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cone 6 reduction glazes?

updated wed 27 aug 03

 

CRoeder1@aol.com on thu 21 mar 96

Hello fellow Clayarters,

Here I am, wishing I were at NCECA (feel like the only kid on the block not
invited to the birthday party...), perhaps next year.

Our local art center has been experimenting with cone 6 glazes in reduction
for over a year now. It is a forced experimentation, since the director of
the school decided to change all of the shop firings from cone 9/10 to cone
six. This was done, supposedly, to get brighter colors, a wider range of
color at least, and save firing time and fuel costs.

Gone are our favorite celadons, copper reds, etc. We have developed a couple
decent glazes, but all in all, the students (some of them having been there
for 25 years) are disheartened with the results.

I offered to go online to post a request for cone 6 reduction glazes. Is
anyone out there using them? If so, I'd like some successful recipies, and
in exhange I'll give you what we've come up with.

Thanks,

Candice Roeder

Bill Buckner on fri 22 mar 96

Candace:

If you are wanting brighter colors, you may need to switch to oxidation.

-Bill

Bill Buckner e-mail: bbuckner@gsu.edu
Georgia State University http://www.gsu.edu/~couwbb

On Thu, 21 Mar 1996 CRoeder1@aol.com wrote:

> ----------------------------Original message----------------------------
> Our local art center has been experimenting with cone 6 glazes in reduction
> for over a year now. It is a forced experimentation, since the director of
> the school decided to change all of the shop firings from cone 9/10 to cone
> six. This was done, supposedly, to get brighter colors, a wider range of
> color at least, and save firing time and fuel costs.

CRoeder1@aol.com on sun 24 mar 96

Bill,

Thanks for your response. I fire at home in an electric kiln, and I do have
bright colors. But at the art center, the students will have to continue
with the pursuit of cone 6 reduction firing. The head of the ceramics
department had cost savings in mind (I think the promise of brighter colors
was secondary, and perhaps only theory). At the Art Center, we have 3 gas
reduction kilns. We had a wide variety of glazes, due to the 20 plus years
of collecting and using cone 9/10 glaze recipies (not to mention the huge
number of published recipies for 9/10).

The students there have become used to the celadons, copper reds, shinos,
etc., that reduction produces. Some of these folks have been using the
studios there for 25 years, and all of a sudden they can't use any of their
tried and true recipies. They have been experimenting for nearly two years
with the development of cone 6 reduction glazes, but they have not been real
happy with the results (with a couple exceptions). They've tried many a cone
6 oxidation recipe, altered the colorants. Also substitued Neph Sy for other
Feldspars, and added fluxes to the recipies. It ain't easy.

If the choice were up to them, they'd stay with cone 9/10. But the choice
has been made for them. Cone 6 reduction it is. It is not that they are
unhappy with reduction, quite the contrary. It is the lack of proven cone 6
reduction glazes that has them bummed out.

There are very few published recipies for cone 6 reduction glazes. I'm just
hoping that there are some floating around in cyberspace that I can give the
students to try out. (And thanks to those on the list who've sent me a few.)

Thanks for your input. We'll keep plugging along. I guess two years isn't
very long to experiment with something new.

Candice

peter pinnell on mon 25 mar 96

I always feel a little bit sorry for anyone working at cone 6, as it is
an "artificial" temperature choice. Earthenware temperatures were
traditionally used because that was the natural maturing point for
red clay and lead glazes. Stoneware and porcelain temperatures (cone
8-12)also came about because certain raw materials (e.g. wood ash,
limestone, and feldspar) easily formed glazes at those temperatures.
Cone 4-6 seems to have been chosen for very different reasons: because
thats as hot as the typical small electric kiln can go, and to save fuel
costs in gas kilns. While those are quite valid reasons, it doesn't make
formulating cone 6 glazes any easier. Most are cone 9-10 glazes that are
adapted to mature earlier.
This can be done by adding additional alkaline earth, such as whiting or
barium, but this changes the color response of glossy glazes (usually for
the worse), and usually doesn't work for matt ones. Zinc can be added,
and will give beautiful surfaces, but only in oxidation, and it is a
color killer. Zinc glazes are "subtile" at best, and, at worst, just
plain boring.
The third method is to add boron. This actually works very well, both
for matt and glossy glazes, but requires a good knowledge of glaze
calculation to do. You can't just add plain boron to a glaze: it must be
used in the form of a frit or gerstley borate. As a general rule of
thumb, add .05 moles of boron for each cone you want to lower the
maturing temperature. This means .1-.2 moles of boron to lower a high
fire glaze to medium fire.
This is a good time to own Hyperglaze or Insight!
In a private studio, todays fuel costs don't justify doing all this
reformulating. In a typical 40 cubic ft. kiln, you might save 5- 10
dollars per firing, and you give up quite a bit of richness and
subtlety. The one additional mug you have to sell to pay for the higher
firing would seem to be worth it.
Good luck!
Pete Pinnell

On Thu, 21 Mar 1996 CRoeder1@aol.com wrote:

