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White Stoneware Suggestions


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Hi everyone. I am looking for some advice on which clay to try out. I want a white stoneware clay that is soft enough to work with. I am quite puny with not an immense amount of upperbody strength and I have a weak wrist so I need something that doesnt need too much strength to wedge/handle etc. Also I dont want a high fire clay. Cone 5/6 is good. I also like using pure white glaze and would like it to fire 'white' and not off white or cream. I live outside the USA and would have to ship it overseas so it doesnt matter where in the states it is located. Any suggestions?

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If you want a pure white clay you should go with porcelain. Standard 365 is a great cone 6 grolleg porcelain. No white stoneware is going to be as white as porcelain. They all go slightly yellow or gray. But a good white glaze will still be white even on a not-quite-white clay body.

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I cannot tell you which clay to buy: do most of my own mixing these days. The only commercial clay I purchased was porcelain. I can however tell you what to look for in shopping clay: color. High carbon ball clays are dark, and low carbon ball clays are light brown to almond. Pending the intermediate mesh clay used: they can be almost white, to medium dark in color. Fire clays tend to be medium color, most in the gray range.

 

So I would look for a nearly white stoneware body: which should be a low carbon clay variety in order to get the color. Often they swamp out #6 tile kaolin: which is a bit plastic in its own right.  Yellow (as Neil pointed out) is from two things: titanium; but some ball clays have very high levels of sulfur- also yellow. (think yellow zinc)

 

OR

 

Lt brown to LT grey colors: will also have cleaner clays in them. The color/s come from low levels of carbon, that burn off readily. Or they can have just one higher carbon ball clay mixed in with kaolinitic materials. : that one addition will darken them.

 

Sorry, no recommendations.. but some guidelines perhaps.

 

Nerd

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