Glass Message Board
Glass Identification - Post here for all ID requests => Glass Trinket Sets => Topic started by: agincourt17 on September 17, 2012, 04:08:54 PM
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A pressed glass trinket tray in uranium green. A sort of rectangular 'dumbell shape, with offset compound handles to short sides (the handles being made up of a flat horizontal plate with a thicker octagonal vertical section). 30cm overall x 13cm.
Also a pink trinket tray in the same pattern.
The pink tray came with a lidded trinket pot of a similar colour and similar stylistic details (but which may not necessarily be a match, of course). The pot base has raised lettering to the undeside near the rim reading 'CHOLSLOVAKIA'.
IDs, suggestions or comments, please.
(Permission for re-use of the images of the pink items on the GMB granted by Ian Grimbley )
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A tray in blue glass.
(Permission to re-use the image on the GMB granted by wibblewidget).
Still no ID?
Fred.
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Photos of a blue lidded pot like the pink one (still not entirely sure if matching the tray or not). Shows that the pink lidded pot had a broken lid finial.
(Permission for the re-use of these images on the GMB granted by surreal_day).
Plus photos of a blue perfume flask to match the lidded pot (and showing the Czech marking to actually be CZECHOSLOVAKIA).
(Permission for the re-use of these images on the GMB by world1078).
Fred.
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Now a tray in amber glass.
(Permission for the re-use of the image on the GMB granted by Alison Theakston).
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I don't have the evidence that this tray matches any of the pots I've seen it with so far Fred... I've seen it with four different ones so far including the ones above. :) I've not seen these pots before though... but I'm pretty sure the tray is Czech...
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Herewith a photo of the matching ring holder of this model ( bottle and pot).
Permission to use the photo.
Eugénie
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Yet another set showing the dumbell-shaped tray with the lidded pots in the same pattern as those above.
(Permission for the re-use of these images on the GMB granted by heritagegroup2008).
This amber set shows that there was also a matching perfume atomiser.
In fact, the perfume flask and the atomiser still retain traces of their original printed foil labels, the label on atomiser revealing the word BOHEMIA .
Fred.
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A small green Uranium pot.
It measures 8.5cms x 6.5cms and is 9.5cms in height.
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Herewith a photo of the ring holder. Anne, you know it already..... please use for the GTS.
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Thank you both for these photos, I'll add them to 113 now.
Looking at the green one, I'm wondering if the glow is manganese rather than uranium as it doesn't seem very strong? Perhaps Christine (lustrousstone) will be able to help with her uranium eyes.
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You might be right Anne. The glow is not all over even
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That's what made me wonder Christine. Thanks for looking. x
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I'll do some more photos from different angles when I get back from work. A quick check with this one next to a couple of others shows it isn't quite as bright.
But it is brighter than a small Davidson bowl and a blue Inwald bowl that both glow weakly and I assume have Manganese rather than Uranium in them.
Perhaps I'm wrong, but my first "test" is whether or not the glow shows up easily on photos. I've found that to my eyes a piece might appear to glow quite well, but if photographed, glows so weakly that the picture hardly picks up any glowing at all. To me that indicates Manganese.
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It looks like uranium to me. I've got quite a few pieces that don't glow very brightly which I'm sure are uranium. Correct me if I'm wrong but Manganese was originally put in to get rid of the green tinge that occurred in clear glass due to the presence of iron oxide in the sand they used. There may be another reason for using Manganese but I'm not sure they would have done this if they were trying to produce green glass.
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Manganese appears in all sorts of colours. It seems likely to me that coloured batches were often based on the master clear recipe. The uranium glow is always bright
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Recently on another thread, Paul S. recommended a book on uranium glass by Barrie Skelcher. I’ve not seen the book but there is an interesting article by Skelcher on uranium glass for the Glass Association here: http://www.glassassociation.org.uk/sites/default/files/Uranium_Glass_sample_article.pdf
In plate 3 he shows glass with high uranium content that doesn’t react at all to uv and items that show various levels of uv reaction that isn’t proportional to uranium content. “...in some glasses, especially those with a high lead content, the fluorescence is so weak that there is an element of uncertainty”.
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Haven't read the article yet, will save it for tomorrow when my eyes are not so tired.
As promised more pics. of the 113 pot.
One and two in comparison with a Bagley pot which to me is definitely Uranium glass. While the Bagley is certainly brighter, some of the extra brightness is related to the thickness of the glass?
Three is comparing it to a green Davidson bowl. To the naked eye the Davidson bowl under UV has an all-over weak greenish, yellowy glow but the photo doesn't pick this up at all, indicating Manganese?
Four is with the blue stem holder from an Inwald bowl. The glass is thicker, showing the weak glow a little better, But again to the naked eye it much more noticeable than in the photo indicating Manganese?
