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The Clay Hole University Ā· The Pottery Wheel

Rescuing a Bottom That Got Too ThinPrintable pottery guide

Nobody can see a thin floor. You can feel one and you can measure one, and those are the only two ways there have ever been. Four moments where you can still catch it, which rescues are real, which are wishful thinking, and where the honest limit sits.

$5.005 guides, 1 free
  • Skill level: Intermediate
  • 28 printable pages
  • 6 video picks
  • 8-question quiz + answer key

Flip through the free sample
  • Instant download
  • Prints on any home printer
  • The full lesson stays free online
The printable, at a glance

What is the printable edition of Rescuing a Bottom That Got Too Thin?

It is the free lesson of the same name, rebuilt as a workbook. It starts with the number a floor is measured against and the needle tool check that takes four seconds, including how to close the hole behind you. Then the uncomfortable part: everything about a spinning wheel is arranged to move clay outward and upward, and there is no move in throwing that reaches into a wall and pulls clay back down into a floor. What you have instead is three options and a fourth decision. After that come the four moments you find out, each with what you are looking at, why it happened, what to do in order, and what to do if it is already worse than that. Then ten habits so it stops happening. On paper it adds a floor log, a one-page rescue card, a printed quiz with a full answer key, and a glossary.

Prefer to read it online first? ā€œRescuing a Bottom That Got Too Thinā€ is free to read, and always will be.

  • 28printable pages, US Letter
  • 8quiz questions, with a full answer key
  • 6hand-picked videos, each with a QR code
  • 15glossary terms in plain language
  • 2workbook pages you fill in yourself
Why a printable, for this one

You are being asked to judge a distance you cannot see

Water in a fresh opening hides an eighth of an inch without any trouble. You press, you feel something push back, and what pushed back was water. That is the whole problem in one sentence, and it has nothing to do with how good you are.

The moment you find out is the moment that decides what is possible. Caught before your first pull it is barely a problem. Caught with the walls up it costs you the pot you had in mind. Caught at leather hard it is a whole second bottom. Caught by the trim tool it is often over.

So this guide is organized by moment rather than by technique, and it is honest at every one about where the line is. The fourth option is the reclaim bucket, and it is the right call more often than the other three put together. Ninety seconds. There is no prize for rescuing a mug.

Look inside

Real pages, for beside the wheel

These are actual pages from the guide, shown here with the sample watermark. The full guide has none.

  • Page 6 of the ā€œRescuing a Bottom That Got Too Thinā€ printable guide: the uncomfortable bit, shown with the sample watermark
    The uncomfortable bitWhy clay goes up easily and comes back down badly, the three options laid out side by side, and the fourth one that is a decision rather than a technique.
  • Page 8 of the ā€œRescuing a Bottom That Got Too Thinā€ printable guide: moment one, shown with the sample watermark
    Moment oneOpened, not pulled yet: the four things you would be looking at, including the gray shadow that is the bat showing through, and why widening is the thief.
  • Page 9 of the ā€œRescuing a Bottom That Got Too Thinā€ printable guide: what to do, in order, shown with the sample watermark
    What to do, in orderMeasure, stop widening, feed the corner in, compress and know why, measure again, and step seven, which is not a punishment.
  • Page 19 of the ā€œRescuing a Bottom That Got Too Thinā€ printable guide: the floor log, shown with the sample watermark
    The floor logTen rows, one pot each: the floor you aimed for, the floor the needle actually read, the moment you caught it, and what happened a week later.
Flip through the free sampleTen pages, free, no email required.
Paper beats the screen here

The decision comes before the rescue

By the time you need this you have wet hands, a pot on the wheel and about a minute to decide. Reading it afterwards is reading it too late.

  • The rescue card

    The four step check, the number, the four moments and the point at which the answer is the reclaim bucket, on one page.

  • A floor log

    Ten rows, about two evenings. The gap between the floor you aimed for and the floor the needle read closes faster than you expect.

  • The number, in full

    A quarter inch is the too thin line, not the target. With a foot ring coming, the floor wants the wall plus about another quarter inch, which is near seven sixteenths on a mug.

  • Ten habits, written down

    So the rescue pages stop being the ones you turn to. Sponge before you judge, open down before you open out, and measure while the answer is still useful.

How the guide is built

Built for the minute you find out

Every guide in the series is designed as a workbook first and a document second. For this one, that means:

  • A learning dashboard before page one

    What you will learn, what you need, the traps, and what success looks like.

  • Organized by moment, not by technique

    Four moments, each with checkboxes for what you are looking at, why it happened, what to do in order, and where the line is.

  • Honest about what is not possible

    There is no move in throwing that pulls clay out of a wall and back down into a floor. The guide says so on its second page instead of selling you one.

  • A whole second bottom, step by step

    Matched stiffness, scored and slipped, pressed on from the centre outward, then dried slowly under loose plastic, because a join between clay at two different moisture levels fails while it dries.

