- Curtis Nelson on mon 13 mar 00
I had some intricately glaze-painted large plates
shipped from Turkey . . . broken in transit. To salvage
some of them, I decided to carefully break them (using
tile nippers) into smaller shards roughly an inch or so
square, randomly shaped. With these I lined a rather
nice bird bath in a pleasing mosaic.
Shards were set in the concrete bath base with tile
Thinset. Once that cured, I grouted with Polyblend, a
sanded tile grout, which I mixed with an acrylic mortar
admix.
Great job. Everyone loved it, and the plate shards were
innovatively preserved. That was last Spring. I put the
thing in the backyard and kept it filled with water all
through the warm weather. A true Turkish bath.
Problem: When I brought it in for the winter, I saw
that 2 or 3 of the shards had lost their glaze coating.
A couple of others showed threats of doing the same.
Then it dawned on me that low-fired glazes on low-fired
bodies aren't designed to stand up to constant
submersion. The water probably attacks through the
shard edges that weren't completely protected by the
grout, as well as through miniscule flaws in the glaze
surface. The grout, by the way, is in excellent
condition.
There you have it. Who knows of an appropriate clear
sealer I might use at this point?
The sealer has to hold up to constant submersion and
shouldn't discolor, of course. I'd like it to adhere to
the glaze finish as well as the toothier edges of the
shards and the grout. If that's asking too much of a
sealer, then I'll accept that and work with a sealer
that I'll have to carefully paint on the individual
exposed shard edges, avoiding the glaze surfaces. (Or
maybe just add a bit more grout where it needs to be?
Is that reasonable . . . adding fresh grout on top of
cured grout and expecting it to stick?)
My local tile providers and setters are informationally
challenged, and what suggestions I have gotten are in
conflict at best and cockamamie ideas at worst.
Even grackles like a nice colorful place to take a bath,
Any help, Clayarters?
Curt Nelson
In Chicagoland, where some birds are already wondering
when the Turkish bath is going to appear.
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