In both three and four the 113 pot's glow is noticeably stronger, indicating Uranium?
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Much as I respect Barrie's work, I'm not sure about the accuracy of those particular claims, as my high-uranium content glass has a knock your socks off glow
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In Skelcher’s article he goes into some detail on the technique to determine uranium content using a Beta sensitive Geiger counter, including calibration against known batch compositions. He mentions other more costly or inconvieniant methods, such as chemical analysis or gamma spectrometry, but using the Geiger counter looks to be his preferred method. He doesn’t specify which method was used to analyse uranium content in the glass shown in plate 3, but it seems inconceivable that he showed those glasses without confirming their uranium content with at least the Geiger counter method.
If he was wrong about the uranium content in the glass shown, and his accompanying text explaining problems relying on a uv source, then it would seem he would have to be wrong in his Geiger counter technique that looks to be a foundation of his work. I find this unlikely. He says .“...in some [uranium] glasses, especially those with a high lead content, the fluorescence is so weak that there is an element of uncertainty”, that is a clear statement, one would assume proven by his research.
What I take from the article is that if an item is relatively early, say pre 1940 and has a strong uv reaction (glow) then it contains uranium. If it has a weaker glow then it might contain just as much uranium but it would have to be confirmed or denied using an alternative technique. I don’t doubt that glow from manganese is the cause of weak glow in many glass items but that doesn’t necessarily account for every item with a weak glow.
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Has anyone any experience of the cheaper Geiger counters and "radiation detectors" available online? It would seem they would be the only reliable means of detecting radiation but I'm very sceptical about whether they work.
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Hi, I don’t know much about them and from the article it sounds like you have to get the right type to help avoid false readings. There is a buyer’s guide here if that’s any help:
https://www.imagesco.com/geiger/buying-a-geiger-counter-pg1.html
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Thanks for that Ekimp, it does mention fiestaware ceramics collecting in the introduction but after that it's pretty generalised. It does look as though a fairly inexpensive hand held digital one would be OK, I'll investigate.
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I know little about the science behind the phenomena that causes some glass to glow and would appreciate any opinions on my earlier photos and use of the camera to determine whether the glow is caused by Uranium or not.
What I see are two bowls (the Bagley and 113) that glow with much the same level of intensity and where the difference can be accounted for by the amount of Uranium present. Importantly the photos accurately show the glow as seen with my eyes.
The other two (the Davidson and Inwald) glow with a completely different level of intensity and more importantly, when photographed, the pictures do not accurately show what is seen by the eyes. Visually, both of these glow brightly enough that they might be thought to contain some Uranium, but the camera cannot capture it.
Could this be something to do with the wavelengths of the glows? Whether it is or not it seems to me that the photos and how accurately they reflect what is seen by the eye is a simple test of whether or not a glow is caused by Uranium.
In other words, if the 113 bowl does not have some Uranium content, it would photograph like the Davidson or Inwald pieces and not like the Bagley bowl??
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There is a very good article on the Collectors Weekly website by Ben Marks called "These people like to collect radioactive glass, are they mad?" It explains the science behind the uranium glow. I can't give you a link to it but if you go to their title page and scroll down the articles you should find it.
[Mod:Direct link to the article, as at 24 June 2020
https://www.collectorsweekly.com/articles/these-people-love-to-collect-radioactive-glass/]
As for the manganese question, I think it's like Christine said that manganese was initially put in a master batch of glass to get rid of any green tint caused by Iron Oxide. A colourant would then be added to produce whatever colour was required. This would mean all glass, including uranium glass, would also contain manganese. I'm not sure if the Davidson and Inwald pieces are uranium as they do pick up some of the glow from the pieces next to them. I don't know the science of the photography but I've had the colour of pieces change completely from the naked eye to a camera and again to a laptop.
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Thanks for your reply. I read that article a few years ago when I realised how much Uranium glass I had collected (without knowing it) and was a bit worried that it might be a health hazard. I found it informative, very re-assuring and would recommend it to anyone wanting a guide to Uranium glass.
I'm equally lost when it comes to the science of photography or the science of Uranium glass. But that is the point I'm trying to make, a simple, practical test for Uranium glass which is science-free and relies solely on the images produced by my (basic) camera.
It doesn't matter if the colour changes from the eye to camera, or from camera to lap-top. The question is whether the camera accurately reproduces the intensity of the glow or not.
My photos of the Bagley and 113 bowl accurately show what I see, including that the 113 bowl's glow is weaker than that of the Bagley. I would also point out that those photos were taken with the same set-up as the photos of the Walther "Rosen" bowl (in another thread) which was accepted as Uranium glass.