  • The numbers reconciled

    The quarter inch is the too thin line. The target with a foot ring coming is the wall plus about another quarter, and the guide carries that on the card so a reader planning a foot is not a quarter inch short.

  • Checked, and corrected where it needed it

    A crack across a floor is put on one part drying ahead of another, a failed patch on trapped moisture rather than trapped air, and the only power tool in the guide now comes with a caution about where your other hand goes.

Why the University is free

The lesson is free. It always will be.

All of the teaching in this guide comes from the free ā€œRescuing a Bottom That Got Too Thinā€ lesson at The Clay Hole University. No paywall, no sign-up, no catch.

The people you watch on the internet do not have a secret move for this either, and if you have been quietly assuming you just have not learned it yet, you can stop. You are not bad at pottery. You are being asked to judge a distance you cannot see, and knowing that should not cost anybody a thing, so the lesson stays free.

The University is free and stays free. The guides are the version rebuilt for paper with an unreasonable amount of care, and buying one keeps the free side going.

Thank you. Genuinely.

Dan Pearce, founder of The Clay Hole
Collect them

Build a little pottery library

Every guide carries a permanent number. This one is 05.13, the thirteenth guide in The Pottery Wheel. The series is designed to live together in a binder, section by section, so the craft ends up on your shelf in the order you learn it.

Put any five printable guides in your cart and the cheapest one is on us. Put in nine and the two cheapest are on us. It happens automatically at checkout, no code to remember.

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Where this leads

From the rescue back to the floor you never have to rescue

These lessons pick up where this one leaves off. Each one is free to read now.

Good questions

Before you buy

Is this different from the free lesson?
The teaching is the same, and the free lesson is complete. The printable adds a floor log, a one-page rescue card, a printed quiz with an answer key, and a glossary.
Can a thin bottom really be saved?
Sometimes, and the guide is careful about which times. Before your first pull you can genuinely feed clay back in from the corner. With the walls up you can push the wall back down and throw the pot again from a shorter, fatter start. At leather hard you can give it a whole second bottom. At the trimming stage the answer is often no, and the guide says so rather than selling you a rescue that does not work.
How thick should a floor be?
A quarter inch is the line below which you are in trouble, not the number to aim at. If you are going to trim a foot ring, the floor wants the thickness of the wall plus about another quarter inch, which lands near seven sixteenths on a mug, because the ring is cut out of that floor. A small flat dish you will never trim is fine at three sixteenths.
Does compressing the floor add thickness?
No, and blurring those two jobs is one of the most common mix ups in throwing. Compression levels the floor and drives the standing water off it, which is the part that keeps the floor from cracking. It does not put clay back. Only the corner, the wall or new clay can do that.
Why did my patched pot crack in the bisque?
Usually moisture rather than air. A join between clay at two different moisture levels pulls apart while it dries, and a patch pressed from the edges inward can seal a damp pocket in the middle. Match the stiffness, press from the centre outward, and dry it slowly under loose plastic.
I trimmed straight through the bottom. Now what?
Stop before you make it bigger, which is the instinct. The guide walks the three cases: no hole means leave it flat, flexing means add a foot, and a hole means patch both sides. It is also plain that a hole bigger than a coin with crumbly clay round it is the pot telling you it is finished.
How do I know how thick my floor is without cutting the pot in half?
A needle tool, four steps, four seconds. Push it straight down until it stops on the wheel head, pinch where it leaves the clay, pull it out and look at the gap. The guide also shows how to close the hole behind you, and suggests a wrap of tape a quarter inch up from the point so you can read it at a glance.
Is this too advanced for me?
It is written for anyone who can center, open and pull a basic wall. Nothing in it is harder than throwing. The hard part is deciding honestly which of the four moments you are in.
I am not at The Clay Hole. Is it still useful?
Yes. Wet clay behaves the same wherever you throw. Where a number is our own teaching rather than a published figure, the guide says so and dates it.
Do I need a fancy printer?
No. It is designed for an ordinary home or office printer on regular US Letter paper, with nothing important near the edges, so normal printer margins cut nothing off.
Can I print it in black and white?
Yes. Nothing depends on color, and we check that every QR code still scans from a soft grayscale home print.
Can I use it on an iPad or laptop instead?
Yes. Every QR code in the guide is also a tappable link, so on a screen you just tap instead of scanning.
How do I get it after I buy?
Right after checkout you get a download link by email and on your order confirmation page. Each link works up to seven times.
What if the guide gets updated?
Every edition carries a version number. When we correct or improve a guide, everyone who bought it gets an email with the new edition at no charge.
Can I share it with my class or studio?
Please donā€™t. It is licensed for your own personal use. Anyone can read the full lesson free online, and the printable is here if they want their own copy.

Sponge it dry. Then measure. Then decide.

Print it, keep the rescue card propped beside the wheel, and write down the next ten floors.

Get the printable · $5.00

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