This two-inch stack of clay body and glaze mix tickets represents only about half of my testing over the past year. Along the way, I also added thousands of photos to my Insight-live.com account. Looking at this pile, I realized why I am testing more: Organized records make it easier to keep multiple projects moving. I can see what I have tried, compare results and pick up where I left off. Each test builds on earlier work, and that visible progress motivates me to keep going.

The underglaze is the 20x5 cone 6 base transparent glaze (G1214M with 5% Mason 6666 black stain). Overglaze left: GR6-H Ravenscrag Oatmeal. Overglaze right: GA6-F Alberta Slip oatmeal. Both produce a pleasant silky matte texture. Double layering using typical dipping glazes is prone to crawling (because of shrinking and cracking during drying). By keeping layers fairly thin, it is possible to achieve success, but with glazes high in clay content (as these are), more is needed. A mix of raw and roasted Alberta and Ravenscrag Slips is the answer here. Start with a 50:50 ratio and adjust to establish a balance between drying hardness and drying shrinkage. For more assurance in production situations, mix the underlayer black as a base-coat dipping glaze.

There are enough variables that a record-keeping system is needed. Start now, and you won't regret it.

Watch the G1214Z video to see me convert the G1214M 20x5 cone 6 clear base into G1214Z cone 6 calcia matte using simple glaze chemistry and recipe logic. This first appeared in the Digitalfire desktop Insight instruction manual 30 years ago. It is an understatement to say that this process is interesting if you want to know more about glazes, their chemistry and recipe logic. Watch this video and see me adjust the recipe of my high-calcium transparent cone 6 glaze to convert it into a calcia matte. In an Insight-live.com account, the process is easy enough for anyone. We'll cut the Si:Al ratio, increase the CaO, maintain the thermal expansion for glaze fit and make the recipe shrinkage-adjustable using a mix of calcined kaolin and raw kaolin. We will even compare it with the High Calcium Semimatte from Mastering Glazes.

While some sectors of modern ceramic manufacturing are highly automated, crockery and holloware production relies heavily on skilled workers who execute the same fundamentals as studio potters. And they use equipment a studio potter can make. But the speed and cooperation at which they work is astonishing. Consider:

-Foam and sponge belts: To finish unfired surfaces and wipe glaze from feet.
-Spinning sponge tables for rim and edge dry finishing.
-Rheology Control: Glaze slurry rheology (specific gravity, thixotropy, fluidity) is adapted to each situation. Workers dip, spin, and extract pieces in seconds without runs, drips, or extended drying pauses.
-Custom Tooling: Instead of standard shop tongs or studio brushes, workers use single-point holding tools, custom wire dipping tongs, and painting and stamping sponges.
-Traditional Jiggering: Workers turn large masses of soft clay into cups and bowls in seconds, or they feed stiff clay into semi-automatic machines.
-Handle Preparation: Workers use custom plaster holders and specialized blade cutters to shear slip-cast handles to match vessel contours.
-Fountain & Dip Glazing: Workers glaze interiors and rims simultaneously.
-Direct Screen Printing: Workers drape a silk screen directly around pieces and scrape ink through via a hand rubber scraper.

Tap/click the typecode link below for the videos.

The author of this new book does what I do, but his readers are industrial technicians and engineers who work at a large scale. But the basic principles of ceramic fabrication are the same for potters and small manufacturers. In ceramic manufacturing, failure rarely begins when the defect becomes visible. It often starts much earlier—while production still appears stable. Small deviations accumulate. Operators compensate. Settings are adjusted. Operating margins gradually reduce. The process continues to produce, but its stability is becoming increasingly dependent on correction. This book is about recognizing those hidden risks before they become visible failures.

To get a better, more brilliant transparency than G1947U, at cone 10R, I tried sourcing Na2O from a frit. The inside surface on this mug is the result (v2), it is so glossy it looks like a low-fire leaded glaze. This screenshot of side-by-side panels shows the frit-enhanced version(s), G3910 and G3910A. Frit 3110 has a much higher concentration of KNaO than the feldspar, a key to making a brilliant glass. While this increases the COE, the fact that it comes from this frit brings multiple benefits:

-A brings a little B2O3, a better melter than zinc (which volatilizes anyway at cone 10).
-It dissolves more low-expansion glass-forming SiO2 (in v2 I switched to 400 mesh silica to enhance that even more).
-The glaze can then tolerate some low-expansion MgO (introduced by Frit 3249 or its equivalent, Fusion Frit F-69).