My photos of the Davidson and Inwald pieces are inaccurate (whether or not they pick up some of the glow through proximity to the pieces next to them) because although they appear in the photos to glow very weakly, (hardly at all in the case of the Davidson bowl) to the eye the glow is stronger, is clearly visible to the extent that for some time I thought the Inwald bowl was blue Uranium glass.
The photos show two entirely different reactions to the same UV light-bulb and I have very little doubt that the Rosen, Bagley and 113 bowls all contain Uranium. Whereas the other two pieces do not.
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I don't know if this will help but this first photo is of an old clear half-pint glass which definitely has manganese in it. You'll notice it only glows really green in the thicker parts and hardly at all elsewhere, the glass also becomes opaque around the green area. I think uranium glass seems to be a consistent colour all over. The second photo is of four trinket sets which show dramatically different fluorescence under the same amount of UV but I am sure are all uranium. You might try and find an old beer glass to act as a reference, they do still turn up, look for one with an excise stamp preferably with a pre 1953 GR mark.
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I don’t know much about photography either, but the apparent brightness will depend on the exposure and what part of the frame the camera’s light sensor is looking at to calculate exposure, the brightness of other objects in the frame etc. I assume that’s the reason your 113 item looks brighter in the last two photos, so you would have to be consistent.
Even if you had a setup that was repeatable, unless you do some sort of chemical analysis/use a Geiger counter etc, then you are calibrating your system with items on which you have made assumptions. Skelcher says fluorescence is not necessarily proportional to % uranium content.
Your system might be right 90% of the time but if Skelcher is correct, you’ll miss the exceptions. Unless someone can disprove Skelcher then I don’t see how you can judge it accurately, when there is a weaker glow, just by looking at it.
Judgements on manganese/uranium in other threads showing items with a weaker glow seem to be based on colour but I’m not persuaded due to the problems NevB mentions with digital imagining.
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Thank you Nev for those photos, I can see what you are getting at and agree with you that all the sets are Uranium but the glass isn't. I'd draw your attention to the ("Mary"?) set at the bottom left corner and how the glow appears stronger on edges where the glass is thicker, just as the 113 pot does.
But I can also understand in a non-technical way, what Ekimp is saying re. the light sensor. My lack of photographic knowledge means my camera is on auto-settings. So although my set-up may be virtually identical in all the photos, the camera could well be adjusting according to what it is "looking at".
Something I've also noticed sometimes when taking pictures of pieces (nothing to do with Uranium glass) and have to resort to a bit of trickery to get the sensor to co-operate.
I think I should put my idea of a "quick practical test" back in its box and go back to the drawing-board, at least until I can explain it convincingly by backing it up with some supporting technical photographic know-how. But thanks again for raising points that test my idea. :)
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The two front sets are both by Libochovice, 1760/1670? on the left and 1700 right, both presumably made about the same time but each with a very different glow. I use a Nikon Coolpix camera in Auto mode, Macro mode for close ups and with the flash off for UV lit photos.
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Has anyone come across this company..Royal Embassy Ware Czechoslovakia....they appear to be the makers or retailers of this mystery set... https://www.rubylane.com/item/712792-191RL7/Vintage-Embassy-Ware-Czech-Amber-Glass
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Found another this has close up pic of label https://www.invaluable.com/auction-lot/4pc-royal-embassy-czech-aqua-glass-scent-set-180-c-bd2407a9f0
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Interesting, no I've not come across Royal Embassy Ware Czechoslovakia before.
The mystery set you have found the labels on is here - Mystery Trinket Set #113
https://www.glasstrinketsets.com/Gallery/thumbnails.php?album=118
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The tray of this Mystery Czech Trinket Set #113 was given the nickname "dumbell tray" Thread here:
https://www.glassmessages.com/index.php/topic,49464.0.html
And another thread on this set here:
https://www.glassmessages.com/index.php/topic,69658.0.html
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Some pieces of this "dumbell tray" Trinket Set found with a label "Royal Embassy Ware Czechoslovakia"
https://www.glassmessages.com/index.php/topic,69689.0.html
And another thread on the "dumbell tray" set here:
https://www.glassmessages.com/index.php/topic,69658.0.html
GTS Mystery Trinket Set #113 link:
https://www.glasstrinketsets.com/Gallery/thumbnails.php?album=118
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Another thread on this "dumbell tray" set here:
https://www.glassmessages.com/index.php/topic,49464.0.html
Sets found with "Royal Embassy Ware Czechoslovakia" labels, thread here:
https://www.glassmessages.com/index.php/topic,69689.0.html
GTS Mystery Trinket Set #113 link here:
https://www.glasstrinketsets.com/Gallery/thumbnails.php?album=118
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All merged. :)