Lmst

Another exciting thing I did at work was make this 25mm crackle tube!

The folks in the office are talking about selling 8 foot crackle tubes. I had never done one in 25mm, but hey it totally works, especially when you bake out the filling in a kiln! I dont think 8 feet would be too heavy... so long as it was handled carefully.

I learned that the opaque colorful frit is not as nice as the clear-and that it will actually be cheaper to buy crystal f4 "frit" than it will be to pay people to crush glass. That is, unless the office can upsell the recycling- our fill glass is currently recycled tubes.

I was kinda fearing the 8 footer, but now I really DO want to make one. Its slow and meditative- as long as the tube doesn't split open and spill its crushed glass guts everywhere :)

I really should make a peertube video of this so you can see the lightning

#neon #crackletube #plasma #plasma? #glass #specialeffects #fancy #25mm #nyc #workinprogress #work #frit #crush #recycled

the crackle tube lit up with a bunch of crossed wires an alligator clips on the fancy felt table that I put stuff to sit for awhile (messy). Lets see how this runs for awhile. That red arc dances around really quickly. 22 torr of neon gas (atmosphere is about 755 torr). Vaudeville neon is also sitting here

The fancy Europeanesque electrode prep for the 25mm crackle tube. I used the recycled free electrodes so I side tubulated. I really like the corner side tube. These new vigoreaux (not sure how they are spelled) are much easier to make. They are designed to keep the fill glass away from the electrodes.

"bombarding" the tube with the aging transformer. The idea is to use the most amount of air as you can while still maintaining an arc. The air is a poor conductor and has lots of resistance, so it generates heat when you put current through it. Like sandpaper. The aging transformer only has 60ma of current- so its a gentle sander. The white arc there is a mostly clean ish air arc.

Crackle tube and work table after sealing the last electrode on (you can see my brass holder. The Trash and Vaudville pattern I made (in case of breakage) is underneath as well as various sorting bins an tools for the glass. the big black transformer at the end acts as a weight. I sealed the electrode on with a hand torch

A test setup of the crackle tubes I made for Daniel Tepper. These are neat to make and simple in a strange way.

I learned that they should be run on separate transformers when together light this. I left the red and emerald tubes on together like this on one transformer for a few hours and they got hot and eventually the electricity took a shortcut straight through the walls of the glass so I remade them.

Im learning too :)

#lightning #sculpture #glass #fabrication #nyc #crackletube #neon

A little video of the xenon and Blacklight tubes for Daniel Tepper. Forbidden Palestine Colors. The Blacklight crackle is a little brighter than I thought it would be. The xenon is neat. If you shake the tube the powders settle and the paths move when the glass adjusts. The powders brighten it.

These both look kinda dim next to the red and the green.

The xenon sure is fun to have!

#neon #xenon #blacklight #crackletube #glass #plasma #specialeffects #nyc #sculpture #light #lightning #brooklyn

I got to use my cheap-O ZVS driver induction heater today. Been making some crackle tubes for an artist named Daniel Tepper. The crackle tubes are fun, real lighting in a bottle. I heat them with a weak, gentle transformer and use the induction heater help heat the electrodes (Activating a getter and helpful alkali coating).

I think I will make some more of this classic special effect

#neon #induction #zvs #crackletube #glass #sculpture #art #studio #plasma #brooklyn #fabrication #murano

Using a coil I wound with some found stranded wire, 7 turns , zip tied to hold them together. Works like a charm with the ATX power supply 12 volt rail. Electrode heated

A change in coils to the original solid copper coil to induction heat the non tubulated electrode on an emerald green crackle tube with noviol gold fill

detail of the electrode being heated wirelessly with induction on a Blacklight Crackletube

Processing the emerald and noviol crackle tube. The Argon Hg blue will be filtered by the yellow glass to a nice yellow green, and then filtered again by the emerald. Rolled butcher paper strips on the tube tell me when its getting hot.

Here is a little video of that crackle tube so you can see the lightning.

After 10 years of neon, this is my first crackle tube. Made exclusively with the crossfire and bombarded. Cheap O side tubulation.

I think I might make another. I wanna make a ruby red one.... I also want different gases. Other colors of glass might be nice.

What should be written in neon lightning?

#lightning #glass #crackletube #neon #plasma ? #brooklyn #nyc #sculpture

After hours of "bombarding" off an on with the aging transformer, holding it over a big puffy flame an a few flushes of #neon gas, the crackle tube fill finally cleaned up!

The lightning arcs tighten up and get more active as the gas pressure increases. Too much pressure and it will run hot with resistance. This one is 24 torr (755 is atmosphere)

Ok I have crackle tube fever now. If I just wasn't so busy with other work now.

Thanks Bill Concannon!

#sculpture #light #crackletube #nyc #glass

#crackletube

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