Alumina Calcined
CAS NO: 1344-28-1
Calcined alumina is generally used in the manufacture of high-grade ceramic shapes, refractories and fused alumina abrasives. In ceramics it is used to increase glaze viscosity, firing range and resistance to crystallization.
Alumina Hydrate
CAS NO: 21645-51-2
Used primarily in glazes as a source of Alumina. Often preferred over the oxide (Calcined Alumina) form because it promotes glaze adhesion and has a capacity to remain suspended in a glaze. It is also used in salt glaze, bungs, and kiln batt wash.
Alumina is added to glass formulations to improve mechanical strength, hardness, thermal and optical properties.
Aluminum Metaphosphate
CAS NO: 13446-46-3
Aluminum metaphosphate is used as a constituent of glazes, enamels, and glass.
Ammonium Metavanadate
CAS NO: 7803-55-6
Ammonium metavanadate (AMV) is used in the production of glazes and pigments for tiles but also in NOx catalysts. Ammonium metavanadate reduces surface tension in glazes and reduces viscosity during the melting process. AMV is also used in the production of NOx catalysts.
Antimony Trioxide
CAS NO: 1309-64-4
Antimony Trioxide is the inorganic compound with the formula Sb₂O₃. It is the most important commercial compound of antimony. It is used as an opacifying agent for glasses, ceramics and enamels.
Ball Clay
CAS NO: 1318-74-7
Ball clays are fine-grained, highly plastic clays, which are mainly used in the manufacture of ceramic whiteware and sanitaryware where they are valued for their plasticity, unfired strength and their light colour on firing.
Barium Carbonate
CAS NO: 513-77-9
Barium carbonate is commonly used in the ceramics industry as an ingredient in glazes. It acts as a flux, a matting and crystallizing agent and combines with certain colouring oxides to produce unique shades not easily attainable by other means.
Battwash
CAS NO: N/A
Battwash is made from alumina and china clay. It should be spread on kiln shelves or batts in an even layer, to ensure the ware being fired remains flat. The aim is to offer resilience to any spilt glaze, protecting the shelf.
Bentonite Clay
CAS NO: 1302-78-9
Bentonite binds particles together in ceramic bodies to make them stronger in the green or dry state. Its minute particles fill voids between others to produce a denser mass with more points of contact. Adding bentonite to glazes also imparts better dry strength and a harder and more durable surface.
Bismuth Oxide
CAS NO: 12640-40-3
Bismuth is used in making extremely low temperature frits and colours, conductive glazes, enamels for metal and on-glaze colours. It is also used in glass frits, these melt at low enough temperatures to make bonding (gluing together) of diverse materials possible
Bone Ash
CAS NO: 10103-46-5
In ceramics, bone ash is an important source of calcium phosphate. The calcium acts as a flux, while the phosphorous acts as a glass former. When added to a clay body such as bone china, bone ash lowers the maturing temperature and adds translucency.
Boric Acid
CAS NO: 10043-35-3
Boric acid is used in chemically bonded firebricks and castable shapes requiring high temperature resistance, corrosion, and abrasion resistance. Borax is a powerful melting agent in glazes.
Borax Anhydrous
CAS NO: 1330-43-4
This material is used as a source of B2O3 in the manufacture of many different types of borosilicate glass, including heat and chemical resistant glasses, illumination glasses, optical lenses, medical and cosmetic containers, hollow microspheres and glass beads. It has a higher bulk density and melts more rapidly than raw forms of borax.
Borax Decahydrate
CAS NO: 1303-96-4
Borax Decahydrate is the refined form of natural sodium borate. Composed of boric oxide (B2O3), sodium oxide, and water, it is a mild, alkaline salt, white and crystalline, with excellent buffering and fluxing properties.
Borax Pentahydrate
CAS NO: 12179-04-2
Borax Pentahydrate, which has high water solubility, is used as a glazing raw material in ceramics.
It is added to glass products used for heat insulation as it increases viscosity, surface hardness and durability when added to glass intermediates. The most important use of Borax pentahydrate is in fibre glass production.
