Ha-ha, this just happened to me and my wife this afternoon as we prepared for dinner. Two of our favorite glass dishes were in the cabinet and had been there for a while. My wife attempted to separate the two and they appeared welded permanently together!!
Now what?
Of course after 38 years of marriage, she looked at me and said, get these separated now, we need them, and they are my favorite glass containers. Totally assuming that I had the remedy instantaneously at hand
The pressure was on, and I thought about how we would separate these two glass vessels, and how I could maintain my history as the problem solver??
The fixer, as I like to call myself.
What happens when a glass vessel is heated, theoretically it expands.
What happens when a glass vessel is cooled, theoretically it shrinks.
OK that is the theory, does it work?
So I tried to find a shallow pan that would allow me to place the two glass dishes in this shallow pan. This would allow me to fill this pan with hot water assuming that the bottom glass dish would expand with the hot water.
Placing the two stuck glasses in the hot water, contained in the shallow pan, I then poured ice cold water in the top dish to hopefully and technically contract the top glass dish. Maybe a few ice cubes would stimulate the contraction of the upper glass dish.
Not really expecting any results, but certainly trying to continue my reputation as the fixer, I waited.
Nothing happened. OK, now what? Hmm I am not looking too good!!
I then filled the top container with some ice cubes, in the hopes of causing a more severe difference in the glass container located in the hot water, and the top container with the now ice cold water.
Wait, that is the secret, it takes time for the bottom glass dish to expand and time for the top glass dish to contract.
As in many issues in life, time and patience is the answer.
After a lot of comments from my wife, known of which were overly complimentary, all of a sudden the two glass containers separated and were easily taken apart.
What did we learn?
We all know that ice and cold will contract a material, and heat will cause the item to expand. As my wife asked, how much does each material expand and contract. Who the hell knows? That is way above my pay grade!! However cold contracts and heat expands, that is a common fact of materials. Therefore eventually the two glass containers should have separated, and they did!!
So the entire idea of this article, is to use the relative normal concept of heat expands, and cold contracts. Many issues and problems can be solved with this very basic concept understood.
Good luck, hopefully you can be the “ fixer “ in the family!!