RED Matthews
Well-Known Member
Hello Robert; I think you are needing some help with learning about bottlemaking. And if you go to my homepage you can get some idea of my life of glass contact and mold making, bottle making by Automatic Bottle Machines. I have collected glass for about 77 years. and studied all phases of glass making history. Mold equipment and metallurgy for mold metals and the machinery to make mold equipment and metal applications in the glass industry. If you look at early rectangular med or oil bottles with sunken panels on the back, face and sides; It was difficult to get the air between the parison shape and the mold cavity surface in the final blow of the bottle. If air could not get out - the glass could not be blown against the mold form, and if there was embossed lettering in those side panels the detail of the embossed lettering did not fill in with glass - so they had to drill vent holes in the lettering. When I worked in the mold shop we had a special drilling machine that drilled a 3/16" hole from back of the mold toward the cavity. And a single drill going from the inside would dill a little #70 vent hole to the outside drilled hole. Then the air could get out and the letter be filled in with glass. A lot of bottles will have a vent hood on the back of the cavity where the straight wall meets the curved shoulder - to let the shoulder fill our properly. I saw a lot of other little questioned items - but I didn't make a complete review of them.Have you seen my little review of information about what serious collectors of hand blown glass look for whe they are bring bottles home for further study? If you email me - I can send you that also. RED Matthews <bottlemysteries@yahoo.com>