Calcium Carbonate
CAS NO: 1317-65-3
Calcium carbonate is another main component in the production of ceramics. Calcium carbonate is an economical source of calcium oxide, which is needed as a melting agent at high temperatures, improves the mechanical and chemical strength of the glass body, and reduces shrinkage from firing.
Calcium Carbonate (Limestone) stabilizes glass, solving the issue of solubility and increases its hardness and chemical durability. It also plays a role in lowering the melting temperature of the batch by improving the melting kinetics.
Calcium Chloride
CAS NO: 10043-52-4
Calcium chloride comes in both flake and prill form. It is used as a flocculating agent in glazes (to suspend and gel them). For many, especially larger manufacturers, it is the product of choice (more effective than Epsom salts). It works well with glazes containing bentonite or carbonates.
Calcium Oxide
CAS NO: 1305-78-8
Calcium oxide is mostly used as a property modifier component in glass composition.
Its main function in glass is to introduce Calcium Oxide into the glass recipe, which is needed to improve chemical resistance and durability. It also acts as flux in glass manufacturing.
Chromite Flour
CAS NO: 98072-82-3
Chromite flour can offer the same benefits to the ceramics industry and create grey bodies. It’s also of use in the creation of glazes for use in ceramics, with such glazes tending to be green in colouration.
Chromite Flour is widely used as a pigment in the production of container glass, providing many different shades of green glass depending on the oxidation state and concentration of chromite used.
Calcium Fluoride
CAS NO: 14542-23-5
Commonly known as Fluorspar. It is used in the production of ceramics and glass due to it’s high strength.
Mainly used in ceramics for cooking utensils and enamels. In glass it helps to promote the melting of glass materials.
Chrome Oxide Green
CAS NO: 1308-38-9
Chrome oxide green adds colour to glass products.
When manufacturing glass, adding green chrome oxide turns glass a green colour. The higher the concentration, the more intense the colour.
Cobalt Carbonate
CAS NO: 513-79-1
Cobalt carbonate can be used as a colorant to produce blues in glazes and can present purples when manganese is present. This compound is sometimes preferred over the Oxide form due to its particle size.
Cobalt Oxide
CAS NO: 11104-61-3
Cobalt is the most powerful ceramic colourant and it is stable in most systems, it appears in many recipes. Like copper, it melts very actively in oxidation. If it is mixed into a fluid frit base in high enough a percentage, it will completely crystallize during cooling.In ceramics, cobalt oxide colour is used mainly in slips, washes, and glazes and can be applied through brushwork or decals.
Cobalt Oxide produces a deep blue coloured glass in a glass melt. Cobalt is a very intense colouring agent and very little is required to show a noticeable amount of colour.
Cobalt Sulphate
CAS NO: 10124-43-3
Cobalt sulphate is used as a pigment in the porcelain and glass industries and as a colouring agent in ceramics, enamels, and glazes to prevent discolouration.
Colemanite
CAS NO: 12291-65-5
Colemanite has been a popular natural source of insoluble boron for many decades. It is similar to Ulexite in its oxide contribution to glazes. It is a useful glaze ingredient in low-fire glazes and low-end stoneware glazes; it combines both fluxing and glass-forming properties.
Copper Oxide
CAS NO: 1317-38-0
Copper oxide powder is a pigment used in the ceramic industry for imparting blue, green, or red tints in ceramics, glazes, and enamels.
Copper oxide powder is used as a pigment in glass manufacturing, typically used in soda, lime, and silica glass colouration.
Cornish Stone
CAS NO: N/A
Cornish Stone is a low-iron feldspar blend used in ceramics as a source of fluxing oxides in both clay bodies and glazes. It is used in clay bodies to give strength while firing and in engobes because of its adhesive properties. With the addition of a suitable flux, Cornish Stone can also be used as a glaze.
Cryolite
CAS NO: 13775-53-6
In low fire ceramic glazes it can be used as a strong fluxing agent (with a relatively low melting point). A source of insoluble sodium and used in frits for enamelling and glazes. It can also be used as an opacifier. In glass it will produce opalescence. In ceramics it can make crackle glazes.
