How to make ceramics?

The process of ceramic production can be divided into four stages: raw material production (glaze and mud production), molding, glazing and firing. These stages will be described in detail below:

First, the production of raw materials.

1. Glazing

Glazing → ball milling (ball mill) → iron removal (iron remover) → sieving (vibrating screen) → glazing of finished products.

2. Mud production

Mud → ball milling (ball mill) → stirring (mixer) → iron removal (iron remover) → screening (vibrating screen) → slurry pumping (mud pump) → mud squeezing (filter press) → vacuum mud refining (mud refiner and mixer).

Second, molding.

1. Drawing forming method: suitable for making circles such as circles and arcs, such as plates, bowls and cans. Its characteristic is that the works are tall and straight, and a series of rotating lines will be left on the surface of the objects.

① Under glaze: mud → mud cake (by hand) → mud rubbing (by hand) → painting blank (also known as pottery machine) → drying (natural air drying to leave 10% moisture) → cutting blank (pottery making tool) → drying (drying oven) → underglaze decoration (painting directly on mud blank, such as blue and white) → glazing.

② Glazing: mud → mud cake (by hand) → mud rubbing (by hand) → blank drawing (also known as pottery machine) → drying (natural air drying to leave 10% moisture) → blank trimming (pottery tools) → drying (drying box) → glazing (glazing machine) → air drying.

2. Clay sculpture method: The method of grinding, beating or cutting clay into plates to embed and control objects is called clay sculpture method. This method is widely used in ceramic production. Traditional purple sand ware is made of clay tablets. The objects formed by clay plates will change with the humidity of clay. The wet clay board can be twisted, rolled and shaped freely; Slightly dry clay pieces can be compacted and made into relatively straight objects. The thickness of the clay tablet depends on the size of the object, but it should be noted that the thickness of the clay tablet should be uniform.

Clay molding method needs to use clay molding machine.

3. Pottery dish method: one of the most convenient and expressive technologies in ceramic molding. You can make works that can be made by any other modeling method, such as circles, squares, abnormities and even sculptures. Using the method of rolling clay strips to make pottery, on the one hand, the clay strips can bend and change freely, which is convenient for making some complicated, irregular and random pottery sculptures, on the other hand, the manual marks and spiral textures left by the rolling clay strips can be preserved, and of course, the clay strips can be trimmed without trace.

The method of making Dorobou tray needs to use Dorobou molding machine and manual turntable.

4. Freehand kneading method: You can express the author's techniques and ideas most directly, and you need to use a manual turntable.

5. Handmade sculpture: Sculpture is an artistic image created by three production methods: carving, carving and plastic. Mainly reliefs and round carvings. Sculpture is a three-dimensional entity. In order to take care of the relationship between various perspectives, we should always rotate the sculpture table and constantly observe and compare it. Clay sculpture tools can be used for scraping, cutting, pasting, picking, pressing, wiping, clay sculpture and modeling.

Third, glazing

Glazing pays attention to skills, and the quality of glaze layer directly affects the success or failure of fired works. Glazing includes spraying glaze, dipping glaze, pouring glaze, brushing glaze, throwing glaze and other techniques. Sometimes, it needs comprehensive application. When glazing, you can use a professional glazing workbench, which can effectively reduce the spread of glaze and recycle glaze.

Generally, the glaze layer of blown glaze is 0.8MM- 1.8MM, that is, the thickness of melon seed filling is known. Surface treatment can be divided into over glaze, in glaze and under glaze. The glaze medium is fired twice between the glaze and the underglaze. The underglaze color is painted directly on the clay blank and applied to the glaze, while the underglaze color is painted on the fired white porcelain tire. Color is very important in works. Yellow stands for warmth, and blue stands for ocean, sky and width.

The methods of decoration include painting, painting, picking, folding, applique, embossing, spray painting, through carving, pinch carving, hollowing out, paper-cutting, daubing, inlaying, printing, mud filling and film covering decoration, daubing painting decoration, fiber fabric wrapping decoration and so on. The key to accomplish these tasks is to cast fire. In kiln firing, the temperature of kiln fire is about (1300℃), which makes the clay sintered into crystals and colored like glass. After the work was cooled out of the kiln, it stood upright successfully.

Fourth, fire.

(1) underglaze color: box → kiln entry → equipment temperature → firing (electric kiln or steam kiln) → kiln exit.

(2) Over-glaze color: box → kiln → equipment temperature → firing (electric kiln or steam kiln) → painting and creating on the fired white porcelain blank (such as applique) → flower baking (flower baking furnace).

In the actual ceramic creation, in addition to the above three stages, we also need to pay attention to some auxiliary and preparation stages:

1. Generally, the glaze will precipitate after two or three days of purchase. At this time, it is necessary to mix the glaze evenly with a blender;

2. If you need to mix glaze temporarily and quickly at work, you can use a quick ball mill to solve it;

3. How to improve efficiency: When making gypsum mold with lathe, vacuum high-pressure grouting system is needed because gypsum mold cannot contain bubbles. Its main working principle is to put the stirred slurry with water content of 40%-60% into a vacuum stirring barrel. When the slurry enters the mixing barrel, start the vacuum pump for vacuumizing. When the slurry is filled to 2/3 barrels, stop the slurry valve, stop the vacuum pump and start the air compressor.

4. In order to improve the surface smoothness of finished porcelain, a grinder is needed;

5. In order to make full use of the recovered mud, the vacuum mud refiner can be used to practice mud again.

6. Selection of kilns: kilns with temperatures above 1000℃ are collectively called kilns; Furnace temperature refers to below 1000℃. Kilns are divided into electric kilns, steam kilns and shuttle kilns. The so-called shuttle kiln refers to a kiln with a kiln car (generally more than 0.6 cubic meters with a kiln car). In general, the temperature of steam kiln is set to 1400℃, the temperature of high-temperature electric kiln is set to 1300℃, and the temperature of low-temperature kiln is set to below 800℃.

When choosing a kiln, it has strong professional knowledge, and generally requires high glaze change and glaze color of the fired products, so it is necessary to choose a steam kiln, because the steam kiln can burn oxygen flame and reducing flame through operation. Porcelain is burned by oxidation flame, and reducing flame is glazed. Electric kiln can only burn oxidation flame, and medium-temperature oven can only burn porcelain glaze for decoration. Therefore, kiln selection should master the above basic knowledge.

7. Selection of clay glaze: Generally, it is better to choose the temperature of clay below 1230℃, and it is better to pay attention to the temperature of glaze below 2℃-4℃ when choosing glaze.

In addition to the above methods, there are many methods for ceramic molding, such as blank cutting, ring making (divided into spiral ring making and rolling plate ring making), lump mud molding, clay plate rolling, mud-fixing molding, mud printing molding, grouting molding, beneficial blank molding and so on. These methods are mutually disciplined and mixed, and whether they can be integrated or not needs to be mastered step by step in practice. Using the above tools and skills, combined with careful observation and thinking and bold creative excavation, you will certainly make beautiful works.