#neon

Things are heating up for my dreams of a color furnace! My color base batch (raw glass batch without the usual decolorants) arrived and we found a time that Mike could stop by and offer his sage color melting wisdom while I have both of the workstations rented for the weekend. The furnace is getting dialed in and this will be the first time it is getting used! I mixed the color base really well and we split it in half for two melts. I added black nickel oxide, sulfur, pine rosin, Barium Nitrate and red iron oxide to *hopefully turn my color base into a dark amber Sunday my tube puller in Philly, (and myself) have to work- but Monday we will pull tubes out of the color furnace! Soon I will get all the glass out of the existing crucible, flush it with compatible glass, then take that out and begin charging the brown batch! So exciting! #neon #light #residency #art #sculpture #color #brown #glass #NYC #Brooklyn #science #craft #chemistry #DIY #Urbanglass #notes #sketchbook #dreams

Wowza! The nickel, sulfur #brown color pot was amazing! I believe Mike nailed the density I was looking for even with just one dip of #glass sandwiched between two clear dips of glass, its dense enough where the tube looks black without a phosphor backing or light shining through it. The personal dark color pot is also amazing for recycling- I could throw my bits of color in the crack off bin (shedding off the cooling blowpipes) back in the furnace before dinner to have fully melted, streaky swirly glass after dinner! I saved most of the dense brown glass cleaning out the pot at the end of the night as color bars- the typical way we buy it I have another 50 pounds of #color base- and well over a hundred, 5 foot tubes. The lighter tan color tubes have silver in them. Mike mentioned silver nitrate may be needed for those. I wonder how much I would need for 50 pounds and if it would be safe to melt? I pulled a flawless 50 footer today! #residency #neon #tube #Brooklyn #art #sculpture

7k #Neon ❤️ moim celem "sukcesu" było 5k, więc duma! Nie byłoby tego bez was mordeczki! Ale to nie koniec rozwoju apki, o nie!

Paging any "LED neon" experts out there in Fedi-land, please...? I plan on replacing the vinyl lettering in my front fascia board with fake-neon. I think probably the best way of doing this is to laser-cut the channel on MDF, paste it to the back-board, then LED strip with a diffuser pipe channel on top to cope with right angles. At thinnest point the lettering is 8mm width, at thickest it's about 15mm. Logotype cannot be changed. Any pointers please? I'm new to this! 😘 #fedihelp #led #neon

Neon synths class at Urbanglass went well. As per usual, I was too busy teaching to get any quality photos- but I did snap this one of the chaotic synth table with blink neon tubes half cleaned up. I am excited for my public engagement for my Urbanglass residency. I am finally getting to do the "you dream it I make it" idea I have had for so long. There are so many amazing artists, and designers in Brooklyn all around me, and in other places. I am making an idea drop box featuring some of the new colors I have made. Then people will get to draw with colored pens and submit their idea to the box. I even learned to use the vinyl printer (giant sticker machine) at work so I can attach qr codes of my website and videos/ articles/ online things that have inspired me. A way to show the intellectual work, and perhaps make it difficult to photograph with a phone ;) Gonna start bending this- tonight! Hoping to have it ready for Thursday #neon #public #collaboration #urbanglass #summer #nyc

https://makertube.net/w/uHvQRcAJkzHGTKweGwMfvQ Excited to do a little artist talk at Urbanglass at 6:00 pm tonight as a part of my residency there this summer and officially debut this drawing submission box sculpture. Hooray NEA funding and public engagement- I will choose my one lucky drawing from this box or website will be chosen to be be made in new colors of neon. In this way we can collaborate and have both co own the outcome. The acrylic box is made from scraps of acrylic that were once used in a Manhattan ad campaign and were slated for the trash. You can also submit digital drawings here (line drawings preferred) https://color.cccfl.co/ I will choose the drawing to make on August 20th. #public #artisttalk #idea #drawing #neon #opportunity #NYC #brooklyn #submission #fabrication #light #color #NEA #Urbanglass #glass #art #handmade #makertube

Clearing roadblocks in the way of firing up a color furnace. I am consulting with Mike, who melts color at a big public glass studio in Brooklyn in Gowanus, and for another factory in West Virginia. I know I want a dark, ambery brown. We are going to get 100 pounds of Sprucr Pine "color base" - all the raw ingredients for the HotShop glass- minus the decolorants. We plan on using some of sulfur, black charcoal, and sugar along with a touch of black nickel to darken it up along with a few other things to tint it. I CNDd a thick scrap of MDF to make a lid for the cement mixer- which Mike mentioned is one of the best ways to mix it up- essential for proper glass. I also cleaned it from refractory cement with hammer, chisel and power washer. The furnace burner still needs to get its gas/air ratio set with a test firing, and I gotta find a time to rent 2 workstations (it's in the corner between them) #color #glass #residency #mixing #colorpot #neon #CNC #nonprofit #sculpture

