Experience with Ceramit?

Folks,

I was reading about Ceramit last night and wondering if it might be
a good way for me to experiment with enamels without the major
investment of a kiln (which I don’t have space or money for right
now). Have any of you tried it? Opinions?

The materials I have describe it as a “low temperature curing
enamel” that requires 200 F / 93 C for one hour to cure.

Have you found this to be true? Is the resulting appearance of good
quality? Are their colors good and durable? Is the material
durable? Does it work well on sterling? copper? gold?

Any info you can give would be great!

Thank you!

Karen Goeller
@Karen_Goeller

Hi Karen-I used to air brush Ceramit onto highly polished (tumbled)
brass jewelry-for costume jewelry combining and layering it with
translucent and opaque auto paints from an auto paint wholesaler.
The colors are great along with metallics for some great effects. It
does contain Benzine which you want to use “safely” with proper
ventillation! And then I cured it in a 200 F turkey roaster! Had a
lot of fun with it and it was very profitable. I also had a good
friend -an excellent enamalist who found the only way to repair a
damaged piece for a customer was to use Ceramit. Have fun with it!

I have personal experience with both Ceramit and Durenamel. The
components in Ceramit are much more volitile(read hazardous
shipping), and working with it can be rather unpleasant. I also
found that getting your hands on a Ceramit kit that isn’t already
almost out of date can be difficult.

Durenamel is very easy to use, has many more color combinations than
Ceramit, and has superior polishability compared to Ceramit. The
odors involved are minimal, and placement of the liquid is
facilitated by a thick and a thin catalyst that you can tailor to
your piece.

All in all, I never got a successful piece of work done w/ the
Ceramit kit that I could polish, but I’ve done hundreds and hundreds
of pieces with Durenamel. Granted, you get the absolute best results
and finish out of your enamel if you can place it on a "finished"
piece and never have to polish it, but some pieces don’t lend
themselves to that.

David Cowling

    *Folks, I was reading about Ceramit last night and wondering
if it might be a good way for me to experiment with enamels without
the major investment of a kiln (which I don't have space or money
for right now). * Have any of you tried it? *Opinions? *The
materials I have describe it as a "low temperature curing enamel"
that requires 200 F / 93 C for one hour to cure. Have you found
this to be true? Is the resulting appearance of good quality? Are
their colors good and durable? Is the material durable? Does it
work well on sterling? copper? gold? *Any info you can give would
be great! Thank you! Karen Goeller 

Hello Karen, and Fellow Orchidians,

I’ve been a lurker for a while! I really enjoy the
Forum.This is my first post! I do not have experience with the
Ceramit product . But I have a lot of experience with vitreous
enamel, which in my opinion is ‘real’ enamel in the most currently
respected sense of the word. Ceramit is an interesting and useful
product but to consider it as interchangeable with vitreous enamel
or as a vitreous enamel substitute, is well I believe incorrect, an
injustice to, and a misrepresentation of the word enamel.

I followed a very interesting thread earlier this year here on
Orchid and you will find a lot of posts on Ceramit, Colorit, and
other resin products, as well as vitreous enamels, in the archives.
I might suggest you check them out Karen, they may be very helpful
to you and answer some of your questions. In addition to the new
posts you will probably receive. List Archives:~
http://www.ganoksin.com/orchid/archive I’ve also included a link to
an article which outlines the etymology of the word ‘Enamel,’ by
Woodrow Carpenter.
http://users.netconnect.com.au/~enews/eNAMEL_the_word_ENAMEL_01.html

And I’ll leave you with these thoughts. If you crave the luscious
lustrous beauty of High Fire Vitreous Enamel on Metal, don’t
substitute it. It’s like using an artificial sweetener, and then
wondering why the drink doesn’t really taste ‘real,’ and sweet like
with sugar. But if what you want is to add some interesting color,
you may find the product very useful, as with many color products.
It’s just that it is NOT a ‘low fire ENAMEL.’ And I sincerely wish
that the makers of such products would stop trying to misrepresent
them as “low fire enamel.” Or enamels of any kind! By their use of
wording like: ( * “low temperature curing enamel” ) So to one of your
questions Karen: * "I was reading about Ceramit last night and
wondering if it might be a good way for me to experiment with
enamels without the major investment of a kiln … While it might be
a fine way to experiment with color, I do not believe it could be a
good way to experiment with ‘Enamel.’ It is not the same thing at
all. I’ve enameled for years, and the art of vitreous enameling is a
most beautiful and time honored art. I highly recommend the ‘Real
Thing.’

