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Finishing Your Stained Glass Piece

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Hello, my name is Phillip McKee from McKee Stained Glass. We have just soldered this frame together and now it is time to clean off the last of the flux and prepare this piece for display. The first thing we are going to do is clean off the flux from our corners. Since this is a water based flux, we can use a standard glass cleaner for that purpose. Do not scrub your patina, it may come off from the cleaner depending on its ingredients. Also, at this point, take time to look at your corners. If they are not as pretty as you would like, feel free to reheat your iron and attempt to smooth them further. Once we have patted that dry, time to polish our solder beads, the patina and the glass. To polish, we are using a magic wadding which is carnauba wax impregnated in a cotton wadding.

You can also use liquefied carnauba wax polishing compounds, but then you will need to supply your own polishing cloth. You tear off a small piece of the magic wadding and lightly apply it to your solder beads and to your frame. This will add a glorious shine. Then using a clean towel, pat it on the solder and carefully clean it off of the glass. You leave it on the glass, it will create a cloudy appearance, that is not very attractive, but if you rub your solder and patina too strongly, you will remove the shine. Do this to both sides of the piece and it will be ready for hanging, if you desire, you can also take a diamond tip scribe and carve your initials into the piece as an enduring signature claiming ownership and that is how to make a complete Stained Glass Suncatcher using the copper foil method. You can apply these exact same methods and make a copper foil window of almost any size successfully.

Expert: Phillip McKee

Artist

http://www.mckeestainedglass.com

P: 703-267-2510

Email: phillip@mckeestainedglass.com

As an artist, I work in the medium of stained glass. I have always had an interest in stained glass. From early childhood I was enchanted by the Middle Ages and especially the medieval church. Seeing the beauty of the windows was always a joy to me. It was with great joy that I studied Medieval History first at Yale University and later at Harvard. I even held a research fellowship at Princeton in 1993. Even though More »