Can’t seem to find the aluminum die you need for your handheld clay extruder and don’t have access to a CNC machine or 3D printer? Make dies from what you have on hand and customize them to your needs.
As an avid estate-sale goer, from time to time I stumble upon the home of an artist whose studio tools are looking for a new home and are priced to move. A couple of months ago, I went to such a sale and found a handheld extruder gun with a single aluminum die for ten dollars. Knowing a deal when I see one and acknowledging a hole in my studio arsenal, I gladly paid the reasonable asking price and made my way home. In addition to being a thrifty shopper, I can be a scrappy “make-do” creative; so instead of ordering a commercially made set of metal or plastic dies, I brainstormed how I could make my own with what I had on hand—clay.
Cut Your Blanks
I grabbed a bag of my groggiest, on-hand stoneware— Aardvark’s Charcoal—and rolled out a 1⁄2-in. (1.3-cm)-thick slab. To achieve a consistent thickness, use a pair of wooden thickness strips on either side of the slab before flattening with a rolling pin (1). Next, use a flexible yellow rib to compress the surface of both sides of the slab. Using the single metal die and the screw-on extruder cap as a guide for the diameter, I selected a 2⅛-in. (5.4-cm) circle cutter to use (2). Double-check that the circles fit inside your extruder cap and fully cover the exterior opening (to avoid clay sneaking through if the die should shift) (3). Cut out as many circles as you want or need and then select your hole cutters.
Add Your Voids
At another estate sale, I picked up a set of stainless-steel fondant cutters made by Ateco, which included a handful of shapes in a few sizes. The variety provided several options for future coil shapes and sizes, so I opted to make more dies than will likely fall into regular rotation (4). In addition to these shaped cutters, I used three hole-cutting tools of different diameters to make “noodle dies”—or dies that make multiple coils of the same diameter at once (5). When positioning the shaped cutter on your clay circle, be sure that the shaped void will be unobstructed by the extruder cap once assembled, and that the shape is as close to center as possible.
Go Rogue
To make a shape not in the cutter set, like a star, foot, or handle profile, you can freehand a shape or use a combination of what you have on hand. For instance, three small-diameter circles could become a clover, two teardrop shapes could come together to form a heart, or an oval cutter can be used as a guide to make a handle profile.
Using a 1½-in. (3.8-cm)-wide oval cutter as a stencil, lightly etch an outline of the shape into the center of a blank clay circle using a needle tool (A). Turn the oval cutter 90 degrees, so it now runs horizontally, and anchor its far-right edge close to the middle of the previously drawn vertical oval (B). Draw an outline of the oval cutter where the two ovals overlap (once drawn, it’ll resemble a crescent moon inside of the original oval) (C). Draw lines to round the corners of the crescent shape to make a jelly-bean/smile shape (D), and using a rib or your finger, smooth the extraneous marks (E). Once you are satisfied with your shape, use a knife to cut out along the drawn line and remove the unwanted clay (F).
Finishing Touches
Once all of your blank disks have been transformed into dies, use the needle (for narrower corners and shapes) or the handle of a needle tool to compress the interior edges of your cut-out shapes. After the interior walls have been compressed, use a metal rib or your knife to remove any clay burrs or ridges on the two faces of each die. Once they’ve been cleaned up, place your clay dies onto a piece of drywall (6). Next, place another small piece of drywall on top, sandwiching the dies between the two absorbent boards (7).
I place a bag of sand on top of the top board to apply additional pressure to keep the dies flat, but that is optional (8). Let your dies dry completely; they are very thick and could break in the firing if not totally dry when fired. If you are unsure if there is still moisture in the disks, add a preheat to your kiln program. Once they are fired, they are ready to use in your handheld extruder gun (9).
the author Margaret Kinkeade is the editor of Ceramics Monthly and maintains her ceramics practice in her home studio. To see more of Kinkeade’s work, visit www.margaretkinkeade.com.
