FastFire BRONZclay

Metal Adventures has a new metal clay called FastFire BRONZclay, as its name says, this new type of bronze clay fires faster than the original BRONZclay.

I am very happy about this new product because it will cut out more than 6 hours of firing time in the kiln.

As any new product, we all need to learn the way this beautiful clay works .

When I opened the package of this new clay I noticed that the color is lighter than the original BRONZclay.

The texture feels very grainy, like wet compacted sand. 

It is not as messy as the other clay, and does not dry very fast when you are working with it.

Making joins is faster and the clay is smoother, which I like a lot!

These are the pieces I made with this wonderful new clay:

My first piece is a heart, of course!! ;-).

The clay was very easy to roll and cut. When I put the piece to dry in my candle warmer, it dried very fast. I did notice I had to be more careful handling the dry piece, because it is more fragile than the original bronze clay when it is dry.

When my heart's base was dry, I started to carve it and the carving in this type of clay needs to be more gentle because it goes very smooth into the clay. 

I fired this piece full ramp up to 1525 F and hold it there for 2 and 1/2 hours. The piece was in a stainless steel pot with coconut charcoal.

When my piece came out it look very matte, and when I was burnishing the heart, I broke it!
Breaking the piece does not mean the clay is not good, what it means is that I may have to increase my temperature during the firing. Remember, this is a NEW product and we are all learning with it and it makes the process more interesting.

After repairing my heart I fired it in the kiln again but this time I increased the temperature up to 1550 F and hold it there for 2 hours. This time, as you can see in the photo, my heart did sinter perfectly, and my repair worked very good.

This Heart Nicho was fired two times because I wanted to see if the fired piece could handle another firing without blistering. The piece was fine after the two rounds of firing.

First firing

Second firing

With my last piece, I wanted to see how a more sculptural form will behave during the firing, I also added a CZ garnet and two bronze eyelets. 

This piece was fired at full ramp up to 1550 F and hold it there for 2 hours.

My "Virgen de Guadalupe" fired perfecly.