Making Glazes

[Min]

Don't think firing to 7 would account for the colour differences. I just threw the ingredients together and poured a couple sloppy pours over that tile, half of it with 1 pour, the other with 2, can't see any difference in thickness. Think it would probably be a bit more matte fired to 6. My guess would be one of your materials is mislabelled. Your cobalt carb is a lilac(ish) colour right? Can't see the ball clay making that drastic a difference, any chance it was albany, blackbird or barnard and not ball clay? (what colour is it?) What glaze did you put over the "purple", was there cobalt in that? 

[GreyBird]

Yes, My Cobalt Carb is a beautiful Lilac color. Is Barnard a type of Ball Clay? Because that sounds kind of familiar and the Ball Clay is in a new container that I labeled so it might have said Barnard Ball Clay before, In my great wisdom, I might have shortened it.  It is dark brown in color and a bit on the heavy side in comparison to the other ingredients.

 

Another question... Is it acceptable to dip bisque ware in water before dipping in glaze to get a thinner coat or better to thin the glaze it'self? I have a bucket called Albany slip so I know I did not use that.

 

The purple alone with no glaze over it is a mat brown. The color you see overlapping is Chun Seafoam Green from same book, No Cobalt Carb in that.

[Min]

Doesn't sound like it's ball clay you added. Barnard has iron plus manganese in it, would account for the brownish colour you got (the cobalt probably intensified it), it's not a ball clay. I would pick up some ball clay, OM4 is a common one, C&C is a whiter firing one but either should be fine for this glaze recipe.

 

I doubled the glaze thickness on one end of that quick test tile, thickness doesn't seem to matter with this glaze to get the purple colour. Some people dip their pots in water before glazing, some don't, bisque firing to 04 is common, especially with non porcelain clays. I rather adjust glaze thickness than wetting the pots. Glazes differ in how much water to add, when you get one applying the way you like it I would measure the specific gravity (lots of posts on how to do that) then until you get a good feel for the glaze just check the specific gravity before you glaze to get it to the right thickness.