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Can’t seem to find the aluminum die you need for your handheld clay extruder and don’t have access to a CNC machine or 3D printer? Make dies from what you have on hand and customize them to your needs.
As an avid estate-sale goer, from time to time I stumble upon the home of an artist whose studio tools are looking for a new home and are priced to move. A couple of months ago, I went to such a sale and found a handheld extruder gun with a single aluminum die for ten dollars. Knowing a deal when I see one and acknowledging a hole in my studio arsenal, I gladly paid the reasonable asking price and made my way home. In addition to being a thrifty shopper, I can be a scrappy “make-do” creative; so instead of ordering a commercially made set of metal or plastic dies, I brainstormed how I could make my own with what I had on hand—clay.
Cut Your Blanks
I grabbed a bag of my groggiest, on-hand stoneware— Aardvark’s Charcoal—and rolled out a 1⁄2-in. (1.3-cm)-thick slab. To achieve a consistent thickness, use a pair of wooden thickness strips on either side of the slab before flattening with a rolling pin (1). Next, use a flexible yellow rib to compress the surface of both sides of the slab. Using the single metal die and the screw-on extruder cap as a guide for the diameter, I selected a 2⅛-in. (5.4-cm) circle cutter to use (2). Double-check that the circles fit inside your extruder cap and fully cover the exterior opening (to avoid clay sneaking through if the die should shift) (3). Cut out as many circles as you want or need and then select your hole cutters.
Add Your Voids
At another estate sale, I picked up a set of stainless-steel fondant cutters made by Ateco, which included a handful of shapes in a few sizes. The variety provided several options for future coil shapes and sizes, so I opted to make more dies than will likely fall into regular rotation (4). In addition to these shaped cutters, I used three hole-cutting tools of different diameters to make “noodle dies”—or dies that make multiple coils of the same diameter at once (5). When positioning the shaped cutter on your clay circle, be sure that the shaped void will be unobstructed by the extruder cap once assembled, and that the shape is as close to center as possible.
Go Rogue
To make a shape not in the cutter set, like a star, foot, or handle profile, you can freehand a shape or use a combination of what you have on hand. For instance, three small-diameter circles could become a clover, two teardrop shapes could come together to form a heart, or an oval cutter can be used as a guide to make a handle profile.
Using a 1½-in. (3.8-cm)-wide oval cutter as a stencil, lightly etch an outline of the shape into the center of a blank clay circle using a needle tool (A). Turn the oval cutter 90 degrees, so it now runs horizontally, and anchor its far-right edge close to the middle of the previously drawn vertical oval (B). Draw an outline of the oval cutter where the two ovals overlap (once drawn, it’ll resemble a crescent moon inside of the original oval) (C). Draw lines to round the corners of the crescent shape to make a jelly-bean/smile shape (D), and using a rib or your finger, smooth the extraneous marks (E). Once you are satisfied with your shape, use a knife to cut out along the drawn line and remove the unwanted clay (F).
Finishing Touches
Once all of your blank disks have been transformed into dies, use the needle (for narrower corners and shapes) or the handle of a needle tool to compress the interior edges of your cut-out shapes. After the interior walls have been compressed, use a metal rib or your knife to remove any clay burrs or ridges on the two faces of each die. Once they’ve been cleaned up, place your clay dies onto a piece of drywall (6). Next, place another small piece of drywall on top, sandwiching the dies between the two absorbent boards (7).
I place a bag of sand on top of the top board to apply additional pressure to keep the dies flat, but that is optional (8). Let your dies dry completely; they are very thick and could break in the firing if not totally dry when fired. If you are unsure if there is still moisture in the disks, add a preheat to your kiln program. Once they are fired, they are ready to use in your handheld extruder gun (9).
the author Margaret Kinkeade is the editor of Ceramics Monthly and maintains her ceramics practice in her home studio. To see more of Kinkeade’s work, visit www.margaretkinkeade.com.
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