Mostly Pix - Marble King

[cheese]

I've only heard theories, although some state them almost as fact. I think the general consensus is that they were unintentional but who really knows. I mean if the flow from the tank slowed down but the cutter speed remained the same, you would have smaller marbles. The slower the stream, the smaller the marble, until you slow the cutter speed down too. Then when you slow it down to match the amount of glass flowing from the tank required to make a 5/8" marble, you get a swirl instead of a patch because the stream ran longer and was able to fold and loop instead of just get cut off like short blocks of cord wood. Then when it hit the rollers, it all got smoothed and rounded into a sphere. So I don't see how it was unintentional for MK to have made 5/8" swirls... it's not like one marble could have come out as a patch/ribbon and the next a swirl. Sure, maybe it could get grabbed by the rollers and twist a little but it wouldn't be more than a little, like the jabo classics when they get caught by the rollers. Some of the MK swirls have an actual stream of glass that looped over on itself more than once and long enough to fill the volume required for a 5/8" sphere, which means the cutters were slowed down as well. I don't think that happened unintentionally unless it was during setup and adjustment periods. That's my take on it, based on mechanics and my understanding of how the marble making machines work. Someone correct me if I'm wrong please

[Steph]

  thanks for the 411

[ManofKent]

The colours are a perfect match for some of the tricolor patches. Have they been found with yellow rather than the orangey red as well?

[cheese]

Yes, I've seen some with yellow but I don't have any.

[Granycamp]

Just a couple sweet MKs.

Thank you, Grant

 

[Steph]

well, hi

 

nice bump.  festive.

[Mr Meteorite]

[Steph]

On 8/28/2016 at 12:01 AM, jeeperman said:

Going through this thread looking for a particular marble and I tripped over this one and ..... aaaaaaaahhhhhhhh.

[jeeperman]

oooh pretty one. =}

 

[cheese]

No doubt!

Here's an interesting one with lots of AV and a swirl pattern. Never seen another one like it.

[Steph]

Would not have guessed Marble King.  

[cheese]

Yeah, if it wasn't in the lot of MKs with similar colors and av (and I think all of them were dug), I might have had a hard time figuring it out, but still I can see MK in it. This one looks dug too.

[cheese]

Here's another neat one from that lot, also looks dug. There were some mibs with bits of oven brick and several DIs too.

[Steph]

I just took pix of four of my five Black Widows for someone.  I might as well post them here.  The front right one was dug by Jill Spencer at her 1960's era Marble King dumpsite.  I don't have the back story on how the other three were acquired, but they came with some nice vintage marbles. I'm confident they're all old.  The fifth one has a slight more brown patch, but it didn't show up on time for picture day, so maybe another time.    A patch on either side.  So they do resemble newer MK's.  

[cheese]

On those swirls Steph, after talking with some others, I do think the simple swirls were accidental. Apparently if the marble machine gets out of alignment with the tank, the stream drags on one side and causes it to fold, making the simple swirl pattern. With all the machinery moving, the machine can vibrate out of place a little and start making swirls. The operator notices and knocks it back in place again. Whether or not that's what happened with the more involved swirls, I don't know. Just wanted to correct my previous thoughts, don't want to spread bad info.

[Steph]

*nods*