When we started gearing up for river running in the early nineties we bought a bunch of 20 mm “rocket boxes” to contain various supplies and to carry “solid human waste” off the river. W named all of our boxes. The boxes for food and such got names of our favorite people, names like Georgie, Gerry Garcia and so on. The poop cans got names of less favorite persons, usually some politician who’s record on river and wilderness issues we found to be lacking.
These are great dry boxes and are the standard in the river running community. I have thought for a long time that having a handle on the top would be a fine thing. I am always banging and scraping my knuckles while trying to get a 20 mm can out of a drop hatch. After numerous applications of Mom’s Stuff the scrapes finally are put right. A handle on the top of the can would also allow for carrying two at once in a balanced way that would not put undue stress on my lower back.
In this post I will show what I came up with.
I start by drilling two 1/4 inch holes through the lid where I want the straps to attach.
Using a propane torch I heat a 20 penny nail and burn holes in the strip of nylon webbing I will use for the strap handle.
This is the hardware I will use to attach the handle. Starting on the left is a 1/4 inch stainless steel machine bolt, a 1/4 inch flat washer, two 1/4 inch rubber washers and a 1/4 inch locking nut.
After placing the flat washer on the bolt I thread the strap on followed by the rubber washer.
I apply a small amount of a liquid gasket product or silicon rubber to the threads of the bolt.
The neat thing I discovered is that the 1/4 machine bolt fits so tight that I have to screw the bolt into the hole in the lid and it sort of taps its self in.
After fitting the other rubber washer onto the bolt as it sticks through the bottom of the lid I smear more liquid gasket material in the threads and tighten on the locking nuts.
There is the first finished handle. I waited over night and tested it by submerging the whole box for several minutes in my spa. It is water tight.
These wee little guys are designed to sit under the bottom shelf of both chambers of my wood burning kiln against the hot face. They will get blasted with a lot of really juicy ash and flash. For the next few days I will be throwing what I call fillers. They are the pots I make to fill in the spaces around and in between the larger wares.
8 oz mugs. I love the look and feel of cool wet clay.
A year ago I tried making a couple of large lidded oval bakers. They turned out well and were sold as soon as they came out of the kiln. (Why does Dave Ericson a;ways show up to help unload?) I decided to try a longer run of the last week. Here is a simplified step by step of their making.
I started by throwing a series of low wide cylinders and reshaping them into a trefoil type oval.
The rim is thrown thick and formed into a gallery to accept the lid.
After the body of the pot has set up a while but is still pliable I throw the bottom. I like throwing rather than rolling it because i get that nice spiral in the center.
The body of the pot is then placed on the bottom and “wiggled” around until I feel it start to stick. I then smooth down the edges with my finger inside and out and cut all the way around it with a wooden knife tool and then trim away the excess clay from the bottom with a fettling knife.
Using a triangular rib I scrape away excess clay from the base and undercut it a little. I like to leave the “deckle edges” where they occur.
With the oval baker still on the wheel I stick a couple of handles on and pull them in place.
Next I cover the bakers with light plastic and roll out a slab of clay a little bigger than the pot for each one and set them aside.
After the slab has had time to stiffen up some I use a hard rubber rib to press the slab into the rim of the baker carefully stretching it to give it an inverted dome shape.
After I have finished shaping the lid I trim around the edge of the baker with a needle tool and let the lids and bakers dry and stiffen together.
When the lid is stiff enough to handle but still pliable I turn it over and trim it along the line left in the clay from the rim of the baker using a needle tool on the outside and a fettling knife on the inside. I also smooth the rim of the lid with my fingers and a little water if needed.
With the lid trimmed and smoothed I pull a strap handle, bend it and attach it to the lid. I fit the lid to the baker by gently adjusting the shape of the baker to conform to the lid and by shaping the lid with a sureform. This is only going to work if the baker is still somewhat pliable. THe moisture content of the baker is critical and can be maintianed by wetting the baker and keeping it covered until the lid is ready.
These six bakers were made and put together over a three day period.
The launch date for our Grand Canyon trip is galloping toward us. I am making as much pottery as I can so I’ll be able to fire before we go. I have a client who wants dinnerware so I need to throw enough to make a firing. Hands on clay, mind in the ditch….a very big ditch.
Last April Lee and I went to NCECA in Phoenix together. We had a great time. We had a show together at the Marshall Gallery in Scottsdale. We had talked about attending the 2010 NCECA Conference in Philladelphia, PA. Then this letter came two weeks ago:
The letter starts like this:
Dear Joseph Bennion,
Thank you for submitting an application in the Grand Canyon National Park noncommercial river trip lottery. We are pleased to inform you that your lottery application was successful and we have scheduled a Standard trip for you to launch from Lees Ferry on February 26, 2010.”