Dolomite
CAS NO: 6927-00-5
Dolomite is the common name given to limestone which contains a certain proportion of magnesium. It is also referred to as dolomitic limestone. Glass-grade dolomite is used in float glass production to improve resistance to natural or chemical attack or weathering.
In ceramics, other than talc, dolomite is the main source of magnesium oxide in high temperature glazes. Dolomite can be used as a high temperature flux and to promote crystal formations in glazes. Such glazes that use this material often aim to achieve the well-known dolomite matte surface, which is a pleasant matte. On its own, dolomite has refractory properties, but when it is combined with oxides in glazes, it properly fuses.
Feldspar Potassium
CAS NO: 68476-25-5
Potassium Feldspar is used as a fluxing agent to form a glassy phase at low temperatures and as a source of alkalis and alumina in glazes. They improve the strength, toughness, and durability of the ceramic body.
Potassium Feldspar is an important ingredient in the manufacture of glass and an important raw material as well, because it acts as a fluxing agent, reducing the melting temperature of quartz and helping to control the viscosity of glass.
Feldspar Sodium
CAS NO: 68476-25-5
Sodium Feldspar is used as a fluxing agent to form a glassy phase at low temperatures and as a source of alkalis and alumina in glazes. They improve the strength, toughness, and durability of the ceramic body.
Sodium Feldspar is an important ingredient in the manufacture of glass and an important raw material as well, because it acts as a fluxing agent, reducing the melting temperature of quartz and helping to control the viscosity of glass.
Flint
CAS NO: 93821-35-3
Flint is a highly refractory and non-plastic material. It is a major source of silica in all types of clay body. It increases firing temperature and reduces plasticity and shrinkage. It may be added in small quantities to prepared bodies to eliminate crazing effect.
Ilmenite Flour
CAS NO: 103170-28-1
Ilmenite Flour is a natural titanium oxide/iron oxide mineral milled to a heavy dark brown to black powder. Suitable for use as an additive to ceramic glazes and as a heavy dark filler in other products where required.
Ilmenite Sand
CAS NO: 103170-28-1
Ilmenite sand can be used in small amounts to produce dark brown specks in bodies and specialized glazes. It also is used in combination with rutile to develop characteristic rutile break glazes; it seeds crystals in titanium glazes.
Iron Oxide – Natural
CAS NO: 1317-60-8
Natural Iron Oxides are supplied in a range of different colours, including Black, Red, Yellow and blends of all three where necessary. In ceramics, red iron oxide is most commonly used in glazes and clay bodies, but black and yellow are also used.
Its naturally high iron content makes it perfect for increasing iron levels in a container glass colourant without adding a significant amount of unnecessary compounds that might interfere with the stability or quality of your glass.
Iron Oxide Synthetic
CAS NO: 1309-37-1
Synthetic Iron Oxides are supplied in a range of different colours, including Black, Red, Yellow and blends of all three where necessary. In ceramics, red iron oxide is most commonly used in glazes and clay bodies, but black and yellow are also used.
Synthetic red iron oxide is the most common colorant in ceramics and has the highest amount of iron. It is available commercially as a soft and very fine powder made by grinding ore material or heat processing ferrous/ferric sulphate or ferric hydroxide.
Iron Oxide Spangles
CAS NO: 1317-60-8
Iron Oxide Spangles are a crystalline form of Iron Oxide, which produces dark brown speckles.
Lead Bisilicate
CAS NO: 65997-18-4
Lead bisilicate is the frit often used in low solubility glazes. Using Lead Bisilicate is standard way to introduce lead to a glaze.
Lithium Carbonate
CAS NO: 554-13-2
Lithium Carbonate is the best source of lithium oxide for glazes. It is a major flux for higher temperature alkaline glazes. It is less soluble than other alkaline compounds and produces more durable glazes.
Lithium Carbonate is widely used in the manufacture of special glass and ceramics where it is used to control thermal expansion.
