I just ran a test on the annealing temp with the CIM colors I bought from

Quinton. I have a  much higher annealing temp reading than the original I
posted. I use the stringer test (1mm stringer) and tested in my FuseBox
II  kiln (digitally controlled) and here are the results:

Temp in Fahrenheit (to get Celsius, take the temp minus 32, then mulitply
by 0.555, result is Celsius reading)
Celadon 1020
Simply Berry 1070
Halong 1099
Leaky Pen 1015
Ginger 1110
Gelly 1078
Butter Pecan 990
Khaki 1078
Bordello 995
French Blue 1070
Cirrus 1078

My kiln is programmed to anneal at 950°F which is about 510°C and I use

this for Moretti, Lauscha, Vetrofond and all beads come out ok. Thing is, I
am worried as I am selling at events where I can't afford to have a whole
lot of people complaining that the beads cracked when they got home. So
I am very careful here. I also know that you could use glass with a max
difference of 4 COE units and the beads should hold. But this is not for
every case.

In this case it would be alright to use the harder glass as the base bead
and the stringer work with the softer glass on top (ie CIM as base bead
and Moretti as application). I'm sorry if I am scaring all of you and
perhaps making a mountain out of a molehill. I've had experiences before
where I spent an entire week making a series of glass beads and they
starting cracking up one by one after one week and they were meant for a
show! Anyway, I would try out the glass and see what happens. In the
meantime, perhaps we can get some feedback from the supplier?

Hope I am not repeating too much here . . .  we have 25 Messy testers,

none of whom reported cracking or breakage problems due to annealing
temperatures EXCEPT with Cirrus, Halong Bay, and Peacock Green.  Most
of the testers did not change their annealing cycles from their regular
Moretti schedule.

We did have testers report, however, that batch annealing was not
effective.

We test every pot of Messy Color that we melt against Effetre regular
clear, Effetre super clear, Vetrofond crystal clear, Lauscha, Precision's
Diamond Clear, and Kugler clear.  We are formulated to be closest to
Effetre and Vetrofond, so we recommend using those. 

Our testers who traditionally use Lauscha with Effetre and Vetrofond have
also reported no problems using Lauscha with Messy. 

It is part of my mission to provide comprehensive and accurate

information about each and every Messy Color individually in order to
optimize your working environment. 

If anyone is interested in delving into this topic more in depth, I have a

lengthy bibliography from Corning Library that I would be happy to
forward.

Kathy

Recently one of our testers, Lorraine Chandler, batch annealed Messy

Color. Lorraine divided the glass into 2 annealing groups and experienced
no breakage with either.  (Thanks, Lorraine, for a great job testing and
record keeping!)

525 (Celsius) annealing schedule for batch annealing

Ramp up         0-150  degrees       1 hour     
                    150-315  degrees    1 hour   
                    315-425  degrees    1 hour   
                    425-525 degrees     1 hour
                    Held at 525 for 30 minutes

Ramp down     525-425 degrees     2 hours

                    425-370  degrees    1 hour 
                    370-315  degrees    1 hour
                    315-205 degrees     1 hour
                    Turn off kiln and remove beads the next morning.

555 annealing schedule for batch annealing

Ramp up         0-150 degrees         1 hour

                    150-315 degrees      1 hour 
                    315-425 degrees      45 minutes
                    425-510  degrees     45 minutes
                    510-555  degrees     45 minutes
                    Held at 555 for 30 minutes

Ramp down     555-510 degrees       1 hour

                    510-455 degrees       1 hour
                    455-400 degrees       1 hour
                    400-290 degrees       1 hour
                    290-230 degrees       1 hour
                    Turn off kiln and remove beads in the morning.

We don’t like to recommend batch annealing because it is always safer to

anneal immediately while the bead is still hot.  However, Trudi, I thought
you would want to know that some of our testers are having success as
well.

And by the way, you also discovered one of the special working properties
of Cirrus.  If you use transparent colors on top of Cirrus, it will appear less
“washed out” than if on regular clear.

Hope that gives you some confidence, Trudi. And hope you will share your
beads and any other discoveries you make about Messy Color. Feel free to
contact me here or directly at kathy@creationismessy.com if there are any
questions.