Best Of Luck Karen!
Sharon Scalise
@Ornamental_Creations
http://users.netconnect.com.au/~sscalise/

Hey let’s hear more about your translucent and opaque auto paints
with ceramit! How do you mix, brand of auto paint, etc. Thanks,

Jim C

I used to tumble polish the handcut brass pieces-deburr with ceramic
shot and water, vibrasonic tumblers-rinse,dry,solder on
findings-tumble again with steel shot, Ivory (Baby) flakes in a
large rotary tubler with water-came out with mirror finish
almost-just a slight texture for the paints to stick. Then steam
clean in a Dr.s sterilizer or double boiler-dry again-attach the
pieces to cardboard backing with a cotton glove-don’t want
fingerprints-then air brush-with a ("C’ wide tip) usually a coat of
White auto(Thomsan’s enamels)-then airbrush multilayers of
translucent or opaque Ceramit plain or metallic(auto paint) on
top-baked in an old turkey roaster at about 200-250 degrees-whatever
Ceramit requires right on the cardboard-shouldn’t burn at that low
temp. The paint stuck to the metal well, didn’t fade or peel. That
was about 1979 when I started and still have some samples that are
like new, So it works- if the metal or whatever material you choose
is clean. Just experiment to get the colors right. Have fun and be
sure to ventilate due to the Benzine and whatever else in the Ceramit
and paint.

Although who’s to say what “hard” means when applied to filled epoxy
resin systems, really? Not the manufacturers of Ceramit, it would
seem, who say the hardness of their material can’t be tested.

My mistake folks - it’s the manufacturers of Colorit, not Ceramit,
who can’t test the hardness of their product - although one would
have thought that after 180+ years the Mohs scale would have made it
across the road to Liechtenstein.

in humility
Al Heywood

 Hey let's hear more about your translucent and opaque auto paints
with ceramit! How do you mix, brand of auto paint, 

You can also tint these things with ordinary artist’s oil paints or
any other coloured paint-like material that will dissolve in xylene
(or with the raw dyes themselves). That is, just about any paint
except those that are water-based. Little tins of hobby “enamel” are
ideal. After all we’re talking about the sorts of resins they skin
surf-boards with here!

To get transparent colours mix a little bit of the colourant on a
toothpick etc directly into the resin (part A) before you add the
catalyst (part B). You’ll have to mix it thoroughly again after you
add the catalyst.

It’s a bit more iffy using paints to get opaques - too much paint
and crosslinking of the resin molecules is retarded (at least I’m
guessing that’s what happens) and the stuff doesn’t cure out as hard
as it otherwise might. Although who’s to say what “hard” means when
applied to filled epoxy resin systems, really? Not the manufacturers
of Ceramit, it would seem, who say the hardness of their material
can’t be tested.

Guess it’s all just a matter of faith hmmmmmmm?

Similarly, you can tint polyurethanes (e.g. the Plaid range of
interior/exterior clear varnishes) with water-based paints like the
Jo Sonja range of acrylic gouaches.

cheers
Al Heywood

I should have mentioned that there is a chain of auto paint stores
called Thomsan or Thompsan (not the Thompsan glass enamels) that I
bought wholesale from-usually the smallest size was a pint or
quart-after making thousands of pieces I never used up all of the
auto paint or the Ceramit kit of colors using the airbrush.

Hi everyone!

I’m new to the wonderful world of resins, and have been scared off
trying the epoxy sort by dire health risk warnings - am going to
start by trying the polyester resins instead (have heard they don’t
attack the body in the same way, plus have an odor so you can tell if
your workspace is adequately ventilated…) BUT really love the
colors I’ve found (Rio sells them for their ‘colores’ brand epoxy
resin) for the epoxies, while my local plastics store (where I picked
up all my stuff) had only basic colors for the poly resin…and Rio
says I can’t use the Colores colors on anything but epoxy. I am
trying to get very very bright, almost fluorescent (but not quite)
opaque colors.

Can anyone out there advise as to how I can do this for the poly
resins? I’m pouring the resin into molds rather than painting on
metal.

Thanks so much in advance…sorry this doesn’t involve any metal per
se, but the pieces will end up combined in the end! But I do know
this is rather off-topic, so really do appreciate y’all letting me
ask & do hope I’m not offending anyone :slight_smile:

-Jessica, enjoying beautiful fall sunshine in San Francisco.

Buy or borrow the smallest amount possible of one of these "Colores"
colours (I don’t know anything about 'em) and try mixing it with the
polyester resin - I’ll be surprised if it doesn’t work.

cheers
Al Heywood