How To Ceramics

Safety

I CANNOT EMPHASIZE ENOUGH HOW CRUCIAL PROPERLY CLEANING IS FOR CLAY AND CERAMICS. Many glazes and ALL dried clay are HAZARDOUS to lung health. If you allow clay to DRY you are making it either DANGEROUS or TEDIOUS for the potter following you to clean up, and if we create clay dust as an area we ENDANGER OTHER MEMBERS. CLEAN AS YOU GO. DO NOT ALLOW CLAY TO DRY.

Walkthrough

• Select and wedge clay
  • Think of wedging like kneading dough. The physical motions are very similar. Wedging is done to remove air and provide a uniform consistency so there are not dryer/harder vs. wetter and softer clay while forming clay

  • Cleaning

    Wipe down wedging table with a damp sponge

• Throw or form pottery
  • Throwing basics
    • starting with a clean wheel, weigh or otherwise portion out your clay
    • slam clay into the center of the wheel
    • Place your hands on the clay, and center the clay. Do not attempt to form the clay until the ‘wobble’ is gone. start with the wheel slow.
    • shape your form. it’s often easiest to have high speed on the base of the piece, and then slow down as you pull walls higher
  • coil basics
    • roll clay into long, thin cylinders (typically from pinky to thumb sized in diameter)
    • use the cylinders to create a base for your piece.
    • begin to coil cylinders on top of themselves at the edges of the base (like an ascending spiral). smooth the joins and sides as you go, being careful not to create voids. use tools to score points of contact to create better joins between levels of coils.
  • slab basics
    • using a rolling pin or similar, roll out sheets of clay. this method is often used for clay types which are used for thin walled vessels and shapes, but does not have to be. make sure you choose your clay according to your goals.
    • use these sheets, trimming tools, and scored edges to form your desired shape
  • Cleaning
    • wipe down all tools until free of clay
    • wipe down any bins or surfaces you have touched with clay
    • mop the floor around the wheel and anywhere else there is clay on the floor
    • clean wheel or turntable
    • never let clay dry on a surface. just don’t. if you do, saturate it with water, let it rehydrate, then clean. Do not scrape or wipe dry clay.
    • wipe down sinks
• in all cases allow pottery to dry to leatherhard . trim your edges and further refine your shapes as desired
  • if your piece cracks or you over trim it, do not attempt to fix it at this stage. drying times will be uneven with repaired sections and the piece will almost certainly fail in the kiln. start over.
  • add your trimmings to recycling. make sure you are throwing the RIGHT MATERIAL in the RIGHT RECLAIM BIN/BUCKET
  • wipe down your work surface and tools
• Allow the piece to dry until ‘bone dry’. do NOT fire still wet pieces. they will almost certainly crack considerably, and may even explode in the kiln.
  • this is a good time to consider if you want this clay to become ceramic. Ceramics last virtually forever in human reckoning. once you fire a piece, it has vitrified and is essentially a hard and brittle stone. if you are unsatisfied with your piece, at this stage it can go in the appropriate recycling bucket. after this it cannot.
• Do a bisque firing at the temperature cycle appropriate to your selected type of clay
  • generally speaking you will want to fire between cone 04 and cone 06. choose according to your clay and desired properties of the finished piece.
  • unlike glaze firing, bisque items can touch. your main concern is that things don’t collapse under their own weight or the weight of things on top of them.
• Glaze your pottery as desired
  • BE SAFE. lots of glazes or their ingredients are TOXIC TO UR LUNG HEALTH. use a respirator when handling ANY dry glaze material.
  • Before mixing new glaze, check existing mixes to see if your desired color is already mixed
  • Be sure to label any glaze you mix on both the lid and the body of the vessel with the brand, color, and date you’ve mixed it. Store it according to the existing organization.
  • be sure that the area of the piece which will be touching the kiln does not have glaze on it. Glaze will harden to a glasslike substance and stick your piece to the kiln. If your piece is glazed to the kiln, it will likely need to be broken to remove it, and may make the kiln ‘sticky’ (full of melty glaze) and prone to damaging other people’s work.
    • wax painted onto the bisque fired ‘foot’ of the pottery is a good basic approach. after glazing, wipe off waxed area with a damp sponge before firing.

  • Cleaning

    many glaze ingredients are HIGHLY toxic. Clean up any and all spills thoroughly, use ppe, and warn other users in the area of dust and spills, unless you 1000000% know your components are completely safe.

• Fire your pottery according to your selected clay and glaze combination. generally speaking, most of our glazes are cone 6. always double check
  • Typical cone 6 schedule is slow ramp at 100 degrees F per hour until you reach 1.1-1.2k, then another 2-300 degrees per hour until you reach cone 6 (2200 degrees F). Then, hold for at least half an hour, then let the kiln cool at its natural rate for 4-6 hours. Do NOT open the door until the temperature is lower than 1000 degrees. Preferably until closer to 500 before any kind of venting. Longer cool times and slower ramps generally decrease the risk of adverse effects to your clay or glaze.
  • Please note a fast paced cone 6 schedule takes close to 24 hours! Schedule your firing and if you aren’t filling the kiln do your best to notify others a few days in advance.

  • Cleaning

    If your glaze spills or drips in any way onto the kiln or it’s shelves, either grind it of yourself WHILE WEARING A RESPIRATOR OR ask for help in the discord, making a note of where you’ve left any damaged shelves

Notes

• Pottery shrinks during both the bisque and final firing stages. How much depends on the type of clay used, but can range from 3-15%. If you have particular goals for dimensions of your final piece, be sure to factor in shrinkage
• Some glaze is highly toxic when ingested or breathed in while dried or powdered. Use ppe as is appropriate for your glaze selection and finishing process
• Firing occupies the kilns/controllers for many hours at once. Please be sure to add your items to the schedule so others can plan accordingly
• Consider testing your glaze and clay combo in an earlier firing, especially if you are doing a full kiln’s worth of pottery, or are very invested in a piece