Shamrock Marbles

Ann, The "bubbles" I am referring to is basically a single bubble near the core of the marble fragment. I was curious if you found a bubble in the plural sense. That is, a single large bubble in two or more fragments. This bubble is a bubble half (section), kind of like Mon's. 4 out of 5 guinea fragments in my possession have bubbles and the fracture planes bi-sect the bubble. Sincerely, John McCormick "Shamrock Marbles"

Ron, The marble in you picture could be a twin sister to Hansel's in another thread. There is a pair of fine orange lines with a black line running between. Nice! Sincerely, John McCormick "Shamrock Marbles"

Griff, Thank you for your recollection of history. Was that 2002? Was that the Summer Buckeye Show? Sincerely, John McCormick "Shamrock Marbles"

Chris, Great to see you! See you have the "94" in your screen name. I can't find my R&T pamphlet, so can you clarify the Road & Tunnel dates for me? Also, was this a common term in the day or did you originate the term and T.M. on your pamphlet? Sincerely, John McCormick "Shamrock Marbles" P.S. You must be ambidextrous, since I samples from you coming from either direction.

Ron, To my knowledge, I can't correlate the numbers to a color. My "lens" was that of a pressed glass pattern and the color desired in that pattern. In a collectibles environment, there are certain wares that hold more value that their "sisters" Say a cobalt vase may go for hundreds, but a lowly "celery" dish in the same color would go for a single Jackson. Lots of candlestick where made (readily available). They are heavy (good glass content). And a "single" goes for much cheaper than a pair at a show or on Ebay. The macros of that marble have me puzzled. Guessing that is unmelted silica? Sincerely, John McCormick "Shamrock Marbles"

Ron, Yes, 632 or 652. It could be black or blueb (short for bluebell)? Sincerely, John McCormick "Shamrock Marbles"

Ron, The number may refer to a Cambridge pattern and the color desired. Here is a link to a Cambridge #632 Pattern Candlestick in Peach-Blo from 1927. http://www.justglassmall.com/stores/curiocab/items/953960/item953960justglass.html Could make some tasty peach slags with these. Ya think? I don't know what pattern #658 would be. Don't have any Cambridge books in my library and #658 is coming up with nothing on Google. Just a stretch. Sincerely, John McCormick "Shamrock Marbles"

LOL! I said I could be wrong! Tank levels also come into play (head pressure at the nozzle). Adjustments to machine speed could have been made. Typically the shear is synchronized mechanical with the auger. Guess the marble could have hit and folded the other way and made a yellow ring around the marble! This stuff is fun. No two marbles alike due to system variability. Sincerely, John McCormick "Shamrock Marbles"

What size is that marble? Here is why I ask. The marble machine is running at a fixed speed. The shearing device is synchronized with the machine speed. The nozzle diameter at the bottom of the fore-hearth is fixed. (I don't think Pelt used a gate plate to alter flow, because it would have altered the pattern. Especially for NLR marbles.) If the temperature rises in the tank, then the viscosity of the glass drops (gets thinner). A longer but thinner stream extrudes from the nozzle. Because the time is fixed between shearing actions, actually a little bit more glass comes out than if the glass was thicker. So, sometimes I find these folded up marbles larger than intended. Say 11/16ths versus the target 5/8ths diameter. I could be wrong. Sincerely, John McCormick "Shamrock Marbles"

Ann, Can you see why one of the thoughtful speculations is that the exotics were really hand-gathered color compatibility tests with no production intentions? Hence, low quantities and no cullet? I mean, it seems that there are more guinea fragments than there are known complete guineas. If you were having a high failure rate, wouldn't you try to understand the reasons and mitigate the cause? But nobody has floated this as part of the sales program. (At least, not yet.) Enjoy your halves tonight! Tell me if you see any bubbles. Sincerely, John McCormick "Shamrock Marbles"

Mon, I see two cut-lines and one butt-crack (fold). The fold is in the middle of the white section. Like a Jabo. If you look at the Peltier patent, it is easy to see how one side can have a color and the other side not. The "bi-furcation" is because ribbon colors are added from the "left" and the "right" of the machine. Looks like the red hasn't made it down to the nozzle, yet. Steph is alluding to it with her comment about being white underneath. The red has bled over on one side. Here is a marble that I made a long time ago to describe the Jabo Butt-Crack (fold). Think of an inchworm. The gob extrudes out from the nozzle between shearing actions. When it hits and lands on the delivery chute, it folds up onto itself creating a faux third cut-line. Does that help? Sincerely, John McCormick "Shamrock Marbles"

