07 January 2009

melting clay for eyes

I spent a pleasant hour or so watching Peter Lenzo work this morning. He is a meticulous glazer.

The devil jug in the post before this one, which I still like after a few months, and which is therefore looking down on me now as I type, has got a melted left eye. I know that it's obvious, but what surprised me is how well it turned out.

To come up with a melting clay, I ran a series of experiments. I started with a base of Highwater Clay's white earthenware and added frit (Ferro 3195) in varying percentages (by weight).

For the electric kiln, cone 6, 80% clay and 20% frit worked best.

So I guessed that for the wood kiln, cone 10, 90% clay and 10% frit would work well. It did, by and large -- it produced the eye in the devil jug below, as well as this guy's eye:



But the same mix also produced this unmelted result:



A mystery.

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