Apply Copper Foil to Stained Glass

Video Transcript

So this is what it is going to look like. I mean it's not put together yet but we are making a very small project now just to demonstrate the basic ideas. This could be a window hanger. It could be the center of a larger project if we were working on it. Generally when you do stained glass too you often work in sections and a lot of people like to start in the middle and work out. So, the next thing we are going to do is move to the foil tape. And so here it is, and so the way you use this is, find the end of it, and remember, it's adhesive on one side. So let's start with one of these rectangular blue pieces. I am going to get one and I am just roughly, just sort of measure how much I am going to need to wrap all the way around it. I still have the protective backing on the back of this foil right now. I am just sort of roughly measuring how much I am going to need to go around the whole thing. I'm going to need about that much. So this stuff, you can really just kind of tear it, and so there we go. So now I am going to wrap this piece of glass with this piece of foil. First thing I am going to do is take that protective backing off. Like I say, it's got a little bit of adhesive on it. It is important to note though that the adhesive is not really what sticks it to the glass. You are going to have to burnish it down and I will show you what I mean by that in a second. So, what I am going to do is I am going to stick this on the edge of the glass but I am going to make sure that it is really well centered and that is because the reason that the foil is a little bit wider than the glass is because you actually fold the foil over the front and back edges to provide a little bit of a surface there for the solder to stick to. So I am really going to kind of center it on this piece of glass and as you start to stick it down you want to pull it sort of tight and I am kind of doing that. You see if you kind of lift it up and press it down and you run your thumb over it you tell if you are lined up in the middle on that piece of glass. What I mean to say is this piece of foil is about 3/16th's wide to about a 1/4 inch. Well, I want the edge of the glass right in the middle of it and I am going to have a little bit less than a 1/16th sticking out on each side so that I can wrap that around the front. So now I've got it pretty good. I am just going to keep wrapping it around, keeping it pretty tight, sticking it down gently now. We are going to burnish it down better in a moment here. Here we go, I am going to keep wrapping, keeping it kind of tight and then come all the way down to this, back to the beginning. Good. It's kind of centered so now what I am going to do is fold the edges over just by squeezing them. So now you see the edges are starting to fold over the piece of glass. I'll move my fingers away from this in a second so that you can see it. I am just kind of folding the edges over. Really kind of sticking it down. But remember, it is not the adhesive on the foil that is going to stick it. The next step is what sticks it. OK, so now we have a piece of glass that has foil stuck to the edge and it has been folded over both the front and back. You should be able to see that now, it's been folded over the front, folded over the back. This isn't as even as it should be. There is a little bit more on one side than the other but that doesn't matter.

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