A wheel, a wall, a kiln

Kilnpot

Three commissions, one kiln load. Centre the lump, open it, pull a wall even enough to fire — then trim, dry, glaze and hold the curve to cone 10. Everything that goes wrong starts with the wall you leave.

Space the working hand · WS wheel speed · AD hand or squeeze · C wet · E set · M mute · H help

Wheel stopped

The clay is where you left it.

How a piece is made

Centre. The lump is off the axis and it wobbles. Set your hand on the mark and hold — the correction pulses as the lump comes round, and it comes round faster the harder you run the wheel. Above 100 rpm the lump will not let go of your hands.
Open. Press to drive the floor down and the wall out. Watch the floor depth and the rim wall. Set it with E — go too shallow and the wall is too thick ever to pull to height.
Pull. Squeeze and rise, one even pass at a time. The pace meter wants to sit on the mark; a fast sweep leaves a thin band and a slow one wastes the clay. The section drawing is the wall you are leaving.
Collar the neck if the brief asks for one, then trim the foot. The knife has to stop before it finds the inside.
Dry it slowly. A fast dry cracks a wall that varies; an uneven wall is also a slow dry.
Glaze, then fire. Below 430°C the piece is still damp and the steam will split it. Above 1000°C the outside vitrifies first. Hold the curve.

Throw about 8% over: a vitrified stoneware body shrinks roughly 6% in the firing, and the kiln only tells you afterwards.

The kiln is cold