Ahhh, guinea halves! Ahhh, colors inside! Ann, I want you to work with me. Let's throw out the idea of cane constructed guineas (for now). We'll work with my paradigm that CA Guineas were hand-gathered and machine-rounded. It is early on in production at CA and all glass in the shop is batch glass made in a pot (not tank). Okay, could have been batched in a tank, but it was poured into cullet. Cobalt Blue cullet was remelted in a small monkey pot. Adjacent or close to the opening of the furnace/monkey pot is a ledge. You've sprinkled some multi-colored frit on the ledge. Get a punty rod. Heat the end of the punty so glass will stick to it. Once hot, dip the punty into the monkey pot and gather a gob of cobalt blue. Turn and lift. Take the molten gob and roll it in the frit. Bring back to the heat. Turn the punty so the gob doesn't flow off the end. Once it is hot enough, remove, get to the marble machine and present to the shears. Snip. One marble cut, now only hundreds (if not thousands) of marbles to go for the shift! Glass workers today would take that punty rod and dump it into a bucket. Maybe a bucket of water, so the glass will fracture and break off. Not back then. You've got production quotas to make and your not going to go back and heat up a new punty. With the remnant glass on the punty (cobalt and colors), you go back to the monkey pot and dive for another gather. Roll, heat and snip. NEXT!! I know. You could have a bank of punty rods setting at a pipe warmer at the ready. You may start that way, but when your buddy is kicking your a$$ using one rod, it wouldn't be long until you followed suit. Are you telling me that some of the internal colors in a guinea are from a previous gather? Yes. Why did they break? 1) Some of the frit colors had a different COE. Glass workers know that you can put incompatible COE frit on the surface of an object and get away with it (sometimes). But get it down into the matrix and you could be looking for trouble. 2) The remnant glass from the previous gather was too cool. The reheating of the over-gather many not have penetrated through the whole mass. The marble may break soon after forming. 3) Entrapped air bubble. Easy to trap an air bubble during an over-gather. This bubble in combination with one of the above would lead to failure. Ever wonder why you see so many guinea halves? ---- Now look at one of your guinea halves closely. Look right at the edge. Notice how the colored frit dips into the base glass. This is because the base glass was molten (soft) and the frit was colder (hard). The frit pushes into the surface. ___________ (Surface) U U U U (Frit) This makes the periphery of the color blotch very distinct (not fuzzy). Dudley Giberson describes this in his book, "A Glassblower's Companion." Hope this make sense. Sincerely, John McCormick "Shamrock Marbles"

Ann, Yes, I would agree that CA Slag/SO/ST seams are more closed (if not completely touching), than those of their German counter parts. Craig has shared some CA halves and you can see the wild color and pattern deep in the core of the marble. People have back-lit CA Striped Transparents and you can see swirl activity deep in the matrix. What I'd like to see is a deconstructed German marble. My hunch is that the colors are more topical to economize on color expense (like Marble Kings). Sincerely, John McCormick "Shamrock Marbles"

"How much influence would you give just a cut mark/seam in Iding a marble to a maker?" I think it would be safe to say that a single feature is not enough for complete identification. Not for me at least. I don't want to put words in Sami's, Galen's or Craig's mouth, but I think they are trying to look at the marble in whole. Colors, patterns, surface texture, cut-lines, existing examples, provenance are all part of the big picture. I guess that is what I'd like to hear from them, as part of educating us all, in what to use for proper identification. There are bits and pieces, but not a complete compendium on the art and science of identifying CA marbles. I think there is a healthy fear that if all was really known as to what to look for, then those features would be incorporated in future creations. Can't argue that perspective. One Collector Paradigm is that Arnold Fiedler shared none of his secrets and took all his knowledge to the grave. When he died, so did the ability to create marbles and glass in the style of CA. Here is my paradigm: The laws of physics have not changed. What was done then can be done now. The only thing that is certain, is uncertainty. "The "H" seam as it's been called on NLR....can you explain your thought on how this occurs?" I'm not familiar with the term "H" seam when describing a NLR marble. Can you elaborate? Sincerely, John McCormick "Shamrock Marbles"