Magnesium Carbonate
CAS NO: 546-93-0
Magnesium Carbonate is supplied in two forms, Heavy and Light. Magnesium Carbonate is used to introduce magnesium into glazes. This chemical imparts strength and colour, with very little shrinkage.
When used in larger quantities, magnesium carbonate produces a dry, opaque surface in glazes.
Magnesium Carbonate is used as anti-flux in refractory in glass making process. It is known to improve the weathering quality of glass sheet and transparency of the glass.
Magnesium Fluoride
CAS NO: 7783-40-6
Magnesium fluoride is commonly used in the ceramic industry, in the production of ceramic frits and enamels, in the nuclear industry, and for surface treatments
Magnesium Oxide
CAS NO: 1309-48-4
Magnesium Oxide is supplied in two forms, Heavy and Light. Magnesium oxide is a specialty ceramic with outstanding high-temperature performance, used primarily in thermal engineering, heating elements, crucibles, and refractories.
Magnesium oxide is also used in the production of glass fibres. Glass fibres requires a high melt viscosity to prevent breakage.
Magnesium Sulphate
CAS NO: 10034-99-4
Magnesium sulphate is mostly used in ceramics as a flocculant. It thickens and gels suspensions by electrostatically charging particles so that they attract each other more. This not only suspends them in the slurry but makes them stay put on non-porous surfaces (by virtue of the gelling mechanism).
Manganese Carbonate
CAS NO: 598-62-9
Magnesium Carbonate is used in ceramic bodies, glazes, and glass. Magnesium Carbonate is used in low fire glazes to produce opacity and mattiness. In low temperature glazes magnesium carbonate in amounts to 15% acts as a refractory, remaining in suspension in the glaze melt to produce a white opaque matte glaze.
Manganese Dioxide
CAS NO: 1313-13-9
Manganese is used to stain clays (usually black) and to impart fired speckling (as a decorative effect). The applications include the use of Manganese Dioxide as an inorganic pigment in ceramics and in glassmaking. Manganese is a colourant used in bodies and glazes, producing blacks, browns, and purples.
By adding certain other ingredients to a molten glass, it is possible to offset the greenish colour and produce colourless glasses. Such ingredients are known as discolourisers, and one of the most common is manganese dioxide.
Nepheline Syenite
CAS NO: 37244-96-5
Like feldspar, Nepheline Syenite is used as a flux in porcelains, vitreous and semi-vitreous clay bodies, and in glazes. Nepheline syenite contributes high alumina without associated free silica in its raw form. This makes it an excellent filler and melting agent, especially for fast firing.
Nepheline Syenite can be used in float glass, container glass, fibre glass, opal glass, sheet glass, electrical glass and tableware glass. Nepheline Syenite provides sufficient additives of alumina and alkali in the glass batch. It is low in silica and contains no free quartz. It also has a favourable ratio of sodium oxide to potassium oxide of 2:1. Nepheline Syenite enables the glass batches to have lower viscosity and easier workability compared with Potash Feldspar.
Nickel Carbonate
CAS NO: 3333-67-3
Nickel Carbonate is refractory and can raise the melting temperature of glazes if used in large amounts. Nickel combines with other metal oxides to produce special colour pigments. Uses also include glass frits for porcelain enamel and to develop colours in clear glass.
Nickel Oxide
CAS NO: 1313-99-1
Nickel Oxide is a powerful and refractory colourant that produces greys, blues, and yellows. It is more concentrated than nickel carbonate. It has been used for making electrical ceramics such as thermistors and varistors e.g. ferrites (nickel zinc ferrite) Pigments for ceramic, glasses and glazes.
Petalite
CAS NO: 1302-66-5
Petalite, also known as castorite, is a lithium feldspar with a high silica content. It is used both in clay bodies and glazes to help decrease thermal shock problems. It is valuable because it provides an insoluble source of lithium and has the highest Li2O:Al2O3 ratio of any natural mineral. Lithium is a strong alkaline flux and is effective over all temperature ranges.