A Sloshing-Mercury-Powered Neon Light https://hackaday.com/2026/07/16/a-sloshing-mercury-powered-neon-light/ #MiscHacks #Krypton #Mercury #Neon #Neonlight #Vacuum

A Sloshing-Mercury-Powered Neon Light https://hackaday.com/2026/07/16/a-sloshing-mercury-powered-neon-light/ #Maker #DIY #Neon

Today was mainly a work day for the students- and for me- I got the bombarder table in place, and the bombarder coil wired into the tiny, very short trolley line system. I do hope they are able to lengthen it one day by suspending the aluminum frame from the roof. Check the image captions alt text to see details on each photo. The turquoise tube is for Tommy's Diner. I am gonna ride my bike to the studio, grab the neon and walk over to the diner to meet my students for breakfast, coffee and a neon install demo at the diner. FUN! Tomorrow the students will bombard- everyone has done it once or twice now, some students are amassing a few tubes to be bombarded and filled. I hope they get to make more tomorrow and am really excited about some of their designs. I taught the students #inkscape and we have been getting them printed to scale as blueprints at copy shops. #teaching #traveling #columbus #alttext #class #neon #bombarding #training #craft #ohio #glass #art #diner #repair

I have been pretty busy in Columbus. We are nearing the end of the second #class - using the neon shop and have almost completely set it up. The cheaper electricians take their time. The students are learning to bend nicely. Picking up where this post l left off before, I had the bombarder wired, but when I went to test it on the last day of the first class it had a loose connection- inside the grounded bombarder box, the coil was disconnected from the ceramic bushing above it. We wanted a safety light for when the bombarder was active, so I made one (the first tube pumped) and then when it broke made another, much nicer one. That is one of my favorite #neon reds- Corning Oxblood Ruby. I want to get a residency somewhere and batch a pot of it- a tricky thing to do because its a cadmium selenium glass and those spew heavy metals into the air (expensive hot air scrubber needed). Bullseye glass has one in Portland Oregon. #bombarder #red #ruby #light #favorite #color #

Its been fun teaching the first weeks class here at Columbus Glass Art Center. Here are my whiteboard drawings for how a variety of bombarder/ choke systems are wired, and how the neon torches work. Katie, my amazing scientific glassmaking TA is upgrading the pump arm. She was going to do more, but the art center has not gotten their usual grants, so no funds were available for glass valves. Oh well, we will just make do with what we have :). And we are making do! I just hooked the manifold up to the vacuum pump and have it sucking down over night. I believe we have hermeticity. It looks like the neon pump line is looking good. We repainted and resurfaced the pump table to make mercury spills super obvious. They couldn't afford the parts- about $225 worth of glass and machined teflon for the dribble proof, retractable mercury injector that Katie could make. I guess stainless steel and glass syringe it is... and the big bucket of mercury absorbent powder. #ohio #neon #columbus

James Akers is an artist and sculptor working with glass, neon tubes and electronics. You can follow his video account at: ➡️ @jamesakers@makertube.net Don't worry if the account looks blank to you, this just means no one from your server follows it yet. Follow the account and its videos will start gradually showing up on your server too. You can also follow Akers's Mastodon account at @JamesAkers@expressional.social#FeaturedPeerTube #Sculpture #Neon #Glass #GlassBlowing #Art #PeerTube

And 3 tickets just opened for tomorrow’s tour. https://www.eventbrite.com/e/matchbook-neon-typography-tour-212-tickets-1978789161650?aff=stewf #SanFrancisco #Signs #Neon #NeonSigns #Matchbooks #Typography #Lettering

🚀 NEON is almost SOLD OUT. Our new high school STEM research program at the Westport Observatory has just a few spots left. Students in grades 9–12 work with professional-grade telescopes, analyze real data, and do real astronomical research — not a simulation. If your student is serious about STEM, sign up TODAY. 🔗 https://was-ct.org/programs/introducing-neon/ #NEON #STEM #Astronomy #WestportCT #StudentResearch #SpaceScience #HighSchoolSTEM #FutureScientists