Digging at the Whitall Tatum factory?

[AntiqueMeds]

Would the molds have been made at the glasshouse

I would think molds would be made at a separate metal foundry. Big glass houses could have had their own foundy areas but it was sort of out of the scope of glass blowing. I have read about molds being ordered and delivered to glass houses so at least some of them didnt make their own molds.

 

[AntiqueMeds]

Those brass/bronze molds have so little relative mass that they would probably cool down very fast.

 

[tigue710]

ive seen etchings and have read accounts of molds being attached and even sunken into the floor of early glass houses. It seems it would be very time consuming and difficult to move the molds around between each use also. Im sure they were put away when they were not in use, after an order was filled, but considering that glass blower's were paid in piece work, and could blow a bottle a minute, i dont think it would be necessary to warm the mold between each use...I really believe the molds were not warmed, except for maybe the first piece blown which could of been tossed, until later in the 19th century. My guess is that they only started using them to keep the bottles more uniform...

how cool does a mold, whether brass or Iron, have to be before it disturbs the manufacturing process? Im thinking it would have to be shockingly cold...

I wonder if someone here on the forum would be willing to let a mold be used for investigation? Gotta be someone on here with some molds...

 

[RED Matthews]

Hello to all of you!!!!!!!!!! What a Thread.----------
Well all of you this has been a job maker for me. I have just put together a copy of this thread so I can make comments directed to each of you, if I have two cents of value to offer that may help you get a better feel of the way I see it.. This whole search of the pieces of evidence, we have been able to read about and learn about, has kept me busy for at least a good fourty years (- because it started when I was still working in the industry). After retirement from my world marketing of mold metal castings and studying the different things I saw and experienced in those travels; I went to collecting books and reading to learn more about how glass products were made before 1900. These studies and my years of glass collecting have all exposed me to the mysteries of making bottles in these earlier methods. The marks on the glass are almost all I have to come to some of my solutions to the BOTTLE MYSTERIES of how things were done that didn’t get covered in the books written. I will work on this coverage for the next couple days no doubt. RED Matthews [/align]

 

[kungfufighter]

Mark Vuono has a scroll flask mold that he has shared with some modern glassblowers and the results of their efforts have been surprising to say the least. To date, none of the flasks have survived the annealing process and from the shards (yes, you read that correctly) it would seem that the blowers are unable to create an even gather, in that the pieces show a wide distribution of glass thickness. Amazing that even with computer controlled kilns these folks cannot replicate the efforts of some drunk old glassblower blowing glass warmed by hickery, ash and apple wood[]

 

[AntiqueMeds]

I would expect most modern art glass blowers are accustomed to creating freeblown items. Blowing in molds would require a different set of skills. There is a lot of rhythm, precise timing, and team work involved in blowing glass. It would likely take a good bit of practice to start producing acceptable bottles in these molds.
The fact that glass blowers were recruited from other factories rather than just plucking folks off the street and training them indicates it took time to gain the skill set.

 

[kungfufighter]

ORIGINAL: AntiqueMeds

I would expect most modern art glass blowers are accustomed to creating freeblown items. Blowing in molds would require a different set of skills. There is a lot of rhythm, precise timing, and team work involved in blowing glass. It would likely take a good bit of practice to start producing acceptable bottles in these molds.
The fact that glass blowers were recruited from other factories rather than just plucking folks off the street and training them indicates it took time to gain the skill set.

Nodding in full agreement.

 

[tigue710]

Highly skilled to say the least! So i wonder if Chris is on to something with the molds being kept warm? this is the only way to enable the glass to "set right" so to say? I wonder how the folks making the civil war reproduction bottles are doing it? I was to believe they were replicating the process of early American glass houses, pontil and all?

 

[kungfufighter]

Yes, that may be true but they (the folks making modern reproductions) are (I think) using molds made from different materials.

 

[AntiqueMeds]

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