Potassium Carbonate
CAS NO: 584-08-7
Potassium Carbonate is also known as Pearl Ash. It is a strong flux and can be used as a colour modifier in glazes. Used as a medium to high temperature flux in glazes and clay bodies.
Potassium carbonate is primarily used as a flux in glass production. It increases the resistance, transparency, and refractive coefficient of glass to give it excellent clarity, making it ideal for use in spectacles, glassware, television screens and computer monitors. Potassium carbonate is a common flux as it not only helps control the process, but also aids the transparency, clarity, resistance, and refractive coefficient of the final product.
Potassium Chloride
CAS NO: 7447-40-7
Potassium chloride is a non-glass, inorganic optical material. It has the lowest density among the non-glass optical ceramics.
Rutile
CAS NO: N/A
Rutile is supplied in two forms as a milled flour and as a coarser sand grade. It can produce many crystalline, speckling, streaking, and mottling effects in glazes during cooling in the kiln and has been used in all types of coloured glazes to enhance the surface character. Many attractive variegated glazes are made using it. In oxidation firings, rutile results in a tan colour; whereas, in reduction firings, rutile gives grey . If the glaze is fluid, rutile tends to form opalescent blues. Rutile is often used in glazes to increase opacity and create mottled effects.
Silica
CAS NO: 14808-60-07
Silica is supplied in several grades, ranging from sand to fine and micronised flours. As the melting point of ceramics is high, it is often fluxed with other materials to lower its melting point, which helps in maintaining the melting point of ceramics in a respectable range.
Milled silica also imparts hardness to glazes and decreases their thermal expansion. it provides the melting, or glassifying agents in a clay body that allow the material to fuse together.
Silica sand is the primary source of silicon dioxide that is essential in the manufacture of glass. To be suitable for producing glass, there must be a very high proportion of silica (above 95%) in the composition of the sand.
Sodium Carbonate
CAS NO: 497-19-8
Sodium carbonate is supplied in two grades, dense and light. Commonly referred to as “Soda Ash”
In glass manufacture in adding soda (sodium carbonate), the melting point of the sand is reduced so it can be transformed into glass at lower temperatures and save energy during manufacturing.
Sodium Hexametaphosphate
CAS NO: 68915-31-1
A significant use for sodium hexametaphosphate is as a deflocculant in the production of clay-based ceramic particles. It is also used as a dispersing agent to break down clay and other soil types for soil texture assessment.
Sodium Fluoride
CAS NO: 7681-49-4
Sodium fluoride is widely used as fluxing and opacifying agent in the manufacture of colours, frits and enamels.
Sodium Fluoroborate
CAS NO: 13755-29-8
Sodium fluoroborate is commonly used in the ceramic industry.
Sodium Nitrate
CAS NO: 15621-57-5
Sodium nitrate is used in the production of glass and ceramic enamels.
Sodium nitrate as a discolourising agent is mainly used to eliminate the undesirable colours brought to the glass by impurities in the raw materials, and make the glass appear colourless and transparent. In the process of making glass, some bubbles will appear. Sodium nitrate is used to reduce these bubbles.
Sodium Nitrite
CAS NO: 7632-00-0
Used in glass enamels.
Sodium Sulphate
CAS NO: 7757-82-6
Sodium sulphate is used as a fining agent, to help remove small air bubbles from molten glass. It fluxes the glass and prevents scum formation of the glass melt during refining.
Sodium Silicate
CAS NO: 1344-09-8
Sodium silicate is commonly used in ceramics as a deflocculant in slip preparation by neutralising the charges of particles in the slip, allowing for more even suspension and thinning.
Spodumene
CAS NO: 1302-37-0
Spodumene is a silicate mineral often referred to as “lithium feldspar”. Its mineral form is characterised by hard needle-like grains of brilliant white color. It is used in ceramics as a source of lithium. In ceramics, lithium is a very powerful flux, especially when used in conjunction with potash and soda feldspars.
