oldlady

love my L&L (and bob battey from 2002) but wish i had known about the kiln that is a little wider and less deep.    now that i cannot deny that i am a senior citizen, i find lifting the round shelves i have been using for over 20 years is getting to be too hard to do.   at 5ft5 inches, reaching the very bottom requires my standing on a 4 inch high stool.
many are so warped they could be used as pasta bowls.
they are the thick, heavy kind,   wish i had the $$$ for advancers.

just remember that the "chemicals" are ground rocks of differing kinds.   rocks are found in even hotter places than NC.

just remember that the "chemicals" are ground rocks of differing kinds.   rocks are found in even hotter places than NC.

The sharing that goes on here is even more valuable than I had realized.  I am the lucky pottery who met up with Mark in St. Louis a week ago.  I knew I had absorbed a lot of his tricks of the trade from this site, but I did not fully realize how much.  As we talked for an hour or two in my booth, almost every aspect of my pottery has some mark of his influence.  From the way I wax my pots to the design of my display shelves - Mark's influence and generosity are  everywhere.  Helpful potters like Mark and Neil E. deserve a lot more credit than they get. 

helena, i noticed that you referred to several cones beginning with zero.  are you working with stoneware or porcelain?    do you have access to a chart that tells you the temperature associated with those cone numbers?   i ask because so many people have been confused and think a higher number following the zero is hotter than the lower numbers.  there are some earthenware clays that are bisqued to 06 and fired to 06 but stoneware finishes much hotter because of its higher density.
the numbers read from  high (cool)  numbers upward to zero and single digits upward toward very high (hot).   my stoneware is mature at cone 6 and i bisque at cone 04 to burn out impurities, the temps are approximately 2240 for cone 6 and about 1850 for bisque 04.   (books out in the studio with accurate #s.)

just FYI, slip made from the same clay as the body of the pieces you make works very well while the piece is still damp from forming.   clay slip soaks into the clay body then but it cannot do that once the piece has dried.
if you read the labels you will find that stroke & coat is a glaze, not an underglaze.
 

karo, hope the wheel is still available for you to buy.   looks are only important to a fashion model.

Just to clarify the options are to spray on some more glaze and refire to cone 5 or cone 6? Risks are applying too much glaze? 
I don't know how that clear fires at cone 5. It would probably be okay but I'm not certain of this. Perhaps placing it in a cool spot in your kiln and do your usual cone 6?
Glad that high calcium clear is working well for you!

karo, hope the wheel is still available for you to buy.   looks are only important to a fashion model.

as i get older, i wish i had a "wheelie bin".    wanna trade for my circular dragitouttothestreet one?

karo, hope the wheel is still available for you to buy.   looks are only important to a fashion model.

karo, hope the wheel is still available for you to buy.   looks are only important to a fashion model.

the word "dust" is misleading.   ordinary household dust is bad enough but pottery making involves many chemicals, well, minerals, that are toxic to the lungs.  when in the powder state, silica is the main culprit and handling it carefully while wearing a respirator provides the safest way to use it in a home studio. 
keep a damp sponge near any handbuilding area and use it all the time.  no work surface should be covered in dry clay.   and tossing tons of water at the piece  while working at the wheel is just silly.  only your hands need enough  water to control the clay.  cleanup is so simple if you do not make a mess in the first place. 
sloppy working conditions are not necessary in any studio.  keep it as clean as you would like your lungs to be when you die.

did a  big birdbath in the 70s without glaze.  molded the shape on a piece of fabric stretched over a large, 22 or so inches diameter trash can and held in place with several rubber bungee cords.   rolled out a slab 3/8 to 1/2 inch thick and draped it into the fabric while keeping an eye on the bungee cords and avoiding their slipping down the can.  
came out great, plain 112 plus 112 with lots of red iron oxide to make fake wood supports running through the bowl so smaller birds could use them while drinking.  adjusting the cords allowed the bowl to be shallow enough, 2 to 3  inches, for birds to bathe safely.  glaze is too slippery so i did not use it.  threw a separate  large diameter, flared base about 9 inches tall so the ratio of support was enough to prevent tipping over.
sadly, i was not home when the first frost was predicted.  calling my son to ask him to take it inside did not work.  teenager.

hot wax on the bottom when finishing the work will keep the glaze from staying on the bottom while you glaze it.  easy to do then, no handling with dry glaze being knocked or rubbed off.
have you considered spraying the glaze so you can reach the whole thing without touching the glaze at all?
sprayed glaze dries so quickly i hardly have time to put the spray gun on its hook before the piece can be handled safely.

what are you referring to when you say "handle"?

