Bucket o mud versus fosterfire heavy duty boro?

pmoores · #1 07-07-2006, 09:14 PM

Well I order a bottle of foster fire boro which I was using in the past for my cabochon mandrels which are up to 2inches held on a circle of mandrel with a small point.

Unfortunately I got a bottle of bucket of mud instead of what I ordered, 2nd time a mess up for this unnamed vendor. Though when it messed up almost 2 years ago I didnt go back until now (moment of weakness).

Now the bucket of mud may work great but I was wondering if anyone has any opinions of the 2.

I wont get to set up my shop until I get back to Canada in about 2 weeks or so, so wont have no other release unless I order at that point.

Even with foster fire, only air drying seemed to work good enough to give you 90% certainty of not losing your work.

Course I may be way off, and find this bucket of mud even better but I hate to play experimenting when I will be busy setting up a house and have to wait to reorder other stuff during the move in process.

Any opinions on the brands?

Helen Simon · #2 07-07-2006, 09:25 PM

BOM is my favorite, and when my dh starts thinning it w/ Alice's, when it's running low, I can always tell because it breaks on me. Straight BOM never breaks, and I make almost entirely sculpted beads...I torture the molten blobs, but he's very strong and uses pliers to de-mandrel all my beads...while I'm still dreaming about the day's new beads.

I have heard complaints that it's too strong, but not for me...er, husband. hth Love, Helen

pmoores · #3 07-07-2006, 11:10 PM

Strength is important, maybe ill even like it better. Still dont excuse a vender sending me what after a years experience I know isnt lauscha but selling it anyways when im sure its vetrofond. Now the whatever happens to be in stock vice what I asked for.

Sure hope your right, as a 2inch blob of glass gets heavy when it only has the flat disc surface to hold onto.

sandree · #4 07-08-2006, 09:15 AM

I use Bucket O Mudd for my boro beads. It still does crack and let go sometimes but I use so much heat..almost anything does. Used to use Fusion but I found it so hard to get the longer focal beads off the mandrels that I switched. I had no luck at all with Foster Fire but at that time, it may not have been the heavy duty boro type or maybe I didn't master how thin or thick it had to be. Anyway...so far..BOM is my favorite.

Sandy

richsantaclaus · #5 07-08-2006, 11:28 PM

BOM for me!!!!!

G.L.McBead · #6 07-09-2006, 08:20 PM

I like a little BOM added to heavy duty Foster.
G.

SuzyQ · #7 07-09-2006, 08:34 PM

I use those same mandrels and have found BOM to be better. I find that if I let them air dry for 24 hours I have less tiny tip popping off and releasing the cabachon than FF. But, after a few days all bets are off. Hope this helps!

grandbeads · #8 07-09-2006, 09:07 PM

I like both of these bead releases but not for boro.Mixing foster half and half with sludge plus works pretty good to me tho...Roger.

fosterfire · #9 07-09-2006, 09:57 PM

Our HD release does work better when air dried, but should still work fine when flame dried.

Dry the release gently in the tips of flame. Make sure to dry thoroughly. Breakage can occur if release is not all the way dry and this is true of any flame dry release.

Sharon Peters uses our release for her largest sulpturals so it should be able to easily sustain the beads you have described.

Lewis Wilson uses a mix of 2/3 FF heavy with 1/3 Fusion. He says our release works fine but he's not patient for the extra 3 seconds so he adds fusion. I've seen him seriously abuse the release and not had the bead break loose, yet he says the beads come off easily.

Hope this helps.

TheRedhead · #10 07-10-2006, 01:48 AM

Foster Fire has been my preference since day one. I've tried a few of the others, but FF gives me no grief and my beads release easily and have never had one slip from cracked release

pmoores · #11 07-10-2006, 06:44 AM

Tks for info, guess like I said, ill get to play with the bucket of mud despite the fact I was quite happy with the Fosterfire release. Course it can hold like concrete on those particular mandrals and it wouldnt matter, exception being when im cheating and prying off the glass above annealing temperature to place in kiln without mandrel (got 4 round and 2 square) as I dont have enough mandrels on a busy day.

But as mentioned, getting to play this experiment since the vendor did decide to play swap the product. Strange though, sent email out and got no response back. Yep 2nd and last time ill let myself be burned there.

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