A warning about a bad batch of color rods from a supplier in Toledo

I was at a workshop in Cleveland last fall and this guy next to me was using a cobalt blue rod from a new supplier. He said 'this stuff is cracking like crazy on the second reheat' and showed me three pieces he'd lost. He was right, the batch number was 22B-47. I checked my own stock and had two rods from the same lot. Tried one on a simple pendant and it spider-webbed instantly after I put it back in the glory hole. Has anyone else run into this specific batch or know what causes that kind of failure?

3 comments

3 Comments

kareng2724d ago

That batch number sounds familiar. Had the same thing happen with a small order of their cobalt last year. The supplier blamed it on a bad annealing cycle during production, something about the cooling rate being off. Lost a couple of good pieces before I figured it out.

sethh5824d ago

Oh man, that tracks completely. Had a nearly identical mess with some of their nickel silver rod a while back. Watched a whole custom run of guides just crack along the grain after the first polish. Their tech finally admitted it was a heat treat problem, like the oven had a cold spot. Cost me a week of shop time easy.

the_pat18d ago

Did they ever make good on the lost shop time?