Though the trip is listed as “Standard” (up to 16 participants) Lee and I are not taking anyone besides ourselves on this trip. We will launch on the date specified and run for 28 days to Pearce Ferry at mile 280 on the river. We have been sceming on this one for about three years, ever since we went down Cataract Canyon on a similar one boat, two person trip. It was one of the best things we had ever done and we decided then that we would do a trip like that in the Grand Canyon.
We submitted to the 2010 river permits lottery in February of 2009 and finally got lucky on January 9 this year. We have five more weeks to get ready. I’ll be throwing and firing a lot of pottery and going through gear. Lee is handling the logistics of gear rental, car schuttle arrangemnts and finding a house sitter. It will all come together on time.
I’m sure you get the picture. We will be taking a commercial trip through the Canyon in June that still has seats open. Click here for details. See you there.
Thirteen years ago Louisa and I went into upper Tuckup Canyon in the Grand Canyon looking for a rock art site called the Shaman’s Gallery. We had a pretty good map to go by that was annotated and got us into the area. It was early January. We hiked down into the canyon but were unable to find the sitr. That was mostly because we didn’t know exactly where the site was or what it looked like. We only knew that it was in the upper part of the canyon. It was a nice hike in the canyon with one of my favorite people.
Last week I went back with several friends. We had down loaded and printed a cowboy map from the internet. Having been in the upper Tuckup area before I figured the map, drawn by mule/horse packer Gordon Smith who claims to have “discovered” the site in the 80’s. Never mind that there is old cowboy graffiti at the site.
The Smith map says that after turning left off of the Toroweep Road you just “stick to the main path”.
Can anyone guess which is the “main path”? This fork is right past the first cattle guard, corral and ponds shown on the map. We stuck to the left fork as it looked most traveled and wound up after some pretty extreme 4 wheeling on a hilltop about two miles from the canyon rim.
After hiking to the trail head we discovered by checking the GPS that one of my hiking friends had brought that we were at The head of 150 Mile Canyon, about 6.5 miles from the trailhead in Tuckup as the crow flies. Of course we are not crows and would have had to drive back to the corrals and then another 10+ miles back out to the canyon rim at Tuckup.
Cowboy relics encountered along the trail into One Hundred Fifty Mile Canyon.
It was a nice day and the country was beautiful. The Shaman’s Gallery will have to wait for another day….again. Next time we bring real maps. Here are some of what we saw while camped out at Toroweep.
Looking west from the Toroweep overlook at the end of the day.
Lava Falls is awe inspiring even from 3k’ up.
More scenes around the Toroweep area.
There was an old cowboy camp on the rim at Saddle Horse Canyon. Here is a stove, watering tank and a pipe line going to a water source below the rim.
I got word today of two shows I will be in early next year. At the Clay Art Center in Port Chester New York “Shino Redux 2010″ curated my Malcolm Davis. The show opens February 6, 6-8 pm and closes March 6. The show opens January 23 and closes April 24, 2010. This piece was a gift to the AMOCA from the American Ceramic Society, Spencer Davis Collection.
In Los Angeles at the American Museum of Ceramic Art “Let’s Table This: A Survey of Table Top Vessels from the AMOCA’s Permanent Collection”.
After Dixon’s demise I unloaded the last firing of 2009 and conducted the last studio sale as well. Lots of good people came and a good time was had by all. I can’t say that we broke any sales records, but considering the economy we did alright. We have been and continue to be blessed.
After these were fired I did make a few more small pots to send out to California for some friends to fire in their New Year’s Eve firing. Those will be 2010 pots.
Friends, family and tourists all came by on the sale days.
Lee, Geri and Matt The Schultses Kenny Nealand and Joe the Potter
Rochanne, Joe, Sasha, Sara, Lee, Zina, Esther, Lee, Bev, Rachel, Sarah and Zina.
Our good dog Dixon followed his brother Kane down the West Road today. Because the kiln is cooling I took the day off. I was out walking in the hills west of Spring City with our three dogs when a hunter shot him through the chest with an arrow. He claimed that Dixon was chasing game and that Utah law allows him to kill dogs that harass game. I will not bother you with details of the case. It doesn’t matter. My friend is dead. My body aches all over. Telling Lee was the hardest thing I have done in a long time. My next task is to wait on my heart to soften so I can forgive. It is a tall order, but part of the path that I signed onto.
I posted an album of images of Dix on FaceBook.
Our good friend Kate Mcleod posted this vid on Youtube that says some of what I am feeling.
“I’m making peace with losing a loved one
Lark in the morning, let it go free”
