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ball milling glass

updated sun 24 nov 02

 

Fredrick Paget on fri 22 nov 02


Hi, I have a small ball mill with a 1 gallon jar. It will grind glass to a
very fine powder but you have to pre-crush it fine enough to pass through
a window screen - about 10 or 12 mesh I think .This needs to be done as
larger pieces take forever to grind and some never seem to get ground up.
Fred

>Hello,
>I saw an old post in the archives that suggested taking blue glass bottles,
>crushing them up, and ball milling them as a means of getting free cobalt.
>It would be like making a frit. I don't know enough about ball mills to know
>if this would really work (i am still trying to convert my old 3phase motor
>so i can use it) Will it turn glass into a fine powder that could be
>screened 80 mesh or finer? Please let me know if anyone has done anything
>like this. Thanks.

From Fred Paget, Marin County, California, USA

Paul on fri 22 nov 02


Hello,
I saw an old post in the archives that suggested taking blue glass bottles,
crushing them up, and ball milling them as a means of getting free cobalt.
It would be like making a frit. I don't know enough about ball mills to know
if this would really work (i am still trying to convert my old 3phase motor
so i can use it) Will it turn glass into a fine powder that could be
screened 80 mesh or finer? Please let me know if anyone has done anything
like this. Thanks.
Paul B

Logan Oplinger on sat 23 nov 02


On Fri, 22 Nov 2002 12:12:01 -0500, Paul wrote:

>Hello,
>I saw an old post in the archives that suggested taking blue glass bottles,
>crushing them up, and ball milling them as a means of getting free cobalt.
>It would be like making a frit. I don't know enough about ball mills to
know
>if this would really work (i am still trying to convert my old 3phase motor
>so i can use it) Will it turn glass into a fine powder that could be
>screened 80 mesh or finer? Please let me know if anyone has done anything
>like this. Thanks.
>Paul B
>
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Dear Paul,

Yes, ball milling glass will work. I used this method last year to recycle
old beer bottles to make test glazes from local/found materials.

Use a gallon size or larger ball mill jar with 3/4" porcelain balls or
flint pebbles. Grind dry. Charge should be about 1/3 volume glass
particles, and 1/3 volume balls/pebbles

Easiest way to break/shatter glass is pre-heat in oven or kiln to 400-500
deg. F, then lower bottle SLOWLY into bucket of ice water, OPEN END UP.
CAUTION!! STEAM GENERATION!! WEAR SAFETY GLASSES!! The sudden shock will
cause the glass to shatter into small fragments.

From this point wear safety glasses and heavy latex rubber gloves to
protect hands while handling wet glass (dish washing gloves are ok). Any
larger fragments can be broken down further in a gallon size metal can.
Place fragments in can, add water to cover, use end of 18" 2x2 like a
pestle to break the fragments with not so hard force. The water helps keep
particles of glass from flying out of container. Combine with framents
from bucket of water, drain off water and place on plastic sheet to dry.
Then ball mill. Wear a dust mask when handling powdered glass. It can be
both mildly caustic and a physical irritant.

Logan Oplinger
Another Pacific Island
Latitude: 13.5 Longitude: 144.7

vince pitelka on sat 23 nov 02


> I saw an old post in the archives that suggested taking blue glass
bottles,
> crushing them up, and ball milling them as a means of getting free cobalt.
> It would be like making a frit.

Paul -
It would be like making a frit with an extremely low percentage of cobalt.
Remember, in a glass, 3% or 4% cobalt is enough to produce a very dark blue.
Essentially you would just have powdered blue cullet, which could be used as
a silica source to contribute some blue coloring to a glaze. But blue glass
is not all that common. Do you have a good source?
- Vince

Vince Pitelka
Appalachian Center for Crafts
Tennessee Technological University
1560 Craft Center Drive, Smithville TN 37166
Home - vpitelka@dtccom.net
615/597-5376
Work - wpitelka@tntech.edu
615/597-6801 ext. 111, fax 615/597-6803
http://iweb.tntech.edu/wpitelka/