Hyn Patty

I got excited when I saw that Big Ceramic Store listed Duncan's Arctic White C101 in stock in pints! Whoo! But sadly when I went to check out it wouldn't take payment. Doing a search looks like Big Ceramic Store went out of business recently. Too bad. I'm still on the hunt so I'll keep looking. Once in a while I find the 2 oz bottles but they are usually at ridiculous prices if they still have any in stock.

Hey all! I'm looking for Duncan Cover Coats Underglazes. Yes, I know Duncan Ceramics/New Mexico went out of business. Mayco bought them out some years ago and I mostly stocked up on all of my favorite Duncan glazes and underglazes at that time. HOWEVER, I didn't stock up enough on Arctic White CC101 which so far is the brightest white opaque underglaze I've yet found. I'm on the look out for a few other Cover Coats colors as well like Ivory Pearl and Harvest Gold, etc. So, if you have Duncan underglaze colors, especially the opaque Cover Coats in 2 oz bottles OR in pints and you might be willing to let them go, PLEASE contact me. I'm located in Western, NC near Asheville and I'm happy to pay shipping on them. The one I need most though is the Arctic White CC101 ideally in pints but I'll take any I can find of this color. If need be I can sub in other colors and brands or mix things to customize the colors I like to use most. But thus far I haven't found any white as good as Duncan's. If you know of a super bright white opaque underglaze in another brand that fires dead flat (no glossiness at all at cone 04) and doesn't have even a hint of cream color to it, PLEASE let me know that also so I can try it. Amaco Velvet's White for example is not nearly as nice. Alternatively I'll get some powdered titanium white to see if I can beef up the Amaco Velvet. Let me know if you have some Duncan Cover Coats underglazes to spare, thank you!

Here's a little tidbit that may also help. Read the labels on everything to see if there are toxic elements in them and add BRIGHT colored warning tape to them or stickers that say MUST BE VENTILATED. Things like gold luster? Definitely worth adding warning stickers or put up a sign where they are stored. Another tip? Call your local fire department. We do free air quality testing all the time for certain kinds of air born toxins. Or you can also contact a home inspection company, or get your own test kits. But if you put up a few signs, slap a few stickers or tape on things that you know are toxic, you can educate the people using the space to cut down on the issue a lot. Otherwise you have lots of good advice here already. Also you can ask whoever is running the space if ventilation fans can be put in to push air through the space and back out the other side when the kilns are in use. Not a perfect solution but still better than no ventilation. Good luck with it.

I think it's worth adding that if you are /new/ to doing it, you really should work at NOT being too critical at first. I find my students are scared to death of messing things up and failing. And yet we learn so much from making mistakes! The biggest issue for people starting out is being too critical and not just DOING IT. Get over FEAR. Do it anyway and not worry if it's not perfect. So it' a two edged sword. Being critical of our own work is good to push ourselves to get better and better, and yet at the same time finding that sweet spot where you can be happy with what you are doing is also really important. I encourage them to let things slide a bit more when you are new at it. There will be time for fussiness or fixing things later. Get the basics down first and don't let the little stuff trip you up and keep you from making work!

Absolutely. It drives me batty if I don't get something perfect. I'll try and make it perfect until I either get it just right, or get tired of working on it, or ruin it. Thankfully the latter almost never happens but there's a chance I'll overdue it. I'm so bad about it that I often go back and REDO older pieces just to bring them up to my current skill level if it's something I still own. I can let some things slide if I must. Everything comes to a point where I simply must stop and move onto something else but that doesn't mean it won't bug me forever after. I do have a habit of looking at someone else's work and thinking about how I'd do it differently, or how it could be better. But that's just because I also teach and I am always trying to offer ways to help my students improve their own work. Without them necessarily copying my own style. That said however, I really like seeing pieces that aren't done the same way as I would do them. Variety is good and being able to recognize another artist's work through their choice of color or style is what keeps things interesting! Little things that are sloppy though, that could have been done better, always jump out at me. In my work or someone else's. But only if it wasn't intentional. Even in my very selective niche of equine art ceramics, realism isn't always the goal. We also do some decorative glazing where it's just basic fun with ceramics and far less restrictive. Always more to learn, or new things to try, even with my own work.