Sami, Thanks for helping add to the body of knowledge. Looking forward to your photos. First, I would like to clarify that I did not "add" the cut-line. The cut-line is an artifact and a witness to severing the gob of glass from the punty. It is a feature that I must live with. In fact, whether the glass is severed from a punty or from a continuous stream of glass, early and modern equipment still create a shear mark. The shuttle shearing device on modern equipment can hide the shear by rolling it amongst the swirl. You'll find Jabos, Sammy's and DAS marbles with shear marks. Easily found to this day on modern Marble Kings. True, I have overheated a gob and had it drip/drop off the punty before I could cut it (zero shear mark). When this occurred, it was so liquid that it fell through the rollers onto the table. They be came blobs or "gems". Other times, there was a short tail that was pressed into the marble or a long tail that wrapped around the marble. In either case, the fine cross-section of the tail cooled so quickly and chilled that the remaining heat in the gob could not remelt the tail and smoothly incorporate it into the body. We've all seen these marbles with "drizzles". It was these "defective" marbles that I mainly placed in my 50-cent box (later raised to $1). Funny, but collectors loved these and they were always the first to go. At one show, my wife sat next to a well known and highly respected glass artist. (I do respect him. His talent and vision are second to none.) He scoffed at the dollar scrap box. By the end of the show, he was amazed by the wad of Washingtons my wife accumulated. So, back to the idea of letting the gob drip/drop off (let us call this the "gravity" sever). This is doable, but the results are very inconsistent. Some patents reference letting gathers or gobs drip, but they end up referencing using a form of shears for consistent results. --- Second, I have made marbles with two shear marks. When demonstrating, people have asked, "Why do some CA marbles have one and others have two shear marks?" I predominately make single gather marbles, so those marbles exhibit only one shear mark. We all work from a paradigm, and glassworkers have formed some pretty rigid paradigms (so have collectors). Considering their backgrounds, most glassworkers have suggested to make a cane and cut off each marble. Understood. The Germans did it this way. Contemporary marble makers using a furnace do it this way. Why not? I've made mini-canes (a mass that could make 2 to 3 marbles). The first marble has one cut line, and the following have two cut lines. The problem with this is that the glass cools so fast that I can really only cut one gob off before the remaining mass cools too much and I can't cut it.. I have to take the mini-cane back to the heat source. Cold glass takes a long time to reheat. Not the most time efficient or cost effective way to compete in an automated world. Another problem with the reheat method, is that the cut line opens back up after heating. What? When the glass is sheared, the blade takes the outer surface of the glass and stretches it (tension) and the inner glass is pushed in (compression). When reheated, the glass relaxes. The surface recedes back like an eyelid opening, while the inside glass blooms out. But wait! I've seen guineas and German circus marbles with ends like this. Yes you have. Hold on! You're contradicting yourself. Now you're saying that guineas were cane cut. No, what I am saying is that the once cut end of that marble was reheated. Please don't confuse marbles with thin gaps with those that have large gaps. The thin gap is the result of enough thermal energy to allow the glass to slightly relax before setting. --- What about cutting more than one marble from a gather? Tried this with mixed results, but better than the cane method. The mixed results have to do with the size of each marble. They tend to vary in finished size. One thing you can do is line up the striations at the cut line from one marble to the next. The other problem is that I have only one groove to drop into. Much easier to do if you have an auger style machine at your disposal. Cut one, drop, auger index, cut two, drop, etc. Again, the number of cuts is a problem, since glass cools exponentially. Reheating the remnant glass on the punty and scraping/pushing it to the end will allow you to make another same colored marble. ---- Finally, I want to point out Howard Jenkin's patent 1,596,879. This invention incorporates a shearing device unlike his previous patent. This device sits atop the machine and has two counter rotating arms with blades on the ends. (I call this the "helicopter" shear.) Above this shear is an arm with a "target" ring for the gatherer to deliver his gob. The helicopter shear makes two revolutions per forming roller set. Now use your imagination, but don't think too hard... The gathering boy has a gob at the end of his punty. He positions the punty end over the delivery ring and lowers the rod. The hot gather starts to drop and the helicopter shear "nips" the leading edge of the gob. The gob drops further and the helicopter shear severs the gob from the body of glass/punty on the next pass. Down it drops into the marble machine to be formed. One gather -- two shear marks. The "first" shear mark is smooth, because there was enough heat at the time of cut to allow it to blend in. The "second" shear mark is more pronounced (visually and with fingernail), because time had elapsed and the surface cooled. --- I've done this quick double cut test to see what the leading and trailing cuts and patterns look like on a marble. These early "tests" can be found in Alan's samples. And yes, some did exhibit the "S" on one side. Look at the marble in the bottom right corner. Food for thought. Sincerely, John McCormick "Shamrock Marbles"

Here is a photo/scan of Chris Robinson's Road & Tunnel Slags (Hand-Gathered & Machine-Rounded): All rights reserved by Chris. Circa 1992-1993? Sincerely, John McCormick "Shamrock Marbles"

She's a beauty. One can't argue how two simple colors with a wild pattern make a beautiful marble. Enjoy! Sincerely, John McCormick "Shamrock Marbles"