More details about this project can be found by clicking/tapping the Insight-live recipe code numbers G1947U, G3910 or G3910A. The red outside glaze is G2571D1.

These tiles were fired at cone 6. The melt-flow comparison behind them shows how much more freely the G3808A clear base flows than G2926B. G2926B produces a crystal-clear glass by itself and works well with some colorants. But with 2% added copper carbonate, its melt does not clear the bubbles and heal the surface completely. G3808A has enough melt mobility to produce a smooth surface.

That extra fluidity comes at a price: Notice the glaze running down the right-hand tile. To get this clear, glossy copper color while controlling movement, strategies include thinner application, keeping the glaze farther above the foot, restricting it to more horizontal surfaces or using a tested catcher glaze below it.

To melt a frit batch, the first challenge is the crucible and release from it. These disposable crucibles were cast from L4404A refractory slip. The front one has an alumina-based liner L3693E. Without the liner, the ingot in the back is inseparable from the crucible wall. But in the other, the alumina has remained as a powder and can be cleaned off the ingot, leaving almost no residue. This test was done at cone 04, so only a tiny amount of Al2O3 is taken into solution in the melt.

Why would a potter consider doing this? Problems with commercial frit availability and consistency are motivating some to investigate making their own. But there are more challenges. Commercial frit manufacturers control melting conditions to produce a homogeneous glass, then crash-cool it to limit crystallization and facilitate grinding. Their furnaces ensure heat distribution throughout the batch (a real challenge in a crucible in a pottery kiln). But some frit compositions are considerably more resistant to grinding; a studio ball mill might not be up to the task. Producers also melt frits at cone 13-20 (a potter frit-firing to cone 10, what a producer smelts to cone 15, risks producing a partially reacted mixture of glass and undissolved solids, rather than the homogeneous frit intended by the formulation). And their furnaces are in no danger of cracking during firing. And they have expertise to formulate and test for low water solubility (yes, glass having an unstable chemistry can dissolve in water). They also have tight control over the particle size of the finished powder. They also have equipment to control dust during crushing and grinding (remember - that the dust is tiny angular glass shards!).

She is likely getting it from nearby. She knows what works: A mix of sand, clay and organic matter. She isn't even the best mud-nester in the bird world. Some species can stick their nests on to walls and cliffs.

If a bird can find and use a native clay, should a potter or even hobbyist be intimidated by the prospect of doing the same? She doesn't overthink it; she likely just samples different spots and uses the one that works the best. The clay appears to be a typical terracotta; if her nest were fired, it could well come out like these overlaid SHAB test bars (the two types, a sandy and smooth, were fired at cone 4 and 04).

Finding a native clay for pottery can begin just as simply: collect small samples from different spots, see how each one works, and watch how it dries. Then take the step the bird has no reason to take—fire test bars. These show how I compare drying shrinkage, firing shrinkage and fired absorption. A nest proves that mud can be built with. Test bars help determine what that mud can become in a kiln.

If you manufacture clay bodies, bentonite deserves more incoming-material testing than its small percentage in recipes might suggest. Because of its highly concentrated nature, bodies are disproportionately affected by variations in its plasticity, soluble salts, particulate contamination, fired color (and another property we will see in a moment). Consider why it is wise to accumulate test data to establish a reliable baseline against which to compare every shipment.

The top two bars are a Wyoming bentonite fired to cone 8 and 2 oxidation. But they are not made from the raw bentonite alone. The test mix is 15% raw bentonite and 85% of the same material after calcining. The calcined portion acts as a non-plastic filler, reducing the extreme plasticity enough that SHAB test bars can be formed and dried reliably. They provide a revealing picture of the fired properties as a pure material.

The bottom two bars use a different approach: A standardized dilution of 15% bentonite mixed with 85% silica. These make evident its effect on the fired characteristics of a pure white, refractory and non-plastic material. The loss of whiteness is obvious, and the lack of fired specks notable. But another thing still reinforces viewing this bentonite as a “controlled impurity” addition: These bars should be much more refractory, but they are porcelain-like, albeit with high porosity, the bentonite itself is acting as a body flux.