Not finding much in searches on this forum and looking elsewhere but ... any of you use a sand blasting cabinet with your ceramics? Specifically I'm considering getting one for the purpose of stripping glaze from porcelain and bone china. My interest is specific to stripping colored glazes off of horse sculpture so I can take it back down to bisque for customized reglazing. I have friends in the UK who do this - they strip the finish off of Beswick horses, Royal Worchester pieces, Albany Ceramics, etc. Not earthenware pieces as they are too fragile. Any thoughts on mediums and grit sizes? I assume the glaze layers are not more than 1 mm and often much thinner even than that if it's china painted bisque without a clear glaze. I'd want to be careful not to mess up the porcelain body underneath. This would also be VERY handy if I have a piece I just am not satisfied with and want to strip back down for a redo. I've rarely ever messed up a piece but the bisques are pretty expensive and sometimes so rare that they are absolutely irreplaceable. So, any input would be welcome if you have experience. Looking for suggestions on which grits to try. Aluminum oxide, silicon carbide, or other ceramic shot or grits? Also any comments about using these with a smaller sand blasting cabinet like a table top 40 gallon Vevor? I hear that the Vevor cabinets don't deal well with the larger grit sizes. It's a bonus if my husband can also use it to clean up metal parts for the truck or motorcycles of course BUT I am concerned about cross contamination. I'm not going to want iron of any sort discoloring my bisques so it may be better if I keep him out of the cabinet. Sadly my larger air compressor only goes up to 90 PSI and only has a 10 gallon tank so I may need to upscale that or just be really patient.

Now, if working on the piece while not standing it up on it's legs is really a no go for you, here are a few more options that I have used or had my students use over the years. Again the kind of clay being used isn't really relevant. If the legs are thick enough as they are in the pig piece shown, then another option is to use built in supports that can burn out. Wadded up stiff paper or rolled cardboard inside of the legs can offer additional support to the clay and simply burns out when fired later. Add holes in the bottom of the pig's feet and the ashes are easily removed after to avoid having them rattle around inside the piece later. Or you can use a wire armature. Yes, I can hear you cringe already and before you say it'll crack or explode ... you use the /right/ kind of wire. Kanthal high temperature wire is what is used in our kilns. Both for kiln furniture that has stilt supports and for the elements. You can buy Kanthal wire (fires up to cone 10) and it's more reliable at higher cones than Nichrome wire. You get a nice heavy gage rods or wire spool and you can use mutiple pieces straight or spiraled like a heavy spring to help support those legs. Then when you bisque fire it the wire stays in there forever, embedded in the clay body. I use Kanthal wire all of the time to do kiln fired repairs of broken pieces I restore and reglaze. It is often used with porcelain pieces that are very delicate and need extra support for thin lacy, arching forms. Lastly you can also support externally as is already being used. Just use more of it than you are if you are still getting compression on the legs. If nothing else it gives you a few more options to try. Good luck - the pig looks wonderful!

I do a lot of slip casting of fine art equine pieces with very thin legs. They aren't hand built (though I have done a lot of that over the years as well) and I haven't really worked with paper clay. But here are a few tips. When I cast a complicated sculpture like my Porthos, I work the legs and body as much as I reasonably can /before/ I attach the legs. If I poured the body too thick or it didn't drain right I can slice it open up the middle and scoop it out, and slip stick it back together - which I did recently at a workshop just to show that we could do that if we didn't want to simply pour another body with the correct thickness. Then I stick the legs on after cleaning while in the leather hard stage. I ONLY stand it up long enough to check that the legs and feet are positioned correctly and long enough with a light fan on it to stiffen up the legs while supported. Then I never stand it up again if I can help it until it's completely dried. I keep it in my wet box lying on it's side, back or whatever until I am completely done with detailing it and ready to dry up the leather hard stage to completely dry. Then I can stand it up and double check things once more before it goes into the kiln for a low heat soak before bisque firing. Really fragile at this dry stage so I don't attempt to fuss with the feet much at that point. Better to fire it and then level the feet again. Lastly, if it doesn't stand perfectly flat once bisque fired? I just sand the bottom of the feet until the hooves are nice and flat without any wobble. Or I can rough up the bottom of a hoof and add a little bisque mender if needed. Pretty simple. Doesn't matter if it's earthenware or a porcelain body, it's still fixable if you use the right stuff. I haven't worked in stoneware a lot but I'm sure if you are using a 'diamond' grit sand paper you'll be able to do the same. That way, no compression down on those legs at any point. Attaching a phot of one of my 'curio' scale Porthos in ceramic. You can see the legs are pretty slender. The legs weren't added until the rest of him was assembled and cleaned up. Once the legs are on all I have to do is clean up those attachment points and add wrinkles or other last details before drying him. I'm also attaching a photo of a Wee Bairn with SUPER THIN legs that I cast whole without assembly. I only stand them up briefly to check the position of the itty bitty hooves then do all the rest of the work while it's lying on it's side. I ever fire the Wee Bairn foals lying down and then do any last fixes in the bisque stage. Some of the foals are put on bases and some are left free standing without a base when I sold them. I hope this helps!

