CaterinaSwain548
Today there are numerous choices for putting decorative patterns onto porcelain china. Some, like decoupage, waterslide decals and air-dry paints like Delta Air-Dry PermEnamel are within the reach of any home crafter.
Others, like dye sublimation printing, transfer printing and hand-glazing high-fired art require substantial investment in equipment and are ideal to well-capitalized firms and artists cooperatives.
Today the two classic methods for putting designs onto porcelain, hand-painting and transfer printing, still exist. In addition, there's a edition of waterslide decals used commercially which includes screen-printing decals with glazes and using the decals to the pottery. In each case, the pottery is high-fired before decorating to at the least cone 6. [Cone is really a measure of heat absorption resulting from heat applied with time. Cone 6 means between 2165 and 2269 degrees F (based on how fast the kiln heats or ramps up ).] Such high-firing creates the hard almost-translucent quality of real porcelain. Then the part is adorned and carefully fired repeatedly to merge and melt the glazes to the porcelain.
Incidentally, the term porcelain has been employed more and more broadly as new techniques developed. Ask any potter to define pottery and he'll likely give the traditional definition to you. To a potter, real pottery is high-fired (cone 6 or maybe more) white clay that is at least somewhat clear. It has a big proportion of kaolin clay, with the remainder being mainly feldspar and silica. That clay composition accounts for the pure white gleam of pottery.
Artisans who paint porcelain (as opposed to make it) reference three degrees of porcelain: hard-paste, soft-paste, and bone china. All of them contain kaolin but only hard-paste has feldspar and silica and is high-fired. The high temperatures cause the glaze and your body to blend. When hard-paste porcelain is damaged, it's difficult to distinguish the human body from the glaze.
Soft-paste porcelain adds ground glass or frit (material for glass that is not yet fused and vitrified) and is dismissed to between cone 01 and 1 (1999 to 2109 degrees F). Since soft-paste porcelain is fired at lower temperatures, it remains slightly porous and does not completely vitrify. When soft-paste porcelain is broken, it is possible to recognize a body coated with a layer of glaze.
Bone china has bone ash put into the kaolin and vitrifies (becomes glass-like) somewhere within cone 2 and cone 5 (2034 to 2205 F). as correct porcelain though not as difficult, bone china is stronger than soft-paste porcelain. The bone ash significantly increases the translucence of the porcelain.
Finally, search for a tile shop and look at their porcelain tiles. If they are turned by you over, base clay will be seen by you ranging from white to brown to gray. This is of pottery in the tile industry has nothing regarding the clay content or amount of firing. Instead, tile manufacturers establish as pottery any tile shot to the level where it absorbs significantly less than three minutes water. homepage
