just put together a resource page that you can visit right here. Now for your input In order for this resource to be useful, I need to know what you think about articles like this one. Was this one helpful to you? Was it lacking, superficial, in depth or just not interesting? Please email me with your thoughts and suggestions. it only takes a few keystrokes, and the result I hope will be a benefit to everyone! Suggestions/Comments |