Galen, Thanks. It is nice to clarify that we are talking about the same thing. So, if you have a two cut-line marble with a "S" (along with other identifying traits), then it is a CA. If you find a single cut-line marble with no "S", but the same coloration to match a previously identified two cut-line CA marble, then the single cut-line is certified CA. Now, if you find a single cut-line marble with no "S", then you have to place that marble into the "unverified" CA category, until an identically colored two cut-line certified CA is found to match. Correct? Love to talk with you also. Have been demonstrating in public here in KC for 12 straight years. I know you'd enjoy the machine. You should come to the show. Southwest airfares are quite economical. Finally, your photo "Fake-CACs.jpg" has subtext of "MC". Is that for Mark Capel or Mark Christensen? I understand if you don't answer. Sincerely, John McCormick "Shamrock Marbles"

Galen, Thanks for the reply. I must admit that I don't recall the "many small flat scuffed areas" as an identifying feature. Then again, I must admit that I haven't read all of your 5,534 posts on this board. Puzzling. I must do homework. Second, the "S" trait is only found on dual cut-line marbles. True? I always thought the "S" was the pattern in the glass that started on the bottom side of a cut-line, then twisted up through the equator to finally terminate on the top side of the second cut-line. This trait is usually on one side of the other, but not the other. So, marbles with only one cut-line will not have the "S". True? With this feature missing on a single cut-line marble, one has to rely on other factors. True? Thanks for hanging with us all. Sincerely, John McCormick "Shamrock Marbles"

Bill, Anyone who works with glass, COE is one of the first things you learn after "don't touch that, it's hot." You don't need to know the "how", but the "why". Chemists such as Fiedler and Hellmers know the "how". The guys on the floor understand the "why". You would suspect that after all these years people making marbles understand this basic. However, if you watch what is thrown into a furnace during a marble run, one wonders why there aren't more failures. The answer is fundamentally the shape of the end product. A marble has the same distance from the center to the edge. If the same COE (or close) are used and they are properly annealed, there should be no problems. However, if widely varying COE glasses are used, then no matter how much annealing is done, there will be internal stress imbalances. If an air bubble or debris is included in the matrix, this will disrupt the balance of forces. If you look at a number of halves, you will probably see an inclusion or air bubble from which the fracture propagated. If you make a multi-colored wine glass, the cross-section of the foot, stem and bowl vary significantly. Because of the different thicknesses, any COE delta would probably result in an immediate failure. Marbles are more forgiving. So, if your question is to whether high-level intellectual analysis was done in making marbles, then my answer is probably not. "Lets see what these three colors will do." is probably more like it. Mix, knead, fold, heat and cut. Next! A nice read about glass: http://museumofglass.org/document.doc?id=13 Another nice read (see how quickly COE is brought up?): http://mickelsenstudios.com/articles/SOFTTCH1.HTM Sincerely, John McCormick "Shamrock Marbles"

One of the question posed to me was: "Why would they make only a few of these marbles?" Get Hellmers' book. Look at all the different formulas. The differences in color formulas require different amounts of ingredients. These differences can alter the coefficient of expansion (COE) for the glass. If the COE differences between two glasses is high enough, you will get failures (fractures and split marbles). Formulae can be altered to fit glasses. When it comes time to do a marble run with two different glasses, do you just hope and pray that the two glasses are compatible? Do you just run 100 or 1000 pounds of glass with your fingers crossed? If I were running an operation, I would want to test glass compatibility. I have speculated that some of these marbles where compatibility tests. No need to produce many, just enough to get a sample. Keep these samples in a box in the lab for future reference. During two conversations, I tried to describe how modern torch workers check for COE compatibility. It was the stringer method. Watch this video: Somehow, this was translated into pulling a cane for testing. I guess you could call a stringer a micro-cane. So, imagine "fitting" two glasses, then now try "fitting" four or five colors together. Companies like Fenton that made single color pressed articles didn't have to worry about fit. The same color could vary from batch to batch without consequences. Look at the Gabbert Cullet website. Notice the varying COE? http://www.gabbertcullet.com/list.html Mixing and matching these can have disastrous results. Funny thing about marbles, is that their spherical shape allows for some incompatibility. They may not break at first, but will fail later. Usually an internal bubble is the start of the failure propagation. Food for thought. Sincerely, John McCormick "Shamrock Marbles"