> ----------------------------Original message----------------------------
> Hello fellow Clayarters,
>
> Here I am, wishing I were at NCECA (feel like the only kid on the block not
> invited to the birthday party...), perhaps next year.
>
> Our local art center has been experimenting with cone 6 glazes in reduction
> for over a year now. It is a forced experimentation, since the director of
> the school decided to change all of the shop firings from cone 9/10 to cone
> six. This was done, supposedly, to get brighter colors, a wider range of
> color at least, and save firing time and fuel costs.
>
> Gone are our favorite celadons, copper reds, etc. We have developed a couple
> decent glazes, but all in all, the students (some of them having been there
> for 25 years) are disheartened with the results.
>
> I offered to go online to post a request for cone 6 reduction glazes. Is
> anyone out there using them? If so, I'd like some successful recipies, and
> in exhange I'll give you what we've come up with.
>
> Thanks,
>
> Candice Roeder
>

ranmcc on sun 24 aug 03


I see very little on Cone 6 Reduction glazes in the archives. I even
searched using "Marcia's ^6 reduction Glazes", but can't seem to find any.

Does someone have a list of these glazes. Appreciate any help?

I have got some new clay that has been recommended for Cone 6 reduction.
Most of the glazes I have are for electric.


Randy
South Carolina

Charles Moore on mon 25 aug 03


Perhaps someone could point us in the direction of ^6 reduction glazes?
Note the message below:

Charles
Sacramento
----- Original Message -----
From: "ranmcc"
To:
Sent: Sunday, August 24, 2003 5:57 PM
Subject: Cone 6 Reduction Glazes?


> I see very little on Cone 6 Reduction glazes in the archives. I even
> searched using "Marcia's ^6 reduction Glazes", but can't seem to find any.
>
> Does someone have a list of these glazes. Appreciate any help?
>
> Randy
> South Carolina

Snail Scott on mon 25 aug 03


At 08:57 PM 8/24/03 -0400, you wrote:
>I see very little on Cone 6 Reduction glazes in the archives. I even
>searched using "Marcia's ^6 reduction Glazes", but can't seem to find any.


If you wrote out all that for one search, you probably
didn't find much. Try various search combos, like:

^6 and glaze and reduction
^6 and glaze and red,
cone six and glaze and red
^6 and reduction
cone 6 and reduction
Marcia and ^6 and glaze and reduction
etc...

There's definitely stuff in there!

Also, just because a glaze works well for ^6 oxidation,
doesn't mean it won't work equally well in reduction.
Most do just fine in either, though some are a different
color. Test 'em!

-Snail

Norman van der Sluys on mon 25 aug 03


I tried searching the archives, and it didn't like the ^ character, so
use cone 6 or maybe just 6 reduction.

Try various search combos, like:
>
> ^6 and glaze and reduction
> ^6 and glaze and red,
> cone six and glaze and red
> ^6 and reduction
> cone 6 and reduction
> Marcia and ^6 and glaze and reduction
> etc...
>
> There's definitely stuff in there!
>
>

Craig Martell on mon 25 aug 03


Hi:

Quite a few cone 6 glazes will work in both oxidation and reduction. Test
any of them in a cone 6 R firing.

Run a Google search on Patrick Horsley and check out his website. He does
some very killer cone 6 R work and provides a lot of info on his site.

regards, Craig Martell Hopewell, Oregon

Daniel Dermer on tue 26 aug 03


I found this posting from Michelle Lowe, capturing
several cone 6 reduction glaze from another discussion
group archive. The post was titled, "cone 6 reduction
glazes--where oh where?", and here is the link:

http://www.potters.org/subject55299.htm

This listing includes a copper red, shino, celadon,
and various other base recipes.

Cheers,
Dan
http://pages.sbcglobal.net/ddermer

Ralph Naylor on tue 26 aug 03


On Mon, 25 Aug 2003 08:57:53 -0700, Charles Moore
wrote:

>Perhaps someone could point us in the direction of ^6 reduction glazes?
>Note the message below:
>
>Charles
>Sacramento

You should be able to find some at Richard Burkett's SDSU Ceramics Web:

http://grafik.sdsu.edu/ceramicsweb//glazedatabase.html

You can search both GlazeBase and old Clayart glaze recipes. I think the
Clayart database has a bunch of pre-archive recipes in it. You can also
go to Robert Wilt's site -

http://www.dinoclay.com/glzbase/gbrecent.html

for more recent GlazeBase submissions. You can't search these, you'll
have to sift through the pages - just under 600 glazes!

Regards,
Ralph in NH

Tony Hansen on tue 26 aug 03


A great cone 6R glaze might be as close as your
reliable cone 6 oxidation base glazes.
Add increasing amounts of iron for celadon,
brown crystal, tenmoku and kaki (2,6,10,14%).
Add manganese to your matte to get reduction
oatmeal, a little cobalt for robins egg blue.
Ideally you could have just two base glazes,
a glossy and a matte, then make every
thing you want from them.

-------8<--------
I found this posting from Michelle Lowe, capturing
several cone 6 reduction glaze from another discussion
group archive. The post was titled, \"cone 6 reduction
glazes--where oh where?\", and here is the link:

http://www.potters.org/subject55299.htm

This listing includes a copper red, shino, celadon,
and various other base recipes.

Cheers,
Dan
http://pages.sbcglobal.net/ddermer

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--------
Tony Hansen, Digitalfire Corp.