I use Paypal myself and have a good long while now. My website however takes all kinds of payments. I used to use Square but I don't really do in person sales anymore, everything is online. I have thought about ditching Paypal and going back to Square but Square is all the time /still/ sending me other people's receipts randomly even after not using it for years. It worries me that they are so screwy that they can't get receipts and charges to the right people, do I really want them handling my accounts? I report the misfiled receipts and never get any response.

I get to several a year - but which ones vary. I don't /sell/ at them though because I never have inventory on hand. Everything I do gets listed to public auction as soon as it is finished and sold to the highest bidder, or gets listed on my website and usually is snatched up within minutes. The last REALLY big craft show I went to was down in Atlanta probably ten years ago or there abouts. But smaller local craft shows I get to most months of the year from spring to autumn. I live in an area with a lot of festivals, pottery, etc. My attending doesn't really have anything to do with my business though. My niche is so precise that I just go to shows like that for fun and shop for gifts. But once in a long while I see some idea I like for presentation. Sculpture though is harder to find at craft shows so I don't see much of it outside of art galleries.

I still have cosmetic things to fix, a crack in the bottom and some chips around the top of the lid, but here's the Olympic kiln heating up for the cone 04 oxidation firing tonight after about an hour and a half later. Tada! Pretty easy job. Now both of my kilns, my little Olympic and my larger Skutt, are both rewired and have new parts. Hopefully they'll both be good for another 10 or 20 years but we'll see. Sooner or later I'll have to swap out those mother boards in the controllers, I expect, but so far so good! If you don't know how to do it, don't be afraid to look it up. Wiring diagrams are often online or available from your kiln manufacturer. There's also a Youtube video for almost anything.

My dog, Conan, an 18 month old German Shepherd (sable) was very helpful. Every time I bent over to pull pins on the elements he kept licking me in my ear! Thankfully, he didn't drink out of the toilet until after I was finished. Thank you for that. I kept laughing pretty hard so it took me a bit longer but pulling the elements and putting in the new ones is pretty easy. Needle nose plyers for the win! A fencing tool or bolt cutters is really helpful! Kanthal wire used to make elements is really difficult for my little hands to cut but a fencing tool made that task easy when I needed to shorten up the ends. Once the ceramic insulators were slid into place my husband did help me with the heavy duty crimping.

So, my Olympic Doll E kiln is 21 years old and just died on me. Threw a vague error but without a code. WAY overdue to gut this puppy as the only thing I've replaced on it over the years is the thermocouple and more recently the relay. My project for today was to pull out the wiring and rebuild the wiring harness, swap out the transformer for a new one, and swap out the elements. Took me a bit over an hour to do, maybe an hour and a half. A few quick photos of the poor old thing to follow. First shot is the Bartlett electronic controller removed and set out on my work table. Care was taken to make sure I got a photo of how the elements were wired up before I cut the connections with bolt cutters. Here you can see my new elements on the upper left ready to install. Ordered high temp wire of the same 10 AGW by Radix. The thin wires I can pick up at my local hardware store. I /think/ and hope the motherboard is still all right and the fuse is fine. Second photo is to remind me how and where the K thermocouple was attached. I removed it just to get it out of my way so I could clean the inside well and get to the rest of the wiring easily. Taking photos step by step before I disconnect anything helps me know how to hook it back up afterwards. All that gunk inside got vacuumed out until the inside of the controller box was as clean as possible. All of the connectors were either replaced with new or steel brushed so they were clean contacts, then checked with the multimeter.