Strontium Carbonate
CAS NO: 1633-05-2
Strontium Carbonate is a very slightly soluble source of Strontium oxide used in ceramic glazes. It is a glaze flux which promotes more craze and scratch resistant glaze surfaces. Can sometimes replace Barium carbonate in glazes.
Strontium Carbonate is mainly used in the manufacture of glass substrate for display glass (LCD) as well as in many other applications of glass, e.g., used in optics, glassware, illumination, fibre glass, laboratory and pharmaceutical glass, etc.
Talc
CAS NO: 14807-96-6
Natural Talc is a core additive for all types of ceramics as it improves the vitrification process, allowing you to reduce firing temperatures and shorten firing cycles. It is a convenient and inexpensive source of silica and magnesium for both clay bodies and glazes and as a parting and release agent in various processes.
Tin Oxide
CAS NO: 18282-10-5
Tin oxide is greatly valued in glazes as both an opacifier and as a white colourant. It has long been used to produce a white, opaque and glossy glaze. As well as an opacifying agent, tin oxide also finds use as a colour stabiliser in some pigments and glazes.
Titanium Dioxide
CAS NO: 13463-67-7
Titanium dioxide is supplied in two main forms, Anatase and Rutile Grades. Although titanium is the strongest white pigment known for many uses, in ceramics the whiteness (and opacity) it imparts to glazes is due to its tendency to crystallise during cooling .It is used in glazes as an opacifier and It can be used as an additive to enliven (variegate, crystallise) the colour and texture of glazes (rutile works in a similar manner). In moderate amounts it encourages strong melts.
Ulexite
CAS NO: 92908-33-3
Ulexite is a natural source of boron, it is similar to colemanite mineral. These two minerals are the only practical sources of insoluble boron for glazes (other than frits).
Ulexite is one of the lowest melting non-lead ceramic minerals, it can form an ultra-gloss transparent glass.
Ulexite is a truly uncommon ceramic mineral in that it contains almost no alumina or silica, it is nothing but fluxing oxides. This mineral forms in unusual geologic circumstances and can be found in very few places in the world.
Vanadium Pentoxide
CAS NO: 788133-24-4
Vanadium pentoxide is used in pigment production for tiles and for UV protection in the glass industry. V2O5 is an odourless, yellowish to reddish-brown powder. Vanadium oxide is used for the production of turquoise pigments for tiles. Acts as a flux; reduces surface tension.
Wollastonite
CAS NO: 13983-17-0
In ceramics, wollastonite reduces warping and cracking during firing and increases strength. Being a calcium silicate mineral, wollastonite contributes calcium in ceramic glaze mixes. It reduces drying and firing shrinkage.
Xantham Gum
CAS NO:
Xanthan Gum is a high efficiency thickener, suspending agent and binder in ceramics applications.
Used as a hardener in glaze slurries.
Zirconium Silicate
CAS NO: 14940-68-2
Two end-uses are for enamels, and ceramic glazes. In enamels and glazes. It can be also present in some cements. Another use of zirconium silicate is as beads for milling and grinding. Zirconium silicate is used for manufacturing refractory materials for applications where resistance to corrosion by alkali materials is required. It is also used in production of some ceramics, enamels, and ceramic glazes. In enamels and glazes it serves as an opacifier.
Zirconium Dioxide
CAS NO: 1314-23-4
The main use of zirconium is in the production of hard ceramics, such as in dentistry, with other uses including as a protective coating on particles of titanium dioxide pigments, as a refractory material, in insulation, abrasives, and enamels.
Zinc Oxide
CAS NO: 1314-13-2
Zinc oxide in ceramics has the main role to reduce the melting temperature; reduce the energy and equipment requirements while improving the intensity of colour glazes. zinc oxide is widely used in brick and tile glaze. In the construction industry, zinc oxide is also used in ceramic wall and floor tile glaze.
In glass manufacturing it is used in heat-resistant glass, cookware, and specialty glass applications including photochromic lenses. Zinc oxide is also currently used in the fabrication of artistic glass, table and cooking ware or crystalline glass.