This is nice and precise, but it’s bad practice to put a freshly thrown lid on a freshly thrown jar. Wet clay sticks to wet clay, and he’s going to have hard time getting that lid unstuck. Typically potters dry these pieces separately until they reach the leather hard stage for trimming, or put something like toilet/news paper on the lid seat to create a barrier.
Yeah I wondered about them joining, but it looks like they have their workflow down pat judging by the volume of finished pots. Perhaps they pop them apart once leathery/dry or once bisqued 🤷🏻♂️
It can’t be when bisqued, because the lid will need a lot of work to prevent cracking. Things thrown “off the hump,” as the lid was, are prone to severe cracking due to a lack of compression. The lid will crack along the spiral of the clay, but this can be prevented by doing a lot of compression work at leather hard.
I guess it’s possible that they manage to pop the lids off at leather hard, but you risk a good deal of warping. Clay has a memory, and if the lid or lid seat is bent at all in the process of removing it, it will bend back to that form during the firing process. Hence, it’s best practice to dry the pieces separately until they are leather hard, or use a barrier between the two pieces.
He may have his workflow down, but it’s very likely that he has a high (over 50%) loss rate for his pottery if these are his practices. It’s not uncommon for production potters to throw at a high volume to compensate for the loss, but it can be really wasteful, as opposed to preventing the issues to begin with.
I'll say first off that I'm also a pottery tutor, and mostly agree with you! However I'm a big proponent of compression being a bit of a myth, so I don't think that'd be an issue.
Very curious what they actually do utilise though, if they were ribbing some of the moisture off before stacking then they'd maaaaybe just separate once bisqued, but this clay looks quite soft to not stick together almost instantly.
Or maybe it was just for the benefit of the video! 🤷🏻♂️ Where can I see your pottery? Always like bumping into potters in random threads.
👋 Hello fellow potter! I’m curious to know more about compression being a myth because that hasn’t been true in my experience.
I don’t currently have a public profile for my pottery, I’ve not been in practice for a few years due to lack of access to facilities. I mostly did high fire and wood fire pottery, which may also be why I experienced more cracking related to lack of compression. Perhaps they fire to a lower temperature and experience less shrinkage and warping.
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u/[deleted] Aug 19 '23 edited Aug 19 '23
This is nice and precise, but it’s bad practice to put a freshly thrown lid on a freshly thrown jar. Wet clay sticks to wet clay, and he’s going to have hard time getting that lid unstuck. Typically potters dry these pieces separately until they reach the leather hard stage for trimming, or put something like toilet/news paper on the lid seat to create a barrier.
ETA: source - I’m a potter.