Japan is an island with minimal natural resources. Pretty much everything has to be imported to the isle and that would include energy (coal, oil, wood or natural gas). Modern Japanese glass (Satake) glass is formulated to have a low melting point. I would presume that Japanese glass factories altered their formulas to melt at a lower temperature to economize their energy usage. I agree with Galen that it was mostly the temperature of the glass at the time of shearing. He also points out the time the glass is removed from the heat source before delivery to the shear has an impact. The quicker the better. Don't let that glass cool! Blade geometry (straight versus curved) have different effects. Blade actuation speed can have an impact. The longer a "cold" blade is in contact with the "hot" glass the more pronounced will be a thermal witness mark. Blade condition. A sharp blade will leave a clean line with a minimal mark. As the blade dulls, it will leave a more prominent mark. Other considerations are: The amount the gob is allowed to drip from the punty before shearing. Increased time and cross-section reduction will cool the glass more. The ratio of gob size to punty diameter. Acceptable quality standards for the given wholesale price point. Sincerely, John McCormick "Shamrock Marbles"

The Secret Marble Machine? One premise in this whole deal is that there was some lone wolf with a secret marble machine in his basement or garage. True, I have run my machine in my basement and garage, but it has been many other places, too. For the record, I know of at least six machines that where built by their owners. I have two (#1 & #2) and we know of Chris Robinson's (#3). Remember the three-wheel marble former that showed up on Ebay the last few years? (#4) There is a machine in the southern hemi-sphere. (#5) And another on the West Coast of the U.S. of A. (#6) (The above are not in chronological order.) But that doesn't mean anything. You only need four things to create a machine-made marble. 1) Source of heat. 2) Glass. 3) Marble machine. 4) Glass Worker/Artist. I want you to think about what happens at a marble factory late at night. Management has gone home and there are no cameras. People involved in private runs know some of what I talk about. 1) Source of heat. Furnace. 2) Glass. Vintage cullet or marble halves/bits. 3) Marble machine. Enough said. 4) Glass Worker/Artist. An employee scraping by day-to-day with an imagination and a need for money. It was fun to watch peoples faces when they demonstrated the Jabo/Vitro marble machine at Wheaton. I could freely observe as a third party. If there was only one thing that I hoped people would take away from this, it was: "It doesn't take much to make a marble if you have the ingredients." Oh yes, those Wheaton marbles where terribly misshaped with horrendous orange-peel surfaces. What's Galen looking for? "I did say that their surface under a 40x illuminated microscope has the identical manufacturing patterns and surface markings as vintage CAC slags etc. So if they are new they were made on CAC equipment with CAC glass in the exact same way as all the other CAC Striped opaques transparents etc that everyone excepts as vintage." - Galen, 3/23/15. So, I am going to speculate that Galen is inspecting the surface of the marble. Hand-made marbles rounded with a graphite or cherry wood molds have a certain surface texture. Machine rounded marbles have a completely different surface signature. Since my machine is "new", the surface is different than one that has been "used". I would speculate my marbles are smoother, but vintage CA marbles have a slight "orange-peel" to them. What is Orange-Peel? When a marble machine is new, the forming surface is pristine. Too pristine is a problem. It is too "slick" and will not "grab" the glass and turn it. Once the forming surface wears in, it develops a groove. You can see this on a machine after it has run for some time. It is like looking at a newly oiled bowling alley with a bowl rolled down it. Or seeing the tracks of a motorcycle ahead of you on a rainy road. Over time, when machines are idled or moved out to run a different size, the metal surface of the rollers oxidize (rust). The rust causes pitting. The more rust the more severe the pitting. So, technically, each forming machine would have an orange-peel profile (like a finger print). I guess when you hear someone state that they can trace a marble back to the original equipment. They are GOOD. The questions I have: 1) Do all CA marbles have the same profile? 2) Wouldn't earlier marbles such as slags have a smoother surface than say swirls that came later? 3) Do the Exotics exhibit surface profiles closer to the beginning or end of production? 4) Do all Exotics have the same identical surface texture? Sincerely, John McCormick "Shamrock Marbles"

Galen, Thank you, but can you educate us what you are looking for and why you need a microscope? If you have developed a CA authentication protocol, can you share it with us? I mean, is it really only going to be you and a few others that are part of the illuminati? I can understand if you have some proprietary techniques you wish to monetize. So, is this the genesis of Galen's Authentication Services (G.A.S.)? Back to the microscope... I don't think 99.99% of all marble transactions are consummated with a check under the scope. Lighting in these hotel rooms is horrid at best. People chuckled at Bo with his 40X scope. Did Jenkins have micro-engraved on his forming wheels, "Made in USA by the Christensen Agate Corporation"? Is this what you are seeing imprinted on to each marble under magnification? You have so much to share with the community. It is a shame you don't share. Sincerely, John McCormick "Shamrock Marbles"

Craig, Thank you! That picture album is a great start. Thanks for the pointer. Sincerely, John McCormick "Shamrock Marbles"