"Sonora White Sculpture" is another type of clay offered by Aardvark. This one has a lot of grog. The grog in Hopkins White clay is like a fine sand but the grog in this clay is much larger. This clay is definitely more suited for sculpting than for throwing but I threw some pots with it anyway.
I used about an eighth of a bag for the bottle vase. The large flower pot took most of a bag. (The ruler in front of the pots is a 15-inch ruler.)
Bisque Firing
On May 10, 2010 the large flower pot was bisque fired (along with many other pots). There were 3 pots made with Sonora White Sculpture clay in that firing. Two of them had minor problems. Some of the grog in the clay exploded making small blemishes in the pot surface. Here are the two problem pots:
Look closely to see a couple of blemishes.
Notice the dot in the middle of the pot.
These blemishes will be minimized by glazing. I'll update this entry after the glaze firing.
"Hopkins White" is another clay body offered by Aardvark. This one has more grog in it than the "Bee Mix" clay. I also prefer clay bodies that fire white instead of tan or brown because the glazes will generally fire more true to color on a white pot.
I really like this clay body. I threw three bowls and a vase using this clay. The two smaller bowls were from 1/8th of a bag. The larger bowl was from 1/4 of a bag and the vase was from 1/2 of a bag.
As a comparison, this shows the two vases that I threw using half a bag of clay. On the left is the Hopkins White vase and on the right is the Bee Mix vase.
Bisque Firing
The pots were bisque fired on May 10. All of them came through the firing without problems.
Glaze Firing
Here is the same group of pots after the glaze firing.
