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Casting Cup Handles


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Slip casting cup molds with the handle made into the mold. I understand it is not done very often. 

Would this make a weaker handle? Is it really just a bad Idea? If you were to make such a mold, what would you take into consideration at the design stages? Any slipcasting tips for this type of cup would be helpfull.

 

I would be making the mold. I was looking at using a cone 6 standard 240 stoneware casting slip.

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I have three mug moulds.  A commercially made one that includes the handle, and two home-made ones, one does, one doesn't include the handle.

 

For me the advantage of including the handle is not having to add it later.

 

The disadvantage (so far) is the hollow hole left after pouring out the slip.  I leave it sitting handle down, and top up the slip to make the handle solid.  If I were to make another with handle, I would make the handle wider but thinner in the hope of alleviating this problem.  It happens with bothmoulds with handles, but is worse on the hand-made one which has a round profile handle, the other has a flatter handle.

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Thank you

 

I was thinking it would be a time saver to make the mug and handle together, but I'm even more so currious to why it is not commonly done.

Are the shrinkage dimples where the handle meets the main problem?

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  • 2 weeks later...

In most cases the handles are cast seperately to eliminate shrinkage issues in the drying phase. This is probably not so much an issue for studio potters as much as porcelain factories, where they're pouring cup forms that are very thin, with very tight clay bodies. (bone china, for instance)

 

I cast my braille cup handles seperately so that the handle is not hollow, which wolud fill with hot liquid when in use, and because the shrinkage would disrupt how the cup shrinks within the mold.

 

On the otherhand, most of the cup molds that I've seen commercially had handles built into the mold. 

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