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Electric Kilns Now Described In Cubic Feet, Why?


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i guess i wasn't watching when this changed.  i cannot even guess what a description stated in cubic feet would look like.  a 7 cubic feet kiln?  lots of math images come to mind, all of them frightening. kilns have ranged in size from the old coffin shaped ones to rounds, decagons, cubes, etc. of various dimensions.  what counts is "can i get it through the door?"  and " will i need new shelves?"  who cares how many cubes will fit inside it?

 

ok, kiln guys, why the change?

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As far as I know kilns have always been in cubic feet-I'm guessing in you only mean electric ones and cubic feet are a standard so no matter what shape we all know what fits inside. 12x12 x12 is easy to think about as one cubic foot.

Now will it fit thru the door-lets see the standard door is 28 -30-32-36-48 inches wide so what door do you refer to? and as far a shelves many manufactures use all different sizes as thats been a crap shoot at best all these years-like Olympics have there own shelve sizes?? I never have figured shelve size in electrics as an easy thought process

As best I can tell its user figure it out

Maybe Howard can tell us some standards??

 

I work in a 12x 24 shelve world with cubic feet describing gas kilns-its about time electrics came into this  cubic world. I feel the more info the better.

I tend to think in cubic feet as far as space so this is welcome trend for me-like this week I'm loading my 35  cubic foot car kiln again just like last week

Thats 5 small 7 cubic foot electric loads I would have to fire to equal the same output of glazed ware-I'm tired thinking about all that bending over to get to the same place.

They call them coffin kilns for a reason.

( I know the real reason)

Mark

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They've always had the cubic feet measurement. They do it because there are many shapes of kilns, so you can't always compare dimensions. A typical 23" wide by 27" tall kiln (L&L E23T or Skutt 1027), the most popular size on the market, is roughly 7 cubic feet. The 28" wide by 27" tall kilns (L&L E28T or Skutt 1227) are 10 cubic feet. But there are square and oval top loaders, as well as front loaders, of the same cubic footage but different dimensions.

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ok, but again, why do we care?  if a sculptor wants a kiln to be tall enough for his work how does cubic measurement help?  this reminds me of the silly term realtors use to describe a lot as 1/17 of an acre.  well, is it a 2 foot wide lot that runs several hundred feet or a square or a triangle?

 

mark, first word in the title is electric because i read it over and realized i had not specified it so i added electric.   i know fuel burning kilns have always referred to cubic feet. i live in apple growing country and keep picturing apple crates stacked up.  try picturing them inside a catenary arch kiln.  too much math for me.

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We care because we have to have a reference point when picking a size. For those of us who make pots, the issue is not necessarily how tall it is, but the total volume gives us an idea of how many pots it will hold and how long it will take to fill. Most all of us have used a kiln somewhere before we bought our own. By knowing the cubic footage of the kiln we've used, we can determine if we need a bigger or smaller kiln for our own needs. Or if you're switching from a top loader to a front loader with different dimensions, again the cubic footage will tell us which kiln we need. I have a lot of customers who want a 7 cubic foot top loader (23" x 27"). It's a good volume for a home studio, but they have a hard time reaching into a kiln that deep. By knowing the cubic footage we can then say a 27" x 18" kiln has the same volume, but is shorter and therefore easier to load.

 

Why do we care how many square feet a house is? It's because they're not all the same shape, and we need to know if it will be big enough for our family.

 

It's just a point of reference for comparing sizes. It's not the only point of reference, but it's an important one. The cubic footage also determines how many watts are needed to heat it up, and therefore how many amps it'll need for the electrical hookup.

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It also helps for bragging rights.

 

If ya say "I spent the week loading and firing my 200 cubic foot anagama kiln." it just sounds better than "I spent the week  loading and firing the big kiln."

 

A friend of mine built a duplicate of my gas kiln, except he built his one brick taller so that he could always brag that his was bigger.

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i guess i wasn't watching when this changed.  i cannot even guess what a description stated in cubic feet would look like.  a 7 cubic feet kiln?  lots of math images come to mind, all of them frightening. kilns have ranged in size from the old coffin shaped ones to rounds, decagons, cubes, etc. of various dimensions.  what counts is "can i get it through the door?"  and " will i need new shelves?"  who cares how many cubes will fit inside it?

 

ok, kiln guys, why the change?

I use cubic feet to compare the firing speed of kilns. The lower the cubic feet and the higher the watts, the faster the kiln will fire. You can make a quick mental calculation from a list of kiln specifications.

 

Sincerely,

 

Arnold Howard

Paragon Industries, L.P., Mesquite, Texas USA

ahoward@paragonweb.com / www.paragonweb.com

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