hot wax on the bottom when finishing the work will keep the glaze from staying on the bottom while you glaze it.  easy to do then, no handling with dry glaze being knocked or rubbed off.
have you considered spraying the glaze so you can reach the whole thing without touching the glaze at all?
sprayed glaze dries so quickly i hardly have time to put the spray gun on its hook before the piece can be handled safely.

the word "dust" is misleading.   ordinary household dust is bad enough but pottery making involves many chemicals, well, minerals, that are toxic to the lungs.  when in the powder state, silica is the main culprit and handling it carefully while wearing a respirator provides the safest way to use it in a home studio. 
keep a damp sponge near any handbuilding area and use it all the time.  no work surface should be covered in dry clay.   and tossing tons of water at the piece  while working at the wheel is just silly.  only your hands need enough  water to control the clay.  cleanup is so simple if you do not make a mess in the first place. 
sloppy working conditions are not necessary in any studio.  keep it as clean as you would like your lungs to be when you die.

did a  big birdbath in the 70s without glaze.  molded the shape on a piece of fabric stretched over a large, 22 or so inches diameter trash can and held in place with several rubber bungee cords.   rolled out a slab 3/8 to 1/2 inch thick and draped it into the fabric while keeping an eye on the bungee cords and avoiding their slipping down the can.  
came out great, plain 112 plus 112 with lots of red iron oxide to make fake wood supports running through the bowl so smaller birds could use them while drinking.  adjusting the cords allowed the bowl to be shallow enough, 2 to 3  inches, for birds to bathe safely.  glaze is too slippery so i did not use it.  threw a separate  large diameter, flared base about 9 inches tall so the ratio of support was enough to prevent tipping over.
sadly, i was not home when the first frost was predicted.  calling my son to ask him to take it inside did not work.  teenager.

your kiln manufacturer has a long history of getting the best out of it's kilns and providing simple controls for users.    why do you think your program is necessary and better than theirs?  and what is special about cone 09?   yours is the first post to mention it in all the years i have read almost every post.   are you glazing some special way that requires your bisque  so soft?  
once you fix the loading as suggested, just try what Neil, who is a kiln specialist and dealer, suggests. 

i have not read this entire post but would like the original poster to consider spraying glaze to avoid disturbing the underglaze.
a very simple siphon sprayer costs about $30 and is branded EZsprayer.  it is very fast and a kiln load, big kiln, can be done in an hour or so depending on how many colors you use.
just a thought.

i have not read this entire post but would like the original poster to consider spraying glaze to avoid disturbing the underglaze.
a very simple siphon sprayer costs about $30 and is branded EZsprayer.  it is very fast and a kiln load, big kiln, can be done in an hour or so depending on how many colors you use.
just a thought.

I am glad you are getting better,  I know that eight weeks is a long break for you.   I finished my radiation therapy on my skin cancer a month ago and it has finally healed.   I need to go buy a big straw hat for the summer.   Don't overdo it.      Denice

nice, lee.    i agree with bam.   the softer edges of your work seem to make them more accessable to the general public.  smooth a few more of those sharp corners so they do not look as though they broke by accident.
denice is right, it is still too cold.   my studio is heated by an oil boiler and 2 radiators, 1 is five feet long.  i turned the heat up from the usual 40 today and plan to do so tomorrow as well.  i have a choice of heating the house to 68 and turning it down at night to 61.  tomorrow the studio will go to 68 and the house can stay at 61.  with oil over $5 a  gallon, i am frugal.
today i made another pattern block using flowers from a succulent that grows inside the very front of the house with eastern sun.  it is just starting the blooming season with coral colored bell shapes dangling above a huge plant.   the final result will be a piece pressed into the pattern block so the flowers are in relief when a new piece of clay is formed into a butter dish, a small bowl or plate, soap dish, candy dish or whatever size tray i want.   look at christie knox's fabulous work.
last year the favorite pattern was actually 3 or 4 different flowers, snowdrops, hellebore at 3 different stages, dogwood and honeysuckle, my personal favorite.  these pieces sell very easily and are not so expensive that everybody can afford something nice to look at and use every day.  pretty is important enough to let their wallets hang open matching the smile as they buy.
good luck with this change!  the one partially shown on the left center looks like you could use it as a great  pattern block just as it is.  fire to bisque, roll clay into it but put some foam rubber under the whole thing before you roll it!
 

after more than 20 years i have finally tossed a very few of the duron bats made in the 1990s.  never wired off a piece on duron bats.  using a 4x8 sheet gave me tons of 5x5 bats to fit inside one that is about a 12 inch circle.