bill edwards on fri 24 feb 06
I think there is actually an answer in all this after reading replies by others now that the door is cracked a little. I am not so sure we will conclude it but everyone is being 'educated' more on the subject. The answers are out there....somewhere?
First, I want to clear something up. I was sent an email telling me to un-wrap my word wrap in outlook, first I don't use outlook fat all for my mail and the settings for this account is 72 per line, apparently there is a problem somewhere else? When I read my digest today on this screen my posts were within the confines of the 72 charectors per line. I copied my settings and sent them to the person who requested me make these changes.
For me I have always asked that those who use any glaze I publish to send me their results and any changes made be included fully and if re-published, those changes and why, be part of that publication for the recipe while holding my original formulation in-tact with it when and where possible. This is for tracking purposes and research and travel issues. A long time ago, a great person would do lots of physical testing using various sourced materials and would not only post the results as I had requested but would send me chips or samples of all those firings. This was good research and helped me develop a more brighter chrome tin red from a completely over-hauled recipe that Lana Wilson had given. Lana provided the earlier information as to why it took tin/chromium in a particular base to get to red and I was able to isolate some of the information and make it more usuable.
Now the complexity - While I had the recipe and the exact ingredients, it didn't give me exactly what she was getting. I wrote her and discussed it and we talked several times. Ababi got in on the action a few years down the road and eventually Ron got in on it and published his version in Mastering Cone 6 Glazes. But Lana Wilson was one of the very first people who really came forth with the best choice at the time that I can remember and she should have the credit for opening up new areas to explore. While I whittled away it clearly proved to me that after months of fighting with this glaze to get to the point I needed or wanted that calculations wasn't giving me the results I expected no matter what I done. This glaze when altered was beginning to become its own master. I spent day after day calculating. I spent month after month doing physical testing and firings. I also was publishing most of these finds which anyone could easily just gleem the information from and start
deducting the variables and could get a red. Ababi did just that even using his own chemistry. So Lana done her homework, I put in many man hours and then after all that it was narrowed down that these reds need to have this and that in order to get consistent results. With that information anyone could take it up and easily move it to the next step and then claim ownership even though much work was done by others along the way due to the sensitive nature of some glazes and their reactive end based on trace elements and chemistry used.
So - I believe that the recipe if it is going to be used at all needs to go out there and that those who think they can just get by with calculations alone are fooling themselves all too often. Currently I am doing labs and research for a new market product for the arts industry. The new products I am working on have had me calculating night and day till I suppose I have became tired and fussy. The hundreds of formulations I have poured over have given me just a few viable ones and hundreds of hours were spent getting there. The final results are in the physical testing.( Thousands of dollars will be spent in labs and toxicology due to ASTM testing and certification processes) I don't believe anyone in the field of science has ever relied on calculations as the only tool. Now with that said, I also believe anyone would be a fool to not calculate what they are doing but to get there you must have accurate information to work from. Posting a molecular formulae doesn't neccessarily
provide the information to a starting potter or an interrmediate potter, they would need to understand how to move from point A to point B which may or may not eventually move them to expert compounder.
To resolve this couldn't we agree that posting the entire thing be the most helpful way to explore. Those who write books for a living can also spend some of their time with their subjects and peers by detailing out issues since they earn a profit or have tried to make money from their efforts regardless of how they got there themselves. They cannot predict their readers, they cannot predict their intelligence levels and they cannot predict their end use no matter how hard they try. SO when one person says they are having this problem or that problem, there's very little anyone can do to help them without crossing over into that gray area that seems to have found its way into our field of work here. Copy-Right law, law-suits, people afraid to openly discuss glazes....How is that educating anyone? What end does it actually serve and to what degree? What it appears to be saying is this. Speaking 3rd party here ' I want to control how my information is going to be used. I want to make
sure I am getting the right information to a target audience that I can have some control mechanisms over, I want to be able to be the one to do the answering because after all, it is my work and I deserve the opportunity to finish what I started and reserve all rights of learning and change that may come from my efforts.
The above is fair to me. I have asked, and I will ask again. Publish and re-vamp my materials at your will but include the origin, the date where possible because some of the earlier stuff is totally out-dated with the newer information we now have and add your changes if you are a hobbiest potter or non-professional person who is trying to market themselves one way or another for profit. I want to choose as well how I can resolve issues that may arise from a glaze I am working on prior to a 'GURU' taking it upon themselves to quickly spot something in calculations, but not physically testing the glaze and then re-posting or printing their expected results which have often been inconclusive and in physical testing, simply wrong more than a few times.
End result is you are not going to get there with calculations alone. Currie made a great discovery for grid work but then you have to calculate your finds and do labs to ensure those finds are worthy if you expect stability. John and Ron rely heavily on their calculations approach and Ron often interjects opinions to glazes because he feels he has earned the reputation of being right. His followers believe in his work due to his success and therefore many are lost to the physical challenges of testing because they trust his instincts and educational levels enough not to do the hard work of mixing and firing multiple tests before going to the labs with the end results. Also it might be added that the best glaze in the world can be altered bad enough to reduce its viability by over-dosing it with colorants without even changing the base. So once again, just exactly how are we going to educate someone with all these unknown variables without them publishing the glaze with the molecular
structure and any changes they might have made, possible by altering the colorants to the point that once great glaze is now defunct and won't pass a lab test if it had to. A glaze is made to hold an upper/maximum level of materials in particular when the base is good, it can still only hold X ammount of coloring oxides before it will start losing them no matter what. I cannot see a control technique for this and you can bet I know some potters that have sworn by these glazes and their latest finds by altering the color choices to get a new look. I have also warned several that this tampering and moving away from the origin has changed the chemistry enough to throw the glaze way off in calculations so lab testing is now pertinent before they embark on public use for food service or sanitary ware. Now if they are going to do decorative work, hey, I am all for whatever it is they think they can get by with. But in the end they may still have problems just because of that simple change
they thought was fine because we haven't discussed it all in full and they are taking whatever someone else says in a book at face value without thinking for themselves.
Law-Suits - as a manufacturing person of the past and potentially one in the future once more, I can attest to how people love to try and find a legal means to get to you. The more success you have the more sharks there is in the water. I have had to fight off a few and have never lost a case as of Feb 24th, 2006 but it doesn't mean people won't try. Usually we don't talk about stuff like that because its just so personal. But while wading into this water a little deeper it might need to be discussed so others can see that you will, if you go out there with products of any kind, find someone willing to put you to the test because they want to make some easy money. Ron and John have narrowed your potential for that but don't forget the many others who have helped you as well. There's plenty of accolades that should be going around and I do mean plenty. But the bottom line is it is your duty and responsibility once you make any alterations to a glaze that you have covered every angle
there is and documented what you done. It is your position to protect yourself as well as to protect others who may use your product. If you take Ron and Johns glaze and decide you like it better with another coloring oxide, you best find a lab to see if that glaze can hold that material. Did Ron and John publish the upper limits for all known oxides that could be used for that glaze or did they say it was a starting point and the end user would need to do further lab tests to see if the base could handle the additions or changes?
While this is long, I hope it brings about more understanding and a greater respect for not only a few but for the countless wonderful contributors to this exciting field of technology. We don't need to be scared to death of what we do. We need to understand it better. We don't need censorship where it may alter ones ability to move beyond physical testing when that is the final answer to the best calculating system there is. I think Ron and John have been clear as bells on that. But in all the excitement of new glazes and all these changes there are potters who are missing it like Ron said, but I think they are missing it in a different way than what he meant. I had a cup sent to me from a potter using MC6G that according to the source said it was direct from the book. Shocked me! I love the cup, it's one of my most favorite cups with great crazing all over it. I suspect that the glaze and that particular clay just didn't jive or perhaps the potter made a mistake in their chemistry
of tweeked something a little? SO yes, I think I have some questions that need answers and Ron, please contact me about a clay that you do consult work for off list for I have some other questions I'd really like to ask. I'm not sure I am using the clay to the best of its ability or am not understanding something correctly.
While I have a book on CD, I am not offering it or trying to gain any market shares or fame at this point in my life and I am selling my studio equipment and have already lost a bunch some years ago that should have given me reason then not to continue doing pottery. So lets remove that from the conversation! I am on to other adventures and have plenty to keep me busy. My priority isn't to fuss, it is to educate because I love the people who have given me so much enhancement to an over-wise pretty boring life in a studio or laboratory setting or a manufacturing situation. I am not fussing at Ron or John, I am asking them to re-look at it one more time, be totally specific as to why they believe their way is the best way. I don't quiet buy their answers at this point and cannot deduct enough reasons or add enough reasons for them to say what they are saying and me not question them as to how they really got that notion. If it was needed for marketing I can understand that. I don't
understand how they believe they can control this enough to make the difference they are stating they can make.
Lets not forget who all out there helped us get where we are today. That list is very long and they are some real diamonds that failed to get shined along the way.
And remember that I did say this. Ron often talks about toxicology. I often have spent BIG bucks and hours with toxicologist for varied reasons. Then I had to study what I do big time because I couldn't afford too many mistakes when I sent my records in. ALL MATERIALS we use in ceramics come with its own inherent potential to cause harm where dust can accumulate or be atomized acutely and chronically. We have been scared often because we don't know what is killing us the fastest. Death is the slowest rate of decomposition we can achieve and we want to cheat it as long as possible. I have said this all before. Wear a dust mask and gloves when handling even your calcium carbonate because your sure to handle other stuff while at it. But don't go crazy and get yourself all scared and up-set or you will have to throw out your flour, your soaps and shampoo's and especially some of those cleaning products. Now you know to wear gloves when cleaning your bathroom, you should also by now know
to wear gloves and a mask when doing your work. Wet mop and put on some of Richard Simmons mopping to the oldies and get back to work!
Bill Edwards
http://apottersmark.blogspot.com/
'Studio Pottery Set-up for Sell, offers considered!'
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