melting my own glass

**Just a curiosity question**

There are enough glasses dropped here that i could probably melt them all and have enough for a 36 foot diameter mirror ;-) Just out of curiosity, what does it take to do such a thing?

I know I'd need an oven, something to hold the glass while it melts, and a mold to pour it in to, but is it possible to do this at home? How hot would the oven need to be and how does that compare to a normal kitchen oven? and what about the other utencles, the pot and mold, would they need to be of specific metals or thiknesses?

I think you have to get to about 3000 degrees F. That compares to your kitchen oven that probably goes to about 500 degrees.

Also might have an interesting time generating glass of sufficient optical quality without lots of bubbles and stuff. But like the idea -- talk about building from scratch!! Gonna plant trees to generate lumber to make the mount? ;-)

Found an interesting article about a guy who is into making huge blanks in his garage. Pretty interesting stuff!

http://home.europa.com/~telscope/stadlem.txt