What happened to Spectrum Glass?

Who make COE 96 Glass? Is Uroboros COE 96? What is System 96 Glass?

As of May 2016, Spectrum Glass and Uroboros Glass (both branded as System 96 Glass) are owned by Oceanside Glass & Tile out of California under the brand " Oceanside Compatible" and are manufactured in Mexico by Oceanside Glass & Tile. 

Oceanside Glass & Tile itself makes Glass Tile from recycled glass so it should not be confused with Spectrum Glass who was know for it's high quality, smooth  System 96 is now branded as "Oceanside Compatible", the COE 96 division of Oceanside Glass & Tile.

Oceanside Compatible glass is now ALL COE 96 and made from the original Spectrum Glass formulas. Spectrum glass was also known as System 96 Compatible. Still confused, then read on!

What happened to Uroboros Glass?

Oceanside in 2016 also purchase the 44 year old Uroboros Glass company and their entire product line of COE 96 accessory glass, like glass frits and stringers and noodles, and all the custom Spectrum sheet glass color formulas and sheet glass texturing plates. In 2020 Oceanside did sell off some portions of the Uroboros product line to Youghiogheny Opalescent Glass Company, Inc.

What happened to Youghiogheny Glass?

Youghiogheny also started making their own line of COE 96 Compatible Sheet Glass to help fill the transition void while Oceanside Compatible had to build a new plant and meet unknown EPA requirements before they could even begin production of COE 96 glass. In 2020, Youghiogheny Glass purchased portions of Uroboros Glass products from Oceanside Compatible and it is now available and branded as  Uro by Yough along with their Y96, COE 96 compatible fusible sheet glass which has true color formulas!

NOTE: Make sure to thank them for bringing  COE 96 Pink Sheet Glass Back!

COE 96 Glass Colors and Formulas are safe and compatible with each other. Fusible Sheet Glass and color coordinated Decorative Accessory Glass are all offered in the same Spectrum Color formulas by Oceanside Compatible.

What has changed with Spectrum Glass sheet glass?

- The Spectrum Glass Stained Glass line of Sheet Glass: Oceanside Compatible has changed the Spectrum Stained Sheet Glass formulas to now be COE 96 Compatible glass, fusible kiln fired glass. This is a win for the fusing artist with the expansion of many more sheet glass styles and patterns available but it has made it more expensive for the Stained Glass Artist to purchased sheets of glass.

- The Spectrum Glass ran multiple production lines of glass simultaneously: Oceanside Compatible has changed to running a single ribbon, one production line of glass. All though this sounds simple, it has effected the restocking and availability of glass to the distribution chain during the transition and even today. The result, outages overall of certain colors or styles off glass at certain distributors. Unfortunately, these outages has effected the consumers, glass artist, being able to acquire glass. 

An example of availability was the Red Transparent glass in 2020 making it difficult to locate for Christmas and Valentine day projects. In 2021, it seems there are interruptions of Dark Amber (for those gingerbread men) and Aventurine Green sheet glass.

Other issues during the transition of using a single ribbon process appeared to be annealing issues with sheet glass runs. This may have been the production line being run to fast from the molten stage to the final cutting stage or environment issues causing the glass to cool too rapidly. One example, in 2020 there was a lot of clear sheet glass that got into the distribution chain that were not cut to standardize sheet sizes of 24 x 48 feet and so there were many sheets that were available in 24 x 24, sold in non-standard sizes or ended up as scrap.

In addition, much of this glass made it to the Resellers and even the customer level. Unfortunately, cutting it to exact sizes was nearly impossible as the glass would run off the score lines into any direction when breaking and left a lot of frustration and scrap.

Overall, the transition for the Spectrum COE 96 line of glass into the Oceanside Compatible glass family made have taken some twists and turns in the past 5 years but, it seems to be stabilizing at least for the Resellers and the glass artist consumer base. The main distributors are doing all the heavy lifting for us by trying to keep the sheet glass and decorative accessory glass components in stock for the rest of us.

Thank you to the distributors for hanging in there for us COE 96 lovers!

Go Fusing and Enjoy!