Adventures into Mexican Markets, Part 9: Mexican Borosilicate Glass Manufacturer

This one's a bit overdue as it's been several days since I've received my shipment but it was worth waiting for to get adequate pictures of the glass I got. I ordered my second shipment from the Mexican Glass manufacturer and I'm honestly extremely pleased.  For anyone that doesn't already know, I work borosilicate glass so finding a manufacturer that produces a quality borosilicate product here in Mexico is nice.  This glass ends up being a good middle ground between lower quality china glass and higher quality American and European glass manufacturers. 

We were actually informed about them by a friend, up late and bored on the internet. She came across the glass company and forewarded it to us, and we found it was indeed a Mexican borosilicate glass manufacturer.  We tried to get in contact but didn't really have much luck.  There are no products or prices on the website.  We didn't really have the money to order yet anyway so we left it alone for awhile. 

After I finally got on the torch a few months back, we finally got the funds together to consider an order from this manufacturer.  It was a pain in the ass trying to communicate and it took forever to recieve responses.  We sent them our money and a week or so later we got that first shipment.  After getting it home we opened it up and I was excited, it was time to experiment with my first colored tube.

And it served me well.  I've done several larger orders at this point, for a new person anyway, and I used much of the blue and green tube with decent results.  I learned a lot about working with colored tube in the process and that I was interested in exploring more about Mexican color.  As my financial situation has improved, I've finally gotten to a point where we could afford to order more glass and to try out the whole range of colors available, which is currently 13.

This isn't scientific tube in the photo, but they are also a producer of scientific grade glass, which is nice.  They also offer quartz, another nice option.  I had the 23mmx3mm tube in the past and had good results with it.  This one is a bit bigger and thicker at 25mmx4mm.  I've not had nearly the issues I had with the small amount of heavy wall china tubing I had from my little starter pack of glass I had. 

Here are the colors: opaque white, translucent white, opaque black, translucent black, translucent pink, amber, yellow, blue green translucent, emerald green translucent, jade green, mint green, light blue and cobalt blue.  They generally have a purple too, but they were out of it when I ordered, so it's something I'll try in a month or so. 

I'm honestly impressed with them all.  They're unique and pretty, all have thier uses. I like the pink much more than I expected to, as it has almost a lilac quality.  

From the bit of fiddling around I have done, I've found them to be remarkably stable.  No cracking when introducing it to a flame, not super easy to boil.  Even the opaque colors are pretty stable, which is good for a new person like me. 

Most of the colors are transparent, but I have white tubing of two different types as well, which makes transparent colors a lot of fun.  There are lots of colored tubing options generally,  usually available at a 16mmx2mm size.  I have 2 tubes, actually a little less, of 25mmx4mm cobalt tubing that I LOVE. Super stable and fun to work with, nice for fuming work.  I ordered: both white tubing, blue tubing, yellow tubing and transparent black tubing.  There was also a case of heavy wall clear as well. 

This is the yellow, which looks amber in some lights.  I overcooked a yellow pipe in the kiln, as I have some yellow tube now and it actually darkened in color, making for an intriguing effect I intend to explore further.  

I was worried when I saw this white, but when I put it in the flame those worries literally melted away.  A lot of the time white can be finicky, prone to bubbles.  This white however could handle a lot of heat, it melted evently and pulled into nice stringers that make nice crisp lines.  It's got an interesting flat texture.  It's my new favorite honestly. 

Here's an example, of mint green tubing with the white stringers drawn.  The red is just china copper based red I have left over for contrast.  I had fun making this pipe despite being sick, partially due to the color combination. 

John likes to mess around on the torch and he did what's called a solid color blowout.  He just got a gob of the pink glass on a blue blowtube and blew it out into a bubble, that I later attached to the end of this pipe.  Call it a collaboration, if you will.  Again, the red is not mexican. 

I got joints to mess around with making my own dab rig.  This went well until the end (for a new person anyway, glassblowers, please don't laugh too hard) when I left it in the kiln on high to strike the red.  It slumped ever so slightly, making it so the new titanium piece we bought for it didn't fit.  I've got a much better replacement in the kiln that I'm very excited for. 

I intend to look into seeing what I can do to make these colors available to American glassblowers.  They're different and they also can replace the demand for china, as they produce more stable glass that isn't super expensive.  I won't say how much I spent or what all I got, but it was an awesome sample pack that will bring interesting creations for you to see here on Steemit. 

Thanks for reading.