Glazed

Last several months, two of the glaze bucket gave away during the mixing, and the glaze gushing from the bottom. My floor has a vinyl carpet, and I was able to collect most of the glaze back to the new bucket with sponges and shop-vac. I was a bit worried about one bucket, and I bought 32 gallon bucket (commercial use) for the glaze over the weekend. I thought I bought the same size, but not.  I have been using 20 gallon buckets.  This gave me enough clearance, additional 5 inches in width,  for the vase I wanted to glaze, instead of spraying.  I mixed the glaze enough to fill a half bucket full.  I glaze it today.  I missed some overlap part, but brushed the glaze. I think this worked.



 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
 

 
I have been working on the exhibition in Syracuse. I posted the postcard in my schedule page. I first thought to exhibit a collection of small teapots, but I am making different pieces now. Here is teapots preview.



 

Decal

I have been reading the decal on the pottery. Keith Phillips and Cynthia Guajardo describes their process at his and her blog. That makes me very curious. I bought the HP 1020 laser printer and the laser printer decal paper off the ebay last week.  I made the decal of the Hungerford Urban Artisan logo on the glaze fired cups, and put in the bisque kiln to cone 06.



Most recommended to cone 04, though I like the bisque pieces to cone 06 for better fit of the glaze. The toner of the laser printer contains 50% iron, that is fused to the glaze, and become very nice sepia color. I like how the test turned out, especially with the rutile blue and the amber glaze combination.


Today, I was glazing and loading the kiln for firing tomorrow.  I wanted several cups made with logo before the studio opening this weekend, but don’t have enough time to glaze fire, attach the decal and bisque fire them.  So, I glazed the cup, waxed over it, and attached the decal on the waxed surfcae. I have no idea this would work or not.


I think making a design for the decal to fit with the glaze would be the most difficult part, and have a whole winter to think about.

Espom salt

Glazing today.

My studio gets very dry, and the glaze bucket does loose its water content in a span of two weeks even with the lid on.  I draw a line on the interior wall of the bucket when finish glazing so I knew when it lost water.
When I glaze, I usually check the thickness of the glaze by using the hydrometer or weighting the glaze (10 cc).  And I still had inconsistent results of the glazed ware.  I suspected the Epsom salt being the cause.  I use the Epsom salt as the flocculant, which slows the settling of the glaze.



Last time, I mixed the new batch of glaze; I did not add the Epsom salt and tested the new batch of glaze in the last firing. (Test, test test!  I do measure carefully, but I still mess up time to time. )   Now I can mix with old batch of the glaze safely.  I checked the thickness by weighing 250 cc of the glaze this time; first the glaze without the Epsom salt, then added the Epsom salt in the glaze.   Both weights came up 275 g. The result showed the Epsom salt does not interfere with the weight of the glaze.  I guess 10 cc was too small of sample.  I did not test today, but I was very sure the hydrometer was inaccurate with the glaze containing the Epsom salt.

Rice bowl 2

We had another snow overnight. This is the perfect timing! (I wish the warm weather is here, though.)

The design of the turquoise rice bowl is somewhat different from the most of my bowls. I had an image of the spring garden in snow or remaining snow at a high mountain in the early summer. I probably started glazing this way in winter, wishing then spring. Cook rice is hot to serve, not cold; there is some fault to my idea. Ha, ha... One of design came out with what I intended.

Glazing idea

April is around the corner.  It was snowing outside.  We always have the tug of war between the winter and the spring.

Kiln is loaded, and ready to go tomorrow. No wind in forecast.

Sometime glazing idea comes from the imperfect firing result.  Here is one.  This bowl is supposed to be look like on the left, but the glaze just dropped during the firing (photo on right).  I liked it, and tried the duplicate design, purposely, by brushing the glaze.

Glaze test

Last two firing, I put a couple of test glaze. I was aiming the chun blue, and got this amber color. I like it actually.

I was glazing today, and noticed this cup on the glazing table. It looks like the chun glaze.  Bottom of the cup shows  2000 by me. I totally forget about I had this glaze. This will be great with my tenmoku glaze. I found the recipe in the hyperglaze program, and will mix it tomorrow for the next firing, which is on Tuesday.

Kiln Unloaded

After two and a half years of trial and error, I finally got a whole kiln reduced at my studio location. It was very calm day on Friday, and might be the reason why. I hope not. I changed the two things, at up to and during body reduction period, and the soaking period. I tried to fire the bricks first, not pottery, as I read one of Japanese pottery book long time ago. I candled the kiln longer, and used the blower at the stronger setting while closing the flap than usual to push the heat until the end of the body reduction with lower gas setting. Second, I put the kiln back into the heavier reduction on the soaking period for 30 minutes. This is not usual way. The way fired pieces look, the turquoise glaze shows the sign of the oxidation, but reduced on the glaze used for decoration, such as red/pink in reduction and pale in oxidation. It seems that the oxidized part of the glaze was reduced by this process. I fired once with the heavier reduction (less air from blower) all way through, which was very bad firing, lots of crawling if I remember correctly. I wish I've taken the detailed note on each attempt.

I do not know either or both processes helped this firing. I am pleased with what I got. If the next firing goes well, I will be out of the woods, for now.

Satisfactory kiln opening

Opened the kiln today. Still having the oxidation on the bottom shelves, but the rests of kiln are good.

The reduction agent reduced the rutile blue glaze, but pitted very badly. I may apply too much. Need further testing.



I am starting to catch the glaze bug. There was a test pieces for the celadon blue glaze, which does not craze, but got yellow-ish color. I sorta like the result, though. I used 1% of black iron oxide. I will try with 1% red iron oxide next time, and apply more thickly.

Back to work

Autoracks parking in the yard. Excess of the empty autoracks are needed to park somewhere, I guess.



I store my glazes in 30 gallon buckets. Glaze thickness is alway very tricky. I weight 10cc of glaze to meet the target weight of each glaze, 14g to 15.5g depending of glaze (10cc of water weights 10g) as well as use the hydrometer. During the winter, my studio gets very toasty hot and dry with the steam heater. If I forget to seal the top of the bucket, 1-2" high of the water is easily evaporated. You can see the result almost instantly when painting. Pottery, you really do not know until it is fired. (2-3 days later)

I pour glazes over the bisque ware. Sequence of overlapping glaze gives the different results. I have been using the same glazes for while, and am getting to know how each glaze reacts to each other with different thickness and so on.



My application is always evolving, and that is a fun of it, and this makes the ware fresh look.



The weather looks good for glaze firing.

Back to work

Autoracks parking in the yard. Excess of the empty autoracks are needed to park somewhere, I guess.



I store my glazes in 30 gallon buckets. Glaze thickness is alway very tricky. I weight 10cc of glaze to meet the target weight of each glaze, 14g to 15.5g depending of glaze (10cc of water weights 10g) as well as use the hydrometer. During the winter, my studio gets very toasty hot and dry with the steam heater. If I forget to seal the top of the bucket, 1-2" high of the water is easily evaporated. You can see the result almost instantly when painting. Pottery, you really do not know until it is fired. (2-3 days later)

I pour glazes over the bisque ware. Sequence of overlapping glaze gives the different results. I have been using the same glazes for while, and am getting to know how each glaze reacts to each other with different thickness and so on.



My application is always evolving, and that is a fun of it, and this makes the ware fresh look.



The weather looks good for glaze firing.