 Re: Heat-dry mortar made of refactory clay and refactory sand (and nothing else)
I have fired local raw clays in kilns and open fires. We dry the projects in the sun till they are bone dry, put them in cast iron dutch oven and build a big fire over the oven. Those that survive are a basic brisk, the color of a flower pot. We have things the kids made 20 years ago sitting in the garden beds, out in the rain and snow that look like the day they came out of the fire, well except for the green stuff that has taken up living on their surface. To get into the range of heat to change clay, I would use charcoal and a fan. You will have some cracks but if you used fire bricks, the oven will hold together. As to the local clays: I found that mud from the bottom of ponds, mixed with crushed up failed projects (frit), about 5 to 1 ratio held together best. The pond mud had some organic matter that burned off in the firing so it had the most shrinkage but it was also the hardest and the smoothest in the end. | 
09-07-2009, 08:18 AM
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