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LaurelB

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Everything posted by LaurelB

  1. If my calculations are correct, my clay is 8.3% organic material, or at least that sample was. I am taking this clay from a pile excavated when we had our foundation repaired (this soils tendency to crack has given more than one headache!), You can visually see that some areas have more organic material than others. As for the plasticity test, the sample fired to 1100 was like a bisque and would not rewet. I tried your neph sy water trick with unfired chunks, and reg water to compare. This clay dissolves so quickly in straight tap water, that the difference was not striking, but I often use my scraps to make casting slip, and I'm excited to try the neph sy there, since that clay isn't so quick to dissolve. The test with 10% neph sy and 15% ball clay is looking very good so far! Thank you so much for taking the time to talk me through all this. I so appreciate your expertise and generosity. It's a little embarrassing how little I know about the inner workings of the material I've dedicated my career to!
  2. I use a roll of the wide painters tape as a chuck on my giffen grip. It may be too big for what you have there, but look around and you'll probably find something ready made that can work.
  3. I do have a scale, and I have dried, but not powdered clay. The clay slakes in water quickly, but the dried pieces are VERY hard. In weighing the dried clay yesterday to add neph sy and ball clay, I needed a smaller piece, and had trouble breaking the 1/4" thick shards down! I don't think it will be easy to make into a powder, so hopefully that's not necessary. I will fire a sample for LOI today. Thanks so much for the instructions!
  4. Have you tried screening the underglaze before adding it to the bottle? Getting rid of any lumps might help.
  5. Wow! What good luck to have found you glazenerd! Thank you so much for the great information. You guessed it, I live in California, about 60 miles north of San Francisco. Muck is the right word for this dirt! It's nearly impossible to dig, because it sticks to the shovel with so much tenacity! I have been drying, slaking down, sieving, and wedging. Is there a better method? I had some bone dry, so it was easy to weigh out and add neph syn and om4. I can't wait to try it! If I fire out the organics, can I do this before slaking and sieving? There will be some rocks in there, but it would streamline the process if I didn't have to dry it out twice. Thanks again for all the information. I didnt have a clue of where to begin, and now I have somewhere to start.
  6. I've been experimenting with the clay in my yard. It's a beautiful color, but even small, stable forms crack if not dried super slow. I've tried adding grog with not much improvement, and hope someone here can give me ideas of what to add to make a clay with better drying performance. The clay is very plastic, sticky, grey when green, a beautiful red at cone 5.
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