Chapter 214: Making a Pottery Pot
Chu Qiao smiled and shook his head: "You are more anxious than me, but you can't pinch it yet. I still need to knead this mud a little more."
"Kneading the clay can expel impurities and air from the clay, which makes the clay denser. If the air in the clay is not completely expelled, the air will expand due to the heat during firing, and the pottery will explode."
After saying that, Chu Qiao kneaded the mud back and forth like dough, and repeatedly pounded it on the stone.
The mud hit the ten pieces, making a popping sound. The sleeping Xiao Diao was startled. He pricked up his ears alertly, looked around, and then lowered them again.
About half an hour later, Chu Qiao rubbed his arm, which was a little agitated.
"Okay, start shaping."
"Many people have done handicrafts. When doing handicrafts, the pottery is placed on a rotatable disc, but in the wild, we generally use hand-kneading and clay strip coiling, which are two primitive methods of pottery shaping.
Chu Qiao rolled the mud into long strips and said, "I will first use the mud strip coiling method to make a larger barrel-shaped container."
"Like this, first roll the clay into long strips, coil them up in circles, and use them to make the bottom of the container."
When the disc-shaped bottom was about 30 centimeters in diameter, Chu Qiao stopped circling outwards and instead began to build it around the outer circle, spiraling upwards.
Chu Qiao carefully moved the snake-like mud strips, which were more than one meter long, upwards in circles, higher and higher.
When it was 20 centimeters high, Chu Qiao pinched off the remaining clay and smoothed it out with her hands, making a bucket of clay.
Chu Qiao looked at the container he had made and nodded: "This one is quite successful, but the clay strip coiling method can only produce a few shapes. Let's make another one and then try to mold it directly by hand."
After saying that, Chu Qiao used the plate-building method to make a bigger bucket, and then tore off a small piece of mud.
"Hand-kneading is less restrictive, but the pottery produced is rougher and less flat, and the firing temperature is also lower."
Chu Qiao kneaded the mud into a cone shape and made a cone.
Then he used his fingers to dig a hole in it. Chu Qiao slowly enlarged the hole and said, "Don't move too much during this correction process, or it will easily break the clay. Just pinch the thick parts to make them thinner."
Chu Qiao made continuous adjustments, and in order to make it easier to use, he made two ears on the mouth of the jar to facilitate taking it.
The whole jar looks like an upside-down hat.
Since the production time was quite long, the finished jar had tiny cracks and many potholes on it. Chu Qiao used mud and water to smooth out the gaps.
He explained, "Hand-kneaded pottery has many small pits and cracks. We try to smooth them out. This will reduce the risk of the pottery cracking due to uneven thickness during the firing process."
After making two or three such jars, Chu Qiao kept her head down and felt her back become very stiff. She took a deep breath, stood up, raised her arms, and stretched.
Her slender waist was revealed as she moved, and the drone instantly moved the end upwards.
[Oh my god, do you really have to be so sensitive? ]
[Master Chu's drone is incredibly awesome.]
[Is Mr. Chu's drone provided by Coke Live? ]
[Brother Feng: Whispering, it's Master Chu's own.]
[Oh my god, Master Chu is really powerful.]
Chu Qiao looked at everyone teasing him, and then he realized that his previous action was a bit dangerous.
She quickly adjusted her grass skirt and said, "The pots are done. There are five in total, three hand-kneaded and two coiled. We need to dry them in the shade for a while before firing them."
As Chu Qiao spoke, he took off a hanging water bag and took a sip of water.
The 5 mm long nails on all ten fingers of her hand holding the water bag were broken, and there was a bloodstain on the broken part of her right index finger.
[Brother Feng: Chu, your finger is broken?]
[Really, Master Chu, don’t you feel any pain? ]
【Would you like to pack it? 】
Chu Qiao was so busy making pottery that he didn't notice his broken nails at all. When he looked at it, he found that among his ten fingers, only the two little fingers were used less and their nails were not exercised.
Before coming here, Chu Qiao deliberately let his nails grow four or five millimeters, considering he had no tools. Chu Qiao looked at his hands covered in mud. Most of the nails had already broken off from the kneading and smacking of the mud.
Chu Qiao frowned and looked at Little Finger, it was so jarring.
She picked up the stone knife and chopped at her nails, and the extra nail on her little finger was cut off immediately.
[Master Chu, be gentle.]
[I almost thought Mr. Chu was going to chop off his hands.]
[Master Chu is a bit aggressive this time.]
Chu Qiao smiled and said, "There's no need to cut nails. They were originally made for survival. Now that we have stone knives and stone axes, nails are no longer necessary."
[Ms. Chu is truly the calmest woman I have ever met.]
【That’s right.】
Chu Qiao stood up and stopped joking with everyone, and looked through some pottery jars seriously.
The sunlight approaching dusk was not enough to dry the clay pots.
Chu Qiao shook his head and said, "This pottery jar cannot be fired yet. It must be dried in the shade. The purpose of drying in the shade is to remove the moisture from the clay to prevent it from bursting."
"But it takes about a week to dry in the shade, which is too long."
【The daylilies are cold.】
[Master Chu, forget it, let's just eat the lotus root raw.]
【Like Tekson, wouldn’t it be nice to bring a pot? 】
[Xiang, with your survival skills, don't come to Master Chu and ask for trouble.]
Chu Qiao didn't give up. She moved the pots one by one to the side of the flame: "The only way to speed up the process is to put them next to the fire and use the heat here to dry them."
[Master Chu, get closer to the fire.]
[What the above said makes sense, it’s that fast. ]
Chu Qiao shook his head: "Don't get too close to the fire, it will easily crack."
The passionate red sunset slowly disappeared and night fell quietly.
In the endless darkness, only the flame in the forest emitted a bright light. Chu Qiao sat by the fire, picked up the roasted wrinkled lotus root slices, and put them in his mouth to chew. The lotus root slices had no taste and had lost their moisture, and tasted like chewing wax, but in the wild, being picky about food is tantamount to seeking death.
"Xiao Diao, come here and eat." Xiao Diao was listless and had no interest in the lotus root in Chu Qiao's hand. Chu Qiao threw it into the air, and Xiao Diao grabbed it out of habit. He looked at Chu Qiao with a reproachful look, swallowed it without even taking a bite, and continued to lie there.
What happened to Xiao Diao? Why is Ganfanlang so listless?
【Xiao Diao is not in the right state.】
Chu Qiao walked over and felt Xiao Diao's oral temperature: "It's a little higher than usual."
Xiao Diao wagged his tail. Chu Qiao looked over and saw that his bottom was red. Chu Qiao didn't know whether to laugh or feel sorry for him. "Diarrhea?"
Xiao Diao nodded slightly.
"It's my fault. You're different from me. Your stomach isn't used to the raw water outside."
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