keeping it on center

[Franklin Sankar]

What are some of the things that make you go off center?
Franklin

[Doug Chaussee]

A sharp blow to the head...........

Seriously, there are many ways to go off center either on the pipe or punty. Most common reasons are improper heating (too hot), too much pressure with the block, paper, jacks, etc and improper blowing when the piece is not on center. If I had a dime for every time I say "keep it on center" while teaching, I'd own my own island! There are many more as almost any thing you do could possibly run it off center. Proper heat management, constant turning and attention to detail will help most of the time.

[Hugh Jenkins]

There are two common problems that relate to gathering and heat. If you take a second gather and do not go two full rotations, then you will have uneven thickness and uneven heat in the walls. Unless you do some very careful heating and surface cooling, this will not blow out on center.
If you have uneven wall or bottom thickness in the first bubble, then a cool thick spot will remain in the wall even after a second gather. Then if you blow without very thorough heating and reshaping, there will be a lump, almost always off center.

[Nick Jones]

I'm no veteran or anything but something that may help is to place priority on turning on center before and as you apply tools. For example, I find that things go much more smoothly when I block if I'm turning on center as I ease into a block as opposed to trying to push the bubble back on center with the block. If you practice that enough you'll eventually find yourself turning on center so much that you'll have to un-learn waiting for centeredness to apply those tools because you're wasting time thinking too much.

This is one of those skills that correlates with how many hours you sit at a bench. You can be doing everything right but not allowing the Meat Puppet enough bench time to absorb it. Keep on truckin' Franklin.

[Franklin Sankar]

Those of you who teach or like Nick remembering the start up days may see some of the problems often enough to post some of the common reasons .
Because of some problems I did not blow glass for a few months. On starting back I was surprised that I did not forget everything but I am more cautious now and seem to recognise somethings I used to do that was not quite correct. I never stopped thinking about the process when I was not hot. I looked at Jim's tape and re-read Ed's book to keep in touch and it helped me to remember.
Doug, I should really get a kick in the head. After all this time I now recognise one of the problems I had/am having is to roll the pipe evenly on the bench whae I have glass on the end. I still remember Allan saying use the whole rail. Tom Furhman told me a while ago about hanging a weight on the pipe and practice rolling with it. That is a great help unfortunately I thought I knew how to roll on the bench so did not bother. I just realised that my shoulders were uneven because of the stop and go on the rail. When you are on the punty its more difficult because you dont want to mess with the shape near the punty ie I shape the mouth only?
I am releasing at the end of the roll ok, but when I run out of finger midway I pause ever so slightly (I think its slight) and that is when I think it goes off. Is this a cause? or a slight pause is ok?
Hugh, I think my bubble is even because I seem to blow it out and it looks nice and even. Even if it looks symetric around the pipe after blowing out a bit, can it still be uneven?
Franklin

[Larry Cazes]

Franklin, I have only been at this for 10 months so you have much more time on the bench than I but I have found that my hands need time to learn how to keep the pipe turning without having to think much about it. If I am concentrating on turning then I have less bandwidth to think about other things such as working with tools, blowing out the piece, etc. I also have a bad habit of turning too fast some of the time. This, of course, makes a piece go even more off center.

[David Patchen]

Turns, turns, turns.

Notice all the suggestions above all have to do with turning. Learn to turn as slow and consistently as possible--like a machine and you'll find so much else will be solved.

Also--I often see ppl try to eagerly get glass off the pipe and long before they've really set up their shape and heat. Better to keep things compact and nail the setup shape and even heat so you drop it *once* and freeze it up vs. trying to marver/paper/jack a bananna which you continually reheat. With the right amount of heat, you'll always get it off the pipe. But trying to work a banana is murder.

Other than that, obsess about even turns.

[Franklin Sankar]

Would a change in speed while on the rail cause the piece to become off center or not symetric . Common sense says yes but constant speed all the time is not always possible, or is it?

I see people who know what they are doing dont use the whole length of the rail all the time. When? I can roll towards me ok but the same hand movements dont work as well rolling back down the rail so I change the method. Wiggle seems to work but it is still jerky. Yes I know practice.
Thanks David, knowing what part of the shape to keep on the pipe and what can be changed on the punty is also important for me to understand. If I try to do anything other than open the mouth I mess up the shape. With more prcatice I can pull out the lip and trim but if it gets too stiff and I pull too hard, one side get longer and out of shape. Is it me only? or did it happen to you also? The glass at the lip gets stiff quickly so you have to work fast.

Franklin

[Brian Gingras]

got on the bench and spend a couple hours turning, no glass just turn the pipe down the rail and back, get rid of the jerkiness of your back rolling...now use the weight method on the pipe and practice turning for another couple hours.

[Eben Horton]

as a rule i always reheat twice before i start blowing out the last gather- this insures that my core gathers do not have a cold spot which will always force your bubble to blow out sideways.
as for turning your pipe, focus on turning the pipe with all of your arm strength and not just your fingers.

[Dan Buchacher]

Sometimes also, people tend to keep tool pressure on the glass at the start and ending of the pipe roll on the bench when you are slowing down or speeding up - this will often push things off center - only apply tool pressure to the piece while evenly rolling the pipe at speed, and always make full turns of the pipe while applying tool pressure. When you get to the end of the roll, front or back, ease up on the tool until you have reversed the direction and have it back up to speed smoothly

[Rich Samuel]

A couple of things that might help:

When turning the pipe, focus on the reflection of light on the surface of the gather. Those reflections shouldn't move. If they do, pause for an instant during rotation to let the gather fall back into alignment. This is also a good tip for the moment you start your necks.

This one may be somewhat "advanced," though it's been second nature to me so long I can't say for sure: When shaping the gather with blocks, do a few rolls with the mouthpiece end of the pipe angled comfortably upward, i.e. off the rail. This lets gravity aid in centering. Some blowers never reverse the roll direction at all, always rolling away from themselves, lifting the non-business end of the pipe, then, while still turning in the "away" direction, dragging the pipe back.

[Nick Jones]

At schools I never went huge due to equipment and skill limitations but now I can put more glass on the pipe in real studios and I've noticed that having the extra inertia from turning something heavy smooths out the jerkiness of "walking the pipe" the length of the rails. I think that's what you're addressing when you talk about the wiggle and jerking. Either that or you're a pervert. The stuff you do on your setup stays pretty light, no? I've yet to hear it from an Italian stallion's mouth but from what I've seen there are some pretty good (light) cup makers who mostly just roll the full length of their hand.

Speaking of Italian stallions, this guy I work with is Sicilian and wore his Italian Stallion shirt to work on Monday and when he wore it again on Tuesday after sweating in it all day on Monday I was obligated to dub him the Italian Scallion. huhu.