Bill Kielb

Fair enough, just have never found a way or am aware of a way to calculate whether a glaze will craze or not, without testing.

Stroke and coat is a low fire glaze that matures at 04/05 and can be fired to cone 5 I believe, but ……. Mayco provides samples of expected color change at the higher temperature as well. So really the effect of combining two glazes is not always predictable or shall we say usually requires testing to figure out if the combination is workable. Glazes craze when the rate of expansion / contraction of the glaze differs significantly from the clay. Testing is the only reasonable way to know, it cannot be calculated or predicted.

I think as Neil mentioned above mark the reinforcing ribs on the side and top of the wheel head and take your best batt centered exactly on the wheel and positioned with the pin holes centered between the support ribs as a template and precisely mark your holes. From there center punch and drill. You should be able to center the batt very accurately by observing the edge of the wheel and edge of the batt while slowly rotating the wheel. So yes I would use the batt as a template.

I would agree! I even think you could make it out of rigid foam fairly easily sturdy enough to make a few, whatever depth you like just cut a full opening for the pool, hot glue a thin sheet of foam from shallow to the break in the deep end and slump away, including the side skirt. Ombré paint the pool, add David’s design and maybe airbrush in some waves, carve some deck texture ……. Just thinking …….

Manual here: https://www.axner.com/pdf/laguna/Pacifica_Manual_2015.pdf Page 6 has pedal adjustments and instructions ought to be on side of pedal. Also quick call to Laguna might be in order if the pedal adjustments turn out to be tension only. I would Definitely check if something is keeping it from returning fully to its minimum position like a bit of dried clay etc….

One thought that comes to mind is make a slump mold and use your normal thickness clay. A pool with skirted sides if you will.

My observation, it has no effect or it’s s minor I have never noticed. We have done thousands of underglazed pieces btw. I can say it changes how glaze is applied in that the underglazed areas are less porous, even when applied on greenware but not as much as when applied on bisque and re bisqued. I almost always spray my glazes though so relatively easy to air dry and spray the next coat.

As Kelly mentioned if this is completely closed and sealed definitely include a pinhole. I assume that means clay will run continuously under the bottom of this so it can also drag on the shelf with lots of friction when fired. You may want to add grog or a bit of alumina under it when firing to lessen the drag or friction on the shelf so it can shrink freely and evenly as it fires to prevent it from cracking as it shrinks. A salt shaker or even sprinkling type spreading is usually just fine.

Sorry, just saw this. Hard to tell without a bit more of a step back context photo but the fact it works and matches the diagram means you have it right. I am curious why some of the the insulators don’t push in flush though. No need to force them though if they are just too long, they only need to keep the bare element wire from touching any metal so they don’t have to be flush. Nice work! BTW your kiln should match the top drawing, the bottom drawing is for a three phase kiln. Both drawings have identical element configurations though.

I was wrong, those ring elements are wired in parallel. Sorry, too much in a rush! The relay has to work for just one of those elements to work. Likely bad connection or jumper between the two elements. Look very closely at the wiring or snap a few pictures of the connections as well as the jumper wires and post. Likely simple fix

You should be able to find a broken one as you remove them; however if they are old enough it’s going to be hard to tell as they will easily break into pieces as you try and remove them. Just an add, try and be sure all nice “very tight” connections to the elements.

Just a question, do you fire with witness cones? I ask because the firing schedule you use is a bit unique and does not really follow the Orton cone methodology that generally gets you to a certain cone. It’s hard to know what these were fired to looking at your schedule. A normal maturing ramp for the last 200f of firing would be 108 degrees per hour. Yours may have been double or triple this speed which could mean you fired more like 07. It’s hard to know. I also mention it because you are pondering firing to 04, so maybe learning how Orton cones predictably drop will be something you explore and prove helpful. So do you use witness cones and what cone was this fired to?

Looks like the 1027 has three relays, each control one ring which has two elements in series. So you could have a bad element in the top ring or bad relay that powers it. Easy to test the elements with an ohm meter or multimeter to tell if they are open as well as to get an idea of how worn they are. Elements generally only last 100-150 firings before they degrade enough to where the kiln will not finish a cone 6 firing. If an elements resistance grows to more than about 10% of its original resistance then it’s time to replace. At this point ALL elements are replaced as they wear together. since your cone dropped, it did reach that amount of heat work. The error I believe reflects the kilns inability to climb fast enough. Here is one of several videos on checking element resistance https://youtu.be/67L6xBiJHz0 Here is your wiring diagram, I believe: https://skutt.com/images/KM1227-3-_1027-1PH-and-3PH.pdf Don't forget shut off the power to the kiln, test safely

Thanks! Just trying to understand the potential element life though. Hard to quantify or anticipate. For some context https://youtu.be/AvdPwKuj6rM

A common way to get lava glazes is with silicon carbide. Here is a sample https://glazy.org/recipes/76600. If this is your intention you may want to search Glazy.org for ideas / formulations.

Definitely call Bartlett but it appears the controller is configured for 3 zones. Since you only have one zone the others show as infinite to the controller and it auto detects and solves as if two of the thermocouples it’s expecting to be there have failed. Check how many it’s programmed for, confirm it is three and call Bartlett, they will let you know how to change back to one zone. If you are in a super hurry, Bartlett has a technical manual online that tells you how to access a hidden menu and set this back to single zone. All of this is assuming The above proves to be true of course.

I heard they are fully fusion powered now.

I think on planet Zircon they have been working at cone 20.

I would love to know your experience with the longevity. Something that it should do but really hard to speculate and quantify.

I love everything above. For the most part I have heard many of the same reasons / feedback and also speculate boron helped simplify the melt issue. I am a cone six proponent for sure just on energy use alone. As far as reduction, I think it’s a great learned skill and an artistic tool. The number six though (cone 6) - seems pleasantly odd maybe without one central reason ……… but it happened.

Stand-off mounts an old tried and true solution, which way is the fan airflow? Nice tight installation!

Perhaps. Seems to make a good case for cone 5 though. ….. and It’s the last cone that follows the .5/5 relationship. Cone 4 is .5Al / 4Si. I have never really found a reason though, lots of speculation. Cone 10 on the other hand does make sense as the raw materials tend to lead you there. Probably far different on planet Zircon.

Very probable and definitely included in the popular speculation. Some Bristol glazes melt as low as cone 2 though. 70’s energy crunch? Reduced academic budgets ……… why 6 and not five though? Weird! Never have found a definitive answer.

Hmm, No worries, if the parallel is unclear my only thought is it is what the geology has lent itself to over many years. Cone six and lesser glazes have generally been cone 10 glazes made to melt earlier. Maybe the better question is how did we end up with cone six? Never found a solid reason for that for sure.

Yes, Not meant to be complicated or elaborate I think it’s a reminder that cone ten is a thing because of our geology, we often do special things to make cone ten glazes melt at cone six or less.