Results from Cone 6 firing

Test 26 was a matt glaze good for oxides. Not great but the glaze was really thick – should re-test with more water

Test 25 was meant to be a clear but is a nice white matt

Test 24 Was thick again and wants to start crawling

Test 23 meant to be a wide firing clear base glaze which is ok but on Keanes red terracotta changes to a slight green tinge – needs to be retested with more water added

Test 22 is another clear that is ok and needs to be re-tested with more water to get rid of gas bubbles

Test 21 is my favourite – its a great crawl glaze I can’t wait to use somewhere!!

All tests were done on Keanes red terracotta, Keanes terracotta and MQF

Sues test which I loved was TAFEs celadon with 1% cobalt fired at cone 6. It has lovely speckles and a green blue kind of look and is a little satin.

Tests of Keanes red terracotta and terracotta with Crysanthos clear. Great glaze that if I am going to start buying a clear glaze this would be it!!

Shrinkage was 12.2%

Porosity was 2.38%

Amy's mid fire white test. Not the nicest clay, the shrinkage bar warped a bit… bit of a dead end this one…

Shrinkage is 11.2%

Porosity is 0.68%

Amy's mid fire brown. Nice to use and is a light brown colour.

Going into bisque and cone 6

Chris kmfp test 1




Brt tests for crawl crackle glaze





Keanes brown Terracotta test




Keanes red Terracotta tests





These are all in queue for a TAFE bisque firing.

Crysanthos clear tests for cone 6

Test 1 & 2 clays and Keanes red Terracotta and brown Terracotta





Daves tagine


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News and update

We have just bought a new house… well hopefully… we just need to get the pest inspection done.

I will need to pack up my studio for about 8 weeks so we can sell our house. I will put down some carpet so it is presentable to home buyers.

I am on the look out for what to use as a studio floor in my new studio at the new house, it need to be flexible enough that we can reclaim the space as a living area if need. The floor underneath is concrete but I don’t want to work on concrete.

I am thinking laminate…

Clay results test 2

Clay 1 test 2 bisque






Eck 2 30
Clay ceram 40
Neph syen 10
Talc 8
Flint 12

No warping but clay got dry when working with it

Clay 3 test 2




Keanes terr 18
Fire clay 14
Eck 2
Fx 18
Neph syen 18
Silica 200 14

Increase silica to reduce shrinkage

Status of affairs

ok I need to recap on a few things.

At the moment I have some red terracotta test bowls in a bisque firing. I will get them out tomorrow. These have a white engobe on them and I will then need to test some clear glazes on them to figure out what glaze to use or whether the engobe does what I want it to do - which is stay white and one the bowl.

There are a few clear glaze options with this one

1. Cesco mid fired clear - have tested this before and is ok but not really excited
2. Chrysanthos mid fire clear - haven't tested but its at TAFE
3. My own - C1 - this hasn't come up great with the terracotta ts not overly transparant (can be seen in an earlier blog)

New texture for origami bowl

Brown terracotta bowl test and some little test ribbons in front to test some clear glazes etc...

Another testure for my origami bowls

Also in the bisque firing is some clay shrinkage test which will need to be documented.

There are some red terracotta mugs that will need to be glazed with a clear glaze or something!!

At TAFE is a white clay test that Chris gave me that will need to be bisqued

More work is needed on my non functional project - I have discovered two glazes I will use on the objects but it would be good to have a few more glazes Slate Dry Blue and Tomatoe red - test bowl posted earlier

Need to do a test with Slate Dry Blue and Tomato Red brushed on 5B and fired to cone 6 as the last bowl test I did was dipped. I probably won't be able to dip the pieces I am working on by maybe able to spray?? Talk to Chris

Need to make and bisque some terracotta tests and some BRT

BRT project is a plate with a crawling white glaze

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Crawl/Crackle glaze ideas

Texture/Crawl Glaze c 6 ox or red.
Nepheline Syenite 70%
Magnesium Carbonate 25%
Ball Clay 5%

adding colorants or stains will give this different colour

I didn't want to use a whole heap of Nepheline Syenite as it is expensive...

One technique to make this happen is to add 15-20% magnesium carbonate (testing required to determine amount) to a low fire transparent glaze.

I'll be trying this out